The Royal Navy ` Would Struggle To Fight A War'

That's exactly what a leaked report from Britain's Ministry of Defense had to say.

The report was commissioned by Britain's Defense Secretary, Des Brown as ammunition to counter criticism in the media and from Britain's Conservative opposition...but ended up coming to a very different conclusion than Brown expected.

According to the report, after years of cuts in spending by Labour, the British Navy has an "under-resourced" fleet composed of "aging and operationally defective ships", the Navy would have problems even repeating its role in the Iraq war and is now "far more vulnerable to unexpected shocks".

The leaked report continues: "A combination of age and reduced spending on maintenance has resulted in today's ships carrying a far higher number of operational defects, which directly erode operational capacity."

"The current material state of the fleet is not good; the Royal Navy would be challenged to mount a medium-scale operation in accordance with current policy against a technologically capable adversary."

The report also refers to the British Navy as "thinly stretched", says its fighting capability is being "eroded" and the fleet's ability to influence events at the strategic level is "under threat".

Of course, the point man on this is none other than the present British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown...who as Chancellor of the Exchequer under Tony Blair was the one who controlled the fleet's funding.

The report was created by one of the UK's most prominent sailors, Rear-Admiral Alan Massey, CBE, the assistant chief of the naval staff.

To show how badly the British navy has eroded, the report cites the following:

• The entire naval fleet has been reduced from a fleet of 136 in 1987 to only 75 ship today, a reduction of around 44%.
  

• The navy's destroyers and frigates have been cut by over half, from 54 ships to a mere 25, and those ships have an average age of 17 years. Submarines have fallen by 66%, from 38 to 13 and the navy's manpower has been cut from 66,500 in 1987 to a mere 38,860, a reduction of around 44%.

• Britain's home fleet, its first line of defense had 35 ships operating in the UK's home waters in 1987...in 2007, there are only 10.

The report has one positive bit, when it comments on Britain's building program for new aircraft carriers and what it calls joint combat aircraft. It doesn't mention, however, how these ships are going to be protected without sufficient destroyer and submarine cover.

Of course, the Royal Navy's not the only casualty of Labour's defence cuts. Just two weeks ago, British army chief General Sir Richard Dannatt complained to the British government that it was "mortgaging" the goodwill of the Army, referring to the huge cuts in spending and in personnel forced on it by the Labour government.

This, by the way, is why Britain has to crawl to repulsive regimes when its citizens or sailors are kidnapped or abused.

Cousins, you had better pray for peace...it certainly doesn't seem like you're prepared to do much to be able to defend yourselves.