As far as defence is concerned, it does not much matter who forms the next government.
Labour and the Tories both believe Britain should play a global military role, and as such are competing with one another to increase military spending and to appear more committed to the hugely expensive Trident nuclear programme. Both parties have also offered support to the international arms trade, which extends to aiding the Gulf autocracies killing civilians in Yemen and the Israelis killing Palestinians in Gaza.
In short, as Iain Overton of Action on Armed Violence writes for openDemocracy today, the next five years will be more of the same regardless of which party wins tomorrow. There will be little attempt to curb the burgeoning costs of new weapons programmes and scarcely a word of Britain’s role in the devastating failed wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and now Gaza.
