[Tubby Isaacs]

The "fantasy maths" here is £4.7bn over 4 years, which is covered (as things stand) by fiscal headroom.

[Youngian]

What's the difference a Defence Bond and other government IOUs?

They could print more money to pay for tanks. And call it injecting national security liquidity into the money supply.

[Tubby Isaacs]

These are patriotic bonds which won't be used to pay for Vicky Pollard's kids, or something.

Even if you can get a slightly lower rate from regular bonds, it's still debt and that may not pass unnoticed by the people who buy the big majority of bonds.

[mattomac]

I think people need to get real.

Sadly Putin's Russia isn't going away and Ukraine have bravely acted as a bulwark for western democracy. The US meanwhile have washed their hands of it and cannot be trusted even once the pants shitter shuffles off to Hell.

[Killer Whale]

I tend to agree. Back in the 80s it was clear that the 'threat' from the Soviet Union was mostly an act, and a marketing ploy by the military-industrial complex in the West. The USSR knew internally, we knew, and most of all the Reagan government knew that the structure was collapsing from within. Reagan decided to push it faster to collapse via military spending, but in truth it was on the way out and posed no threat to Europe.

Times have completely changed. I don't know how long Putin has left, or what will follow him, but it's clear that he threatens the peace. Add in cyber threats from Russia, China, North Korea and who knows where else, everlasting war between Israel and Iran, and disinterest from a USA too divided internally to care about world stability, and you have a situation that demands that we prepare to at least look like we (Europe as a whole) can defend ourselves.

[Oboogie]

I think people need to get real.

Sadly Putin's Russia isn't going away and Ukraine have bravely acted as a bulwark for western democracy. The US meanwhile have washed their hands of it and cannot be trusted even once the pants shitter shuffles off to Hell.

Agreed.

There's also the question of who follows Putin? Some commentators seem to be putting a lot of faith in Vlad's apparent ill health and/or an assassination/coup-d'état carrying him off, they assume who/what replaces him will be more benign.

Well, I say bollocks to that!

The "Ladybird Book of Benign Russian leaders" contains a picture of Gorbachev and a load of blank pages.