Former MI6 chief: UK “infantilised” by US security guarantee | The Economist

We've been huge beneficiaries of an incredibly generous security guarantee from the United States over decades But my strong view is that we’ve actually been infantilised by it We have been prepared to outsource the most fundamental duty of government, which is security, to another nation Now they're close allies of ours but they don't have identical objectives So in some ways this is a bit timely I don't think we should hasten or encourage people in America who want to draw down or reduce their commitment to the most successful alliance in history, which is NATO But at the same time, I think this is the moment where we actually amend our relationship with hard power and understand that without that we’re just going to be prey to other people's ambitions, really And so that is overdue So in some ways this is a good opportunity And we haven't talked about Ukraine yet but, of course, this is the other big galvaniser This is the time where Britain and Europe needs to regain its capacity to develop and exercise hard power And here's the rub, I actually think we'll have a better relationship with America once we do that I think getting that transition right is very hard, particularly in areas like intelligence It's not clear how easy it is and how affordable it is to hedge against this and to build alternatives How do you go about doing that? With regards to the relationship with America, to me, it was pretty clear Of course, we've got decades of working together where there’s strong personal relationships But in the end it was about being useful And I don't think I was under any illusion about what that relationship would be like if we were not useful So it doesn't alter the mission from a UK intelligence perspective: be good and be useful And that's objectively what we want to achieve, in any case