LONDON, June 16 (UPI) -- Britain will replace its armed forces chief and the top official at the defense ministry, a decision indicating that changes are in stock for one of Europe's biggest armed forces.
London said Air Chief Marshal Jock Stirrup, the head of the military, and Bill Jeffrey, a permanent undersecretary at the British Defense Ministry, would leave their posts several months earlier than expected.
"Both the chief of defense staff and the permanent undersecretary are here longer than they needed to be," Defense Secretary Liam Fox told The Sunday Times of London.
They were scheduled to serve until April 2011 but will now quit this fall, when Britain is due to publish a major defense review, Fox said.
In an interview with the BBC, Fox denied that Stirrup was let go due to allegations he hadn't done enough to support the 9,500 British troops in Afghanistan.
"I really don't think that whatever mistakes have been made in the past in Afghanistan or anywhere else that the blame should land anywhere else but firmly on the desks of the politicians," he said.
Britain's freshly elected Prime Minister David Cameron this week returned from a trip to the conflict-ridden country. British troops are stationed mainly in the south, where they are engaged in fierce firefights with the Taliban.
Cameron during his trip said that "nobody wants British troops to be in Afghanistan a moment longer than is necessary."
Afghanistan has been a costly war for Britain, which is due to publish a major strategic defense review this fall. Britain's last strategic defense review was done in 1998, years before the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and the wars in Iraq and in Afghanistan.
Britain's new government is divided on military spending but it's almost certain that the defense review will propose budget cuts and the review of individual military purchases.
Critics have accused the armed forces of procuring heavy and expensive weaponry they don't need anymore. Rather, British troops should become more mobile and sleek, waving goodbye to Cold War thinking and weapons systems, they say.
Much like in other countries in Europe, Britain's national budget is under severe pressure because of the financial crisis. One question is which of its large defense purchasing programs -- including orders for two carriers, dozens of highly modern stealth fighter jets and the delayed and costly A400M military freighter -- will have to undergo a cost-cutting review.
Germany recently announced it might cut down its forces by up to 100,000 soldiers, on top of procurement cuts amounting to more than $1 billion.
On that note it's quite astonishing that Fox, promising that all aspects would be open for discussion, ruled out from consideration Britain's nuclear deterrent, a submarine-launched missile system called Trident.
The renewal of Trident was agreed in 2007 and is due by 2024. Yet in light of constrained budgets, the $32 billion program was being hotly debated. While the Conservatives in their campaign supported the full renewal of Trident, the Liberal Democrats said they want a cheaper way to defend Britain. Critics of the system argue it is a remnant of the Cold War, adding that decision to renew it was rushed through Parliament to help BAE Systems, the British company that builds the submarines.
