Today’s broadcast news is led by David Cameron, who will set out a five-year strategy to combat Islamic extremism in Birminghamtoday, saying it is the ‘struggle of our generation’.In print, The Daily Telegraph today leads on Lord Richards’ comments on the BBC Andrew Marr show yesterday.
ISIL
The Daily Telegraph reports comments made on Andrew Marr yesterday by former Chief of the Defence Staff, Lord Richards, who said the coalition must accept that eventually there will have to be boots on the ground. The piece - which references the Defence Secretary’s likely appearance in the House today to explain the activity of embedded UK pilots conducting strikes in Syria – carries Lord Richards’ criticism of the current strategy. Lord Richards said: “The current strategy won’t work in the time I think we’ve got available. The current strategy is essentially one of equipping and training others to do the hard stuff for us. I think that could work, but the scale of effort going into it is woefully insufficient.” He added: “If we really want to get rid of them… we need to effectively get on a war footing.”
The Sun and Daily Mail also report that Lord Richards said he ‘felt in his bones’ that Britain and her allies would eventually have to send troops. Leaders in the Daily Mirror and Daily Mail resist Lord Richards comments; the Daily Express suggests it may be unavoidable.
The Times and Guardian focus on political criticism of the policy against ISIL and Islamic extremism, with the Times leading again on the Defence Secretary’s likely appearance today in parliament to defend UK pilots conducting strikes without parliamentary approval. Vernon Coaker said that opposition MPs did not need informing about every embed but that an exception should have been made for Syria, and “the sensitivities of the situation should have been taken into account.” Julian Lewis told Radio 4’s The World This Weekend that a vote would depend on whether the Prime Minister, “…instead of making this up on the hoof – as has been the case, I’m afraid, up till now – presents parliament with an integrated strategy, approved jointly by the heads of the Armed Forces, as something that could produce a decisive result.”
RAF Regiment
The Daily Telegraph follows the Sunday Times piece, that British specialists including members of the RAF Regiment are training foreign governments in how to prevent terrorists shooting down airliners with shoulder-launched missiles looted from Colonel Gaddafi’s stockpiles. Thousands were seized by militias as they captured Government bases during the civil war in 2011.
A government spokesperson said:
We have a longstanding policy of advising other governments on security matters.
Image of the day
The Vulcan, XH558, is the last airworthy example of the UK's famous V-Force fleet and the delta-winged aircraft will not take to the skies again after 2015. To salute the remarkable former RAF bomber, the Red Arrows performed a flypast with the Vulcan in front of tens of thousands of people at the Royal International Air Tattoo, at RAF Fairford.
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