Police search MoD HQ after leak of Liam Fox letter

[Jan Klimkowski]

The FOR YOUR EYES ONLY letter was immediately leaked, and now the rozzers have been called in.

Behind the theatre, serious matters are playing out.

The military-intelligence-multinational complex is furious.

Police search MoD HQ after leak of Liam Fox letter

Up to 30 officers in operation to discover how sensitive letter from defence secretary to PM was leaked to Daily Telegraph

Vikram Dodd, Nicholas Watt and Richard Norton-Taylor

Police are today conducting a search of the Ministry of Defence (MoD) headquarters in Whitehall to try to find evidence over the leaking of a highly sensitive letter from Liam Fox to David Cameron.

Up to 30 officers are involved in the operation, which comes after the government was severely embarrassed by the leak to the Daily Telegraph of Fox's warning that he is facing "draconian" defence cuts.

An MoD spokesperson said the search was an "internal investigation" and did not involve any officers from the Met or from regular police forces. The spokesperson could not say who had ordered the search by MoD police.

The operation came as Fox condemned the leak of his letter to Cameron in which he warned that the strategic defence and security review (SDSR) appears to be a souped up Treasury cuts process that will harm the military.

The defence secretary said: "It's appalling that a secretary of state can't write to the prime minister in confidence and we will be looking into that this morning."

Fox insisted he had received strong support from Cameron. "I've had tremendous support from the prime minister and he fully understands the problems that Labour left behind. We will continue to work together collectively to ensure that we get a good outcome to the SDSR. We won't be able to do it overnight. It will take us, I imagine, several years to get out of the position that we're in."

Fox's remarks failed to paper over tensions between the MoD and Downing Street over planned cuts to the military that will be announced by George Osborne in his spending review on 20 October.

The MoD believes the defence review, which is to be completed ahead of the spending announcement, has been taken over by the Treasury.

These concerns were highlighted in Fox's strongly worded letter to Cameron, written on Monday night before a meeting of the national security council (NSC) that discussed the defence review.

Fox wrote: "Frankly this process is looking less and less defensible as a proper SDSR [strategic defence and strategy review] and more like a "super CSR" [comprehensive spending review].

"If it continues on its current trajectory it is likely to have grave political consequences for us, destroying much of the reputation and capital you, and we, have built up in recent years. Party, media, military and the international reaction will be brutal if we do not recognise the dangers and continue to push for such draconian cuts at a time when we are at war."

Fox warned that the review could mean that Britain will no longer be able to maintain a naval presence in the Falkland Islands. It could even increase the risk to Britain's Trident nuclear deterrent if the Nimrod MR4 is removed.

"Even at this stage we should be looking at the strategic and security implications of our decisions," Fox wrote. "It would be a great pity if, having championed the cause of our armed forces and set up the innovation of the NSC, we simply produced a cuts package. Cuts there will have to be. Coherence, we cannot do without, if there is to be any chance of a credible narrative."

Tensions between Fox and Cameron were strained further after it emerged at yesterday's NSC meeting, chaired by the prime minister, that plans to build two large aircraft carriers at a cost of at least £5bn are in jeopardy.

The navy is pressing for the carriers, which would be equipped with US planes costing at least £100m each in a package that could cost £15bn.

Cameron questioned claims by navy chiefs and the shipbuilders that cancelling the contracts would save only £1bn, according to Whitehall officials.

Under existing plans, the navy will be equipped with new frigates and destroyers. A well-placed official said last night that the question of which ships the navy will get, and how many, was now "up in the air".

Fox is at loggerheads with Osborne over who will pay for a new Trident nuclear missile system. The chancellor says the initial estimated £20bn cost of renewing Trident should come out of the core defence budget; Fox says it should be paid for using a special supplementary budget.

The defence secretary blamed Labour for leaving the government with a deficit at the MoD. "We were left with an appalling legacy of defence by Labour. It was a shambolic financial position they left behind. We are trying to sort it out. It's very difficult. We're in a spending round, it's likely to be robust when there's tight finances."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/...k-liam-fox