On November 22, 2024, I posted a video titled “Can Russia Attack Britain? ” about how a conventional attack might unfold. Some viewers criticized it as baseless scaremongering, but I think they misunderstood my point—Russia wouldn’t strike Britain alone because that would trigger a full NATO response. My video was about how Russia could cripple the UK if NATO, including Britain, was already at war with Russia.
I explained that a combination of precision cruise missile strikes and cyberattacks would quickly destroy our unprotected transport hubs, power generation, and many military bases, causing massive chaos across Britain. The food supply network would particularly collapse, ports and bridges would become inoperable, and power stations could easily be disabled. Phone networks would go down, and civil unrest would inevitably follow. Now it seems my warnings, and those of many other commentators over the past few years, are finally being heard by the current government and the Ministry of Defence.
They’re currently taking measures to launch exercises testing civil defense resilience against conventional and cyber attacks—the largest since the end of the Cold War in 1991. However, I’m not convinced that Britain, with its very small and underfunded army, could do much against a multi-dimensional attack designed by Russia or any other foreign power. What the Ministry of Defence is specifically looking at is how to rapidly expand the British Army in the face of such threats, or if war actually broke out. Much nonsense has been written in the newspapers over the past two years about the possibility of conscription or a return to national service.
But the last thing the army wants during a crisis is trying to train unwilling youths forced into uniform from scratch. In this program, I want to examine how the Ministry of Defence could rapidly expand the army without the government ordering conscription—and if they did try to impose it, what that might look like. The argument politicians often put forward these days is bringing back national service—compulsory military service for young people that existed in Britain between 1948 and 1963. I’ll show you a clip from a film in a moment that gives you an idea of what national service involved.
The uniform and weapons have changed, but the basics would remain the same: turning an eighteen-year-old civilian into a disciplined, physically fit, sharp-looking fighter within a few weeks before they serve their country in a useful role and then return to society. Most importantly for any future emergency, it would provide a huge stock of trained ex-soldiers who could be recalled to service if needed—something we obviously don’t have today. Then general military training begins for 5 weeks. On the parade ground, the sergeant takes charge.
They’ve listened to the company officers and the commander. They know why they’re here and what they need to do about their families’ concerns, if any. But now, he tells them: “You must listen to me. ” Platoon, attention.
Move to the left in groups of three. Turn left. To the right, turn right. Quick march.
And so begins the first phase—five grueling, intensive weeks laying the foundations of discipline, basic knowledge, and physical fitness upon which everything else is built. The transformation in these men within five short weeks is truly remarkable. With upright posture and alertness, they begin to gain new self-confidence. Britain abolished compulsory military service in May 1963.
Before that, between 1948 and 1963, all able-bodied young men were required to serve 18 months in one of the armed forces branches. Before that, compulsory military service had only been imposed twice during the two World Wars. Britain has always relied on a professional volunteer army, which has continued from 1963 to this day. This raises an obvious question.
With a British army so small that a former army commander stated it would struggle to occupy a small town in wartime, what would happen if the British government decided to commit the UK to a large-scale war with any potential adversary? How would the army—the nation’s primary fighting force—be expanded to provide a force large enough to have an impact in any such war? Well, the government wouldn’t start calling people up immediately. Instead, it would first exhaust its stock of reservists and retirees before moving to untrained civilians.
This is because the army is actually backed by two groups of trained personnel who can be legally mobilized in emergencies. So, the regular British Army today stands at about 74,000 soldiers, representing about 13 combat brigades and divisions, and it maintains two divisions ready for deployment. The first group of trained personnel who can be called up in emergencies is called the “Regular Reserve. ” This consists of former regular service personnel who leave the army but retain a legal obligation to serve for a specified number of years after leaving regular service.
My maternal grandfather faced this situation, for example, in 1950. He was a regular soldier between 1930 and 1946 before becoming a civilian after World War II, but he was recalled to service from the Regular Reserve for the Korean War due to a shortage of experienced veterans. He ended up serving until 1960 after deciding to stay in the army following the Korean War. Disturbingly, the army’s Regular Reserve strength is currently undisclosed, with the last available figure dating back to 2014 when the regular army was much larger, and the Regular Reserve was recorded at 30,030 personnel.
To be cautious, I’ll downgrade that 2014 figure for 2026, estimating 15,000 Regular Reserve soldiers. Calling them up would raise the army to 89,000 personnel. The next stock of trained soldiers that can be drawn upon is the “Volunteer Reserve,” formerly known as the “Territorial Army” or “weekend warriors” for being part-time soldiers—civilians in uniform. The Army Reserve would immediately be integrated into the regular army in the event of war, just as happened with the Territorial Army in 1939.
All its personnel and units would be distributed as needed. The Army Reserve currently numbers 25,700 men and women. Although in reality, some would be considered medically unfit or exempt for various reasons such as the nature of their jobs. But the bulk would likely be mobilized.
This would increase the army to 114,700 personnel, bringing it up to the strength of the regular army in the late 1990s. With that number, you could perhaps control three market towns. After that, the trained workforce would of course be exhausted. The Ministry of Defence has pushed for what’s called a Strategic Reserve call-up to bring ex-soldiers back into service up to age 65, which would fill the army’s ranks, but with older, less fit individuals.
Finally, civilian mobilization would be the last resort. It might begin with a national campaign calling for volunteers to join the army, similar to Lord Kitchener’s “Your Country Needs You” poster. But I think such a campaign would fail because people these days are far less patriotic than they were, and more aware of what’s going on in the world compared to the generations of the First and Second World Wars. And since the army already struggles desperately to persuade people to join in peacetime, it’s unlikely more people would want to join in wartime with all the associated risks.
The last resort then would be conscription. Whether that’s reinstating the national service of the 1940s, 50s, and 60s, or World War II call-ups, or some kind of lottery system on the American Vietnam War model—who knows? We also don’t know whether the same exemptions would apply as before. If a major conflict occurred, the army would need a lot of manpower quickly.
In 1939, men aged 20 to 23 were first required to register. Reserved occupations were legally rationed. For example, men working in essential industries like coal mining, agriculture, engineering, and medicine were generally not called up, though they could volunteer for service. Nowadays, of course, reserved occupations wouldn’t be the same.
We don’t have a coal mining industry anymore. Agriculture no longer relies heavily on manpower. It’s shrunk to essentially one farmer per farm. So that group of civilian labor no longer exists to be protected.
The conscientious objector category might be re-established. A tribunal system, as in World War II, to determine who has genuine moral convictions against fighting and who can be conscripted or imprisoned for refusing conscription. And those classified as conscientious objectors would be given non-combatant roles or civilian work supporting the war effort. Would women be subject to military service like men this time?
These are all interesting questions that I don’t think the government has answered. The first phase would be this limited conscription. In 1939, as I mentioned, 240,000 men registered for service. However, this was later expanded to full conscription of men between 18 and 40, excluding the medically unfit and certain essential workers.
Later, conscription was extended to age 51 for the army and up to 60 for some civil defense organizations. For example, police, fire, civil defense work, home guard, and so on. Britain isn’t the only country thinking about reintroducing conscription. The United States recently ordered young men to register for the draft essentially.
Germany is seriously considering reintroducing national service. And Russia is seeking to mobilize up to half a million reservists. So, what do you think about all this? It’s certainly an interesting trend in many countries today.
Thank you very much for watching. Please subscribe and share, and visit my channel for audiobooks, “War Stories with Mark Felton. ” You can also help support both my channels via PayPal and Patreon.
Details are in the description box below.
