UK defence chiefs want an ‘Iron Dome’ shield

With warnings growing louder of us stumbling into World War Three, a rare consensus in British politics right now centres on the defence budget. Labour and the Conservatives both say it must rise – so what should we spend the money on? 

After watching Israel fight off Iran’s attack last month, and seeing the impact of Russian airstrikes in Ukraine, many politicians and military chiefs believe that a UK anti-missile defence system like Israel’s Iron Dome is a priority. 

But other experts fear it could become an expensive folly. They argue that our limited funds should be dedicated to offensive weapons, using deterrence to prevent conflict breaking out. 

Among the technology’s strongest supporters is Air Chief Marshall Sir Clive Loader. The retired head of RAF Air Command, who flew Harriers over the Falklands, Iraq and Bosnia, thinks that investing in homeland defence is an integral part of convincing Vladimir Putin that attacking the UK with missiles would be ineffective. 

Comparing the situation now to the years preceding the Second World War, he tells i: “Rather sadly, we’re in the early 1930s again and need to be really careful. 

“They say: ‘He who forgets the lessons of history is condemned to repeat them.’ I’ve got a nasty feeling that we’re not a million miles away from that.”  

With Russian forces able to hit British targets from thousands of miles away, the ability to protect “strategically important areas” with our own interceptor missile batteries is essential, Sir Clive believes. 

“This is an insurance policy that we cannot afford to not take out at the moment,” he argues. “Do I think it’s a waste of money? No.”

Admiral Sir Tony Radakin, the head of the British armed forces, expects that a missile defence system “will be needed in the future”. Deciding what kind of technology to buy is “a live conversation,” he told LBC last month. 

Several prominent MPs are strongly in favour, with the Commons leader Penny Mordaunt taking inspiration from Israel. 

“A nation a fraction of our size that has staved off an attack from a nation 10 times its size,” the Conservative MP told The Sunday Telegraph. “We have the same duty to our citizens.” 

Former defence committee chair Tobias Ellwood has called for “an Iron Dome for the UK” to provide a “permanent umbrella of security”, and ex-defence minister James Heappey says it is “inescapably necessary”. 

This political clamour frustrates some analysts, however. They fear it gives the public the impression that we can build a single impregnable system that could protect the whole country from airborne attack. 

Though all-out war may not be an immediate threat, fears of the conflict in Ukraine spilling over have risen recently.

But one former senior member of the UK’s Missile Defence Centre, a government-led research partnership with major military suppliers, tells i that anyone “calling for an Iron Dome-type system for the UK… barely makes the grade of ‘useful idiot’.” 

Iron Dome, the smallest of three systems in Israel’s overall Aerial Defense Array, has been highly effective at stopping short-range rockets fired by Hamas and Hezbollah. But on 13 April it didn’t shoot down any of Iran’s more sophisticated 120 ballistic missiles and 30 cruise missiles. 

Instead, Israel’s Arrow 3 hypersonic interceptor, designed to eliminate the biggest enemy missiles when they leave the Earth’s atmosphere, is thought to have been crucial, helped by American SM-3 missiles and allied jets. Another Israeli system, David’s Sling, can destroy medium-range missiles. 

An equivalent of Iron Dome would be useless for the UK unless rockets were being fired at us from Calais. Even the French don’t hate us that much. 

But this misuse of the term “Iron Dome” doesn’t invalidate the argument for buying other systems and using them differently, says Sir Clive. 

“I don’t think we’d have an Iron Dome everywhere. We’re not a tiny state like Israel, so it would be around strategically important areas. The seat of government, for example; big cities like Manchester or Birmingham; our means of war production; our ports.”