Spectator Australia · Eliot Wilson · Wednesday 22 April 2026
Chancellor Rachel Reeves is reportedly weighing war bonds to plug Britain's defence gap — a vintage solution to a structural problem decades in the making.
Reeves is dusting off war bonds like a bloke finding a 1940s recipe in the back of the cupboard and serving it to guests who've already eaten. Britain's defence isn't broken because the Treasury ran out of fundraising gimmicks — it's broken because successive governments spent thirty years pretending the world had ended. You can't patriotism your way out of an empty arsenal.