British Defense Subsidizes and Assists the U.S. Alliance System
The British armed forces and defense industry take a knowingly subsidiary role to the U.S., strengthening its alliances across Europe. This however locks the UK out of great power status.
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The United Kingdom is one of the world’s foremost military powers. The British military operates one of the world’s few nuclear arsenals capable of delivering nuclear bombs to any location on the planet through submarines equipped with intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). The Royal Navy is one of the few navies to maintain large aircraft carriers capable of carrying fixed-wing aircraft across oceans. Although the British Empire no longer exists, British troops continue to be present at over 140 overseas bases and facilities on all seven continents, including Antarctica. British defense contractors maintain key traditions of knowledge in strategic and difficult-to-replicate technologies including small nuclear reactors, solid rocket motors, laser detection systems, and high-performance aircraft engines. The United Kingdom however lacks a dynamic and autonomous foreign policy, with the result that its military and defense-industrial capacity is directed towards reflexively supporting the foreign policy and global alliance system of the United States establishment, especially in Europe.