Defence expenditure

Defence expenditure is not mentioned in Nicholas Crafts comprehensive analysis in his Britain s Relative Economic Performance 1870-1999 (London Institute of Economic Affairs, 2002), but may have been a contributory factor to some of the reasons that he does give cartelisation and poor productivity in firms that were kept going instead of being allowed to fail (defence departments tried to keep contractors going, often peddling out small orders, so that these firms would be available in war) and poor productivity in nationalised industries (which include the royal dockyards and royal ordnance factories, and one major aircraft firm. Short Brothers, taken over in 1943, and kept going on account of the employment it offered in Northern Ireland long after it would have otherwise been closed down). 

This chapter considers the following questions. Was Britain a technological leader in naval armaments Did she lag behind other European nations as regards her army and her attitude to the possibilities of aircraft What constraints were there on defence expenditure Did the British government have a clear idea of what strategy would be pursued in a European war, and if not, why not ... 

Financial year Total defence expenditure GCm) Percentage of GDP adjusted to financial year... 

Sources Defence expenditure in future years summary of forecasts submitted by the defence departments , 22 Oct. 1937, CAB 24/272, TNA. 

Notwithstanding these caveats, table 3.2 shows clear trends. Defence expenditure stabilised after 1923, even rising in some years and, measured as a percentage of GDP, was not much lower between 1923/4 and 1927/8 than between 1906/7 and 1913/14 (see table 1.1). Prom 1928/9 to 1932/3 there was a clear dovraward trend, with no significant recovery until 1935/6, and the percentage figures were stable only because of the... 

Defence expenditure in future years interim report by the Minister for Co-ordination of Defence , CP 316(37), 15 Dec. 1937, GAB 24/273, paras. 7-10. These paragraphs, which the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir John Simon, called a classic statement of the elements that make up our strength for national defence (Cabinet conclusions, 16 Feb. 1938, CAB 23/92, TNA) are printed in Gibbs, Grand Strategy vol. I, pp. 283. Feiling, Neville Chamberlain, p. 292. 

Howard, Continental Commitment p. 100 Peden, Burden of imperial defence . Defence expenditure in future years , CP 316 (37), GAB 24/273, paras. 98—9, TNA. Ibid., paras. 80-99. 

Manpower in the armed forces and defence expenditure as a proportion of GDP were reduced until 1950 (see tables 5.2 and 5.3). The fears provoked by the outbreak of the Korean War reversed these trends. On 26 July 1950 the United States asked NATO governments what additional expenditure they intended to carry out on their own, and how... 

Table 5.6. Defence expenditure of leading NATO countries as a percentage of GNP at factor cost, 1949-55...

In the summer of 1952 a revised version of the Global Strategy paper was taken by Slessor to the United States, where General Bradley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, criticised what he saw as its likely deleterious effects on attempts to build up NATO s conventional forces. Nevertheless, from January 1953 the new Eisenhower administration, faced with pressures from rising defence expenditure on the... 

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