SNP's policy of 'unarmed' Armed Forces is sheer madness

The SNP must drop its ban on public money being used to support companies that make munitions

As the UK yesterday marked Armed Forces Day – described as “a chance to show your support” for the men and women in the military – SNP ministers will hopefully have been reflecting on their spectacularly bizarre stance on defence spending.

While the nationalists have long opposed nuclear weapons, they are not a pacifist party. They support membership of Nato, pledging an independent Scotland would be a “reliable and dedicated international partner” like Denmark and Norway.

They also say our domestic defence industry “will not just be welcome in an independent Scotland but will be a vital part of our ability to have a defence capability that matches an Independent Scotland’s needs and threats” and criticise the UK Government for “a failure to meet Scotland’s specific defence needs”.

READ MORE: The UK stepped back as the rest of Europe stepped up, it is time for Scotland to rejoin the mainstream

Ukraine needs munitions and so does the British Army (Picture: Sergey Shestak) | AFP via Getty Images

‘Russian threat is very real’

So it is all the more difficult to understand why it is a “long-standing position” of the SNP that government funding should not be provided for the “direct manufacture of munitions”. So, for example, Scottish Enterprise and the Scottish National Investment Bank do not invest in companies that make weapons.

Former SNP defence spokesperson Stewart McDonald has now rightly criticised the ban as “a stupid policy” and called for a new debate. His comments followed a hint by John Swinney that the party’s stance could change as “we are living in a very different context today” and “the Russian threat is very real”. However a Scottish Government source explained ministers were struggling with how to “manage” the issue within the party.

But, with the UK set to increase defence spending to 5 per cent of GDP, now is not the time to tip-toe around the subject. Not only is the manufacturing of munitions and weapons vital to defend this country and to help Ukraine fight off the Russian invasion, it is also a major economic opportunity.

The SNP needs to make an urgent choice between pacifism and realism. They might think their policy of supporting our Armed Forces while simultaneously objecting to the idea that they should actually be ‘armed’ is a politically astute halfway house, but it’s more like a madhouse.