BRITAIN now has its most militaristic government since the 1980s.

Despite yesterday’s headlines about reductions in troop numbers, the military machine is not being cut nor its power reduced. The reverse is true. 

Along with the cut to army numbers — from about 80,000 regulars to 70,000 — comes the multibillion-pound funding of several new “defence” schemes, including a new submarine project and a fleet of A400M aircraft. 

A new special-forces unit, called the Special Operations Brigade, is to be launched at a cost of £120 million. 

This comes only days after Boris Johnson declared he would lift the cap on the number of nuclear warheads owned by the Westminster government by 44 per cent. 

Johnson has already promised an increase in UK military spending of £24 billion over four years, the largest percentage increase since the Korean war — but he can’t “afford” a decent pay rise for nurses. 

Meanwhile the Overseas Operations Bill puts military leaders beyond the law and makes prosecutions of UK forces personnel for war crimes even less likely than they already. And the Police Bill aims to restrict our protests against any of this. 

Last weekend, “Defence” Secretary Ben Wallace wrote in the Sunday Telegraph about the threats facing Britain. He did not once mention the threat of pandemics, poverty or extreme climate change. 

Ministers and generals continue to live in a fantasy world in which “defence” is a euphemism for war, and “security” has nothing to do with what really makes people safe in their everyday lives. 

There are two mistakes that the left could make in response to this militarist onslaught. 

The first is already being made by the Labour Party. Shadow foreign secretary Lisa Nandy says that Labour won’t support the nuclear warhead increase. But she has yet to say that they will vote against it rather than abstain. 

Remember, this would not be a vote on retaining existing nuclear weapons but on increasing them.

What can you do with 260 nuclear warheads that you can’t do with 180? Either number would be enough to wipe out much of the world. 

It seems to be about looking tough, a policy championed by overgrown upper-class schoolboys who risk fuelling an arms race and making the whole world less safe. But Labour might abstain. 

In similar vein, Keir Starmer and his colleagues, rather than condemning the new plans for submarines and special forces, have criticised government plans for cutting the number of troops. 

They have highlighted the helpful work done by a small percentage of army personnel to build hospitals and deliver vaccines. But such work is evidence that we need these people’s skills in civilian emergency services rather than as a secondary function of an organisation rooted in violence and obedience to the ruling class.

The Labour leadership — though thankfully not all Labour MPs and members — seems to be terrified of disagreeing with the militarist lobby. 

The left at the grassroots, thankfully, has more courage. Opposition to the Police Bill is strong and widespread, notwithstanding the likelihood of Priti Patel and her allies trying to use events in Bristol to smear the Bill’s opponents. 

The nuclear decision has been widely condemned. At the Peace Pledge Union, we have been hearing from people since the nuclear news hit the headlines who are willing to take non-violent direct action over the issue. 

There is always a danger, though, that we on the left separate issues that are tightly bound together. 

We campaign about the climate emergency but don’t always mention how climate change is fuelled by capitalism and war. 

We condemn corporate power but sometimes forget how the influence of arms companies fuels high military spending. 

Certain trade-union leaders support their members struggling to keep their jobs but fail to work to transform industry rather than simply to keep it going. 

But we do better when we connect up all these issues. 

Now is the time for a renewed mass movement against militarism. We need to expose militarism’s links with unaccountable corporate power, its tendency to fuel arms races, its dangers to the world, the way it takes resources from healthcare and from struggles against poverty and climate change. 

No-one on the left can afford to treat militarism as a side issue. We need to oppose Johnson’s nukes, but to oppose all other manifestations of militarism as well. 

To speak out about military recruitment practices that target the poorest young people for recruitment and dump them back into poverty when they leave the forces. 

To offer an alternative to the everyday militarism that presents violence as positive if the state has ordered it and which champions obedience and hierarchy as virtues rather than assaults on human dignity. 

We need to resist militarism in the streets, in workplaces, in education, in the media, in Westminster, in the devolved parliaments and in local government. And we need non-violent direct action and civil disobedience as well. 

I invite you to join with the Peace Pledge Union online on Monday April 12 for our event on resisting militarism in your community (details at ppu.org.uk). 

We are also keen to hear about campaigns you’re already running or planning and suggestions for how we can build resistance (email [email protected] or call 020 7424-9444). 

Several explanations have been offered for why the government has cut troop numbers despite the big increase in military spending. 

Some strategists argue that modern warfare requires expensive equipment rather than large numbers of soldiers. 

The influence of the arms industry has no doubt also helped to push the focus onto costly big-ticket items. 

But part of the answer is almost certainly that the army repeatedly fails to meet its own recruitment targets. 

It seems that many young people are not prepared to sign up to a lifestyle that requires them constantly to obey authority — including obeying orders to kill, or to facilitate killing. 

Perhaps today’s young people have more to teach us than the ministers, generals, admirals and arms dealers. 

Symon Hill is campaigns manager of the Peace Pledge Union and a history tutor for the Workers’ Educational Association.