RUSI Land Warfare Conference 2021

The British Government published its Integrated Security, Defence and Foreign Policy Review in March 2021, setting out its ambition for the UK’s role in the world over the next decade. Given the announcements around personnel and equipment contained in the IR, the Army is now working to plot a path into the future. But what does the Army need to do to ensure that it is prepared for any immediate conflict, and what does the Army need to be looking at to ensure it retains an asymmetric advantage?

Given the context of renewed great power competition and enduring disorder, the British Army is seeking to persistently operate by, with and through partners and allies while constraining adversaries, to deter escalation to warfighting. The UK needs to field forces that can counter hostile actors continuously and globally whenever they, or their proxies, threaten British interests, yet still retain the ability to transition to fully integrated coalition warfighting at short notice.

There is a broad consensus among militaries that advantage in the future operating environment will be gained by states that have undergone a digital transformation enabling them to integrate effects and capabilities. If war breaks out, states will need to leverage emerging technologies and prioritise speed, range and precision-strike. As the complexity of military systems increases, allies will need to work collaboratively to remain at the cutting edge of manned-unmanned teaming and artificial intelligence. There is a critical need for armies to be able to integrate their capabilities and people to be more than the sum of their parts, and to integrate with partners, allies and industry.

RUSI Land Warfare Conference 2021 will allow partners and allies to explain how they are modernising their forces, calibrating their force posture, and pursuing technological advantage. This will enable us to consider how we can balance maximising the effectiveness of the next generation of combat systems with being able to interoperate.