Remote Warfare Podcast

  The Remote Warfare Programme's Liam Walpole and Megan Karlshoej-Pedersen sit down with Dr. Larry Lewis to discuss working with strategic military partners and civilian casualties. Drawing upon his experience of working with the Obama Administration on partner assistance in Afghanistan, Iraq and Yemen, Dr. Lewis highlights how this approach can mitigate civilian harm and the lessons that the UK can draw from these cases. 

  With the surprise announcement of a potential US withdrawal from Syria just before Christmas, the international military presence in the country is back in the spotlight. This represents a good moment to revisit a piece written by the Remote Warfare Programme in the aftermath of 2018’s other big Syria news story, Theresa May’s decision to respond to the use of chemical weapons by the Assad regime with a limited strike alongside the French and Americans.  May's decision reignited an old topic of debate: when is it appropriate for a British Prime Minister to authorise the use of military force without advanced parliamentary approval?  As the House of Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee begins its inquiry based, in part, on this very question, the Remote Warfare Programme team recently sat down to discuss the importance of the 2013 parliamentary defeat of David Cameron’s policy of intervention in Syria and its legacy.

  In December 2018, the Secretary of State for Defence, Gavin Williamson, released the UK Ministry of Defence’s (MoD) long-awaited Modernising Defence Programme (MDP) review. In just 28 pages, the document examines the evolving nature of the threats facing the UK since the publication of the 2015 SDSR and addresses budgetary problems in the MoD's equipment programmes.  While encouraging, the report appears to reinforce the government’s shifting strategic focus towards countering state-based threats, particularly Russia, despite the fact that remote warfare is likely to dominate British military engagement in the foreseeable future. Given that the MDP process was put in place as a means to resolve spending problems, this is a problematic oversight. Presented by Abigail Watson, the Remote Warfare Programme's (RWP) Senior Research Officer, the RWP team critically discuss the MDP.