Si vis pacem, para bellum.

“If you want peace, prepare for war.”

An old adage, true today as it ever was.

In his book about Phillip Sassoon, Damian Collins MP points to the work Sassoon, his predecessor in Folkestone & Hythe, did to build up the British air force prior to the second world war. Sassoon (and Churchill) saw an air force as essential even when others didn’t. In retrospect, his foresight meant the history books call it The Battle of Britain and not “Luftschlacht um England”.

Foresight was not universal.

Head of the army, Sir Archibald Montgomery-Massingberd’s strategy for the coming era of the tank, was to increase forage for horses by 10 fold and give each cavalry officer an extra horse! (Why big companies squander good ideas — FT.com)

On the same day you were giving your talk in the House of Lords, this astonishing article — the digital maginot line — was published. If correct in its analysis, we are already living in an information war — one in which all citizens are both targets and combatants.

It’s objective? To paralyse hostile, democratic societies into 50–50 splits (or should that be 52–48 splits?). The article names us, the UK, in the dispatches as early casualties in this new war. With Brexit as the name of the battle.

But it’s not too late.

We can mobilise. But we need investment, and investment now.

The private sector alone cannot shoulder the burden alone. Only government can invest in the society wide intellectual infrastructure needed to shore up our country.

The unfortunate reality is that right now we don’t fully know whether we need the digital equivalent of airplanes or horses. The battle lines of the information war are still being drawn.

At least now we know there’s a war on.

So we’re going to need new units, and new divisions. What about:

• The Queen’s Cyber Security Guards,
• The Royal Social media influence Dragoons,
• The 1st AI accountability Fusilleers
• The Prince of Wales campaign for Universal Media Literacy (I say — Teach kids the 4th R — Reporting)

We need a multi billion pound investment in cyber warfare.

Good speech. Now from words to action.