Labour's Patriotism Problem Can't Be Solved by Spreadsheets

Keir Starmer's defence spending promises reveal the hollow heart of political patriotism

The debate over Labour's patriotic credentials reveals a deeper problem in British politics: conflating military spending with genuine patriotism.

As Tom Jones argues in The Critic, measuring patriotism through defence budget percentages is a superficial and potentially harmful approach to national security.

Keir Starmer's Labour Party, eager to shed its historically "unpatriotic" image, has embraced a peculiarly technocratic form of patriotism. Their promise to increase defence spending to 3% of GDP, while simultaneously engaging in accounting sleight-of-hand by including intelligence services and possibly the Chagos deal, exemplifies how targets can distort genuine strategic thinking.

True patriotism isn't found in arbitrary NATO spending targets or politically expedient budget reallocations. It lies in making clear-eyed decisions about national defence capabilities based on actual needs rather than percentages. The current approach of meeting spending targets through creative accounting whilst simultaneously cutting crucial military capabilities - like Britain's amphibious forces - reveals the hollow nature of this financial patriotism.

Labour's attempt to rebrand itself through Union Jack imagery and increased defence budgets feels particularly cynical when considering their recent £500m defence cuts. This "patriotism by numbers" approach suggests that neither major party has truly grappled with what meaningful defence policy looks like in a post-American security landscape.

Real patriotic defence policy would focus on capabilities, not calculations - on what Britain needs to defend itself and its interests, not on meeting arbitrary percentage targets. Until politicians move beyond GDP percentages and flashy announcements, we're stuck with a shallow imitation of patriotism that serves neither the nation's security nor its genuine patriotic interests.