UK media fails to disclose defence sector links in nearly 60% of cases

https://aoav.org.uk/2026/military-experts-or-arms-industry-insiders-uk-media-fails-to-disclose-defence-sector-links-in-nearly-60-of-cases/

by XzetaU8 • 2 months ago

383 207 2 months ago

aoav.org.uk

sourcegrift• 2 months ago

No wonder they are so pro russia (but pretend otherwise ), they want the war to go on and on, have people die on both sides.

cwillu• 2 months ago

“This research does not suggest that any individual cited in this report deliberately concealed their commercial affiliations from journalists. Rather, it highlights a recurring failure by news organisations to disclose potentially relevant industry interests when presenting former senior military figures as independent expert commentators on defence, conflict, and national security issues.”

“Of course, holding private-sector roles after military service is both lawful and commonplace. This is not the point of this report. Rather, the concern highlighted here is about the UK’s media.”

“The findings presented here do not argue that the individuals identified are acting improperly, nor that their analyses lack merit, however we assert that the public has a right to full and relevant information when evaluating expert commentary, particularly where it involves lives, public expenditure, and international security.”

“It is important to note that this report does not allege wrongdoing on the part of the individuals identified, nor on the part of the publications presented within the pages of this report.”

Practically every third paragraph reiterates this.

daveshistory6• 2 months ago

They are anticipating a flood of complaints from various well-connected groups and individuals that it's an unfair hit piece. They want to be able to point to all the "Hey, we didn't say this ACTUALLY MATTERED" disclaimers they front-loaded it with.

flumpcakes8• 2 months ago

Source? The UK has been extremely vocal about defending Ukraine's sovereign rights and has spent a lot of money supplying it with defensive equipment.

Russia despises the UK. The UK does have a few right wing pro Russia people, just like the US does. Just like most of Europe does. It is the fringe view and not reflected in state policy.

SuddsMcDuff2• 2 months ago

The UK does have a few right wing pro Russia people

"Right wing" people like George Galloway? Put your obvious bias aside for a moment and just say "a few pro Russia people".

einpoklum4• 2 months ago

1. Calling it the "defense sector" is already quite biased. Almost all of that sector's activity involves offensive activity. Or just call it the "arms industry" etc. If we were less charitable, we could well call it the "war industry".

2. Reading the article we note there's quite some overlap between arms industry links and links to Israel's fundraising and lobbying circles. I wonder whether UK media discloses those links.

tempfile2• 2 months ago

"war industry" is still very charitable! If you have any standards that distinguish a war from indiscriminate killing, they probably violate those standards in a large proportion of their business.

philipallstar6• 2 months ago

What informs your "probably"?

philipallstar6• 2 months ago

Almost all of that sector's activity involves offensive activity.

What do you mean? As in invading other countries?

defrost7• 2 months ago

Just on the facts,

* assisting US offensive actions,

* weapons sales for offensive usage (eg: The UK government admits that Saudi Arabia has used UK weapons, made by companies around the UK, in its attacks on Yemen.)

shevy-java2• 2 months ago

He is quite correct though. By calling it "defence" industry, it is insinuated that this is always a moral right use of arms. In reality one would have to look on a case by case basis to see which use really qualifies as defence. In many cases I would not call it defence, for instance, if money is used to overthrow other governments and so forth. Or the Falklands War as an example - technically one could claim the UK had to "defence" its territory, but at the same time one has to question the use of colonies in the first place.

flumpcakes8• 2 months ago

The UK doesn't have some imperialist policy of land grabs like Russia, or diplomacy through violence. In the current Iranian war the UK is only allowing it's bases to launch defensive missions, i.e. strike offensive capability or incoming missiles. So no, it is in fact the defense sector.

What countries have a defense sector, if the UK doesn't?

RobotToaster2• 2 months ago

Defending those launching illegal strikes is still offensive, in both meanings of the term.

coldtea3• 2 months ago

The UK doesn't have some imperialist policy of land grabs

It has centuries of exactly that at a global scale, and continued post-war neo-colonial land grabbing and pressuring, plus eager participation in all the imperialist games of its larger brother.

I mean, just mentioning "Tony Blair" is enough...

themgt• 2 months ago

In the current Iranian war the UK is only allowing it's bases to launch defensive missions, i.e. strike offensive capability ...

Reminds of the old joke, "What propaganda? We don't have propaganda."

anonymousDan• 2 months ago

I can't tell if your first sentence is a joke or not...

TheOtherHobbes• 2 months ago

Iraq and Afghanistan might disagree with your first point.

Last time I looked Iran and the UK are quite some distance from each other, and Iran has inexplicably neither been launching missiles at the UK, nor threatening to, and is apparently not even capable of it.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/crm120x4lzxo

So the justification for these "defensive" bombing runs on Iranian mountain sites from Fairford remains mysterious.

The UK's arms industry is - like most things associated with the establishment - an exercise in turning privilege into cash, so it's not a surprise to see Senior Figures doing the media rounds in establishment narrative factories like The Telegraph and The Daily Mail.

Readers with the money and connections to make a difference already know how the game is played.

Readers who don't should perhaps be allowed to keep their happy fantasy that the UK isn't one of the most corrupt countries in the world, as a mercy.

roenxi4• 2 months ago

In the current Iranian war the UK is only allowing it's bases to launch defensive missions, i.e. strike offensive capability or incoming missiles.

Claiming that the UK doesn't support diplomacy through violence then transitioning into this gem has to be one of the wildest juxtapositions I've seen this year. Do you classify the US strikes on Iran as uniformly offensive or defensive in nature? Or do you think there is a mix? How would you classify a US bombing run on anti-air defences in the opening phase of the conflict?

CrzyLngPwd5• 2 months ago

Iran.

It didn't attack anyone until it was attacked.

It has been defending itself.

pbiggar• 2 months ago

Defensive missions? Was the UK under attack?

throawayonthe• 2 months ago

war is peace etc etc

tardedmeme• 2 months ago

In the current Iranian war the UK is only allowing it's bases to launch defensive missions, i.e. strike offensive capability

If Iran struck all of the UK's missile factories and military bases, would it be considered a defensive or offensive action?

keybored2• 2 months ago

They still own Falkland Islands.

einpoklum4• 2 months ago

The UK doesn't have some imperialist policy of land grabs

Not directly, mostly; and not through land grabs. The age of land grabs is pretty much over - but imperialism lives on in different form - including massive military interventions and covert operations for manipulating or replacing regimes, more that properly conquering and settling lands.

Today's UK is not an independent empire of this kind. It used to be; but now it is relegated to being a junior partner in its alliance with the US empire, mostly, and with the EU, to a lesser extent. This is reflected in its top 10 arms recipients, e.g. for 2024 [1]:

Saudi Arabia, £14bn United States of America, £8.3bn France, £5.2bn Qatar, £3.5bn Italy, £2.8bn Oman, £2.5bn Turkey, £2.3bn India, £2.3bn Norway, £2.2bn United Arab Emirates, £1.7bn

and there are also arms Israel for about £0.572bn; and the arming of Ukraine, a cooperation with both the US and European powers, as part of NATO's struggle against Russia.

The UK also sends troops as part of US imperial interventions, e.g. in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya. There are also UK-dominated or UK-only interventions abroad, but mostly if we go a few decades back [2].

[1] https://www.thenational.scot/news/24272310.uk-arms-exports--...

[2] https://www.declassifieduk.org/the-uks-83-military-intervent...

holoduke• 2 months ago

You are quite the hypocrite to call the UK not a imperialistic country. They are probably the greatest of them all. They have far more blood on their hands in foreign interventions than Russia and China combined. In fact they are still occupied with abuse and destruction throughout the world. You are naive and victim of propoganda for not seeing this.

alansaber3• 2 months ago

"Ex UK military members discover the private sector pays 10-20x more" underlines the title, but yes, media should disclose it. But even if they were "just" retired ex-military, their bias would be the same (being a member of the UK military).

defrost7• 2 months ago

Media in general is poor on declaring any and all bias of their various interviewed "experts".

Quack doctors spruiking amazing new treatments (that they hold shares in).

Automotive experts promoting car brands (that they receive advertising and influencer dollars for).

etc.

buran772• 2 months ago

Quack doctors spruiking amazing new treatments (that they hold shares in).

Doctors commonly have kickback arrangements to prescribe specific medication. Sometimes it's the correct course of action they just always go for the particular brand, other times it's the wrong course of action but they prescribe it anyway for the kickback (the OxyContin scandal comes to mind).

matsemann• 2 months ago

One thing I've seen a bit in Norway, and which is relevant this month, is opinion pieces by "concerned parents" that get their writing into national news, but a quick search show that they're often head of some bigoted organization. Of course they should be entitled to their opinion and be able to express it as any other, but the news papers not disclosing this is unethical imo.

amiga386• 2 months ago

What you're seeing there is churnalism; journalists just want to get a piece printed and move on. Sometimes the whole piece comes from a source that benefits from the piece being printed, not just the expert. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Churnalism

Sometimes the expert benefits just by being in the news, see for example NPR banning the expert they quoted 77 times, law professor Carl Tobias. Mainly because he'd write to them offering his opinion on the topics of the day, and as he is a law professor, even if the topic isn't law, NPR journalists couldn't help but accept his quotes to pad out their articles. https://www.mediaite.com/media/nprs-new-rule-for-2026-stop-q...

throw_a_grenade• 2 months ago

10-20× more in private sector for senior leadership/advisory role sounds reasonable, but still, I wonder if some part of that compensation stems from the fact that the person is availing him/herself as an asset of influence, i.e. can be used to push narrative through media while posing as independent, credible expert. Needs further research and/or A/B testing I guess.

alansaber3• 2 months ago

Well yeah when you hire at a senior level it goes unsaid that you're partially hiring for that persons influence. The labour value alone would not reflect such a high price.

helsinkiandrew2• 2 months ago

These individuals had also been quoted, featured, or otherwise used as commentators in UK media coverage of defence, conflict, or national security issues.

If they are promoting defence spending or plugging their employers products that's bad, but using their experience to comment on the Iran war or Ukraine, or Russian/Chinese Spy networks doesn't seem that bad?

JdeBP7• 2 months ago

In 17 of the 19 detailed instances, it is stated that they are promoting increases in budgets and spending. The two others are reported as speaking with different conflicts of interest.

dgroshev9• 2 months ago

"People who have seen the state of the military first hand are saying that we need to fund the military" is not really shocking or sinister.

helsinkiandrew2• 2 months ago

Does it say that in the full report somewhere else? I can't find that in the text.

I think most people would be surprised if ex senior military Personnel didn't think military spending should be increased.

RobotToaster2• 2 months ago

There's lots of indirect ways to promote "defence" spending, such as promoting more involvement in a conflict.

rigonkulous6• 2 months ago

In the context of Julian Assanges' treatment by UK media, and his subsequent disassembly at Belmarsh, who cares what they have to say about Russia or China.

TiredOfLife• 2 months ago

In the context of Assange turning out to be russian mouthpiece. Well deserved.

advisedwang• 2 months ago

I think it should always be disclosed. Even when they aren't explicitly advocating for a direct benefit to their company, their overall analysis is colored by their interests. The defense industry is going to amp up risks of an aggressor, downplay the risk of appearing to be aggressive, downplay non-military foreign policy strategies etc. Allow the defense industry to influence how we think about foreign events is certainly going to influence how we think about policy and spending.

shevy-java2• 2 months ago

In other words: institutionalized corruption.

It's also a problem because who controls those media? So the taxpayers are at the least two times at a disadvantage here, private interests funding private media, to then set the agenda of reporting very selectively - or not at all in certain areas.

Npovview2• 2 months ago

The problem isn't good honest journalism can't be done. Think from the point of view a good critical news story, if that news story is gonna disadvantage a powerful entity, that entity will do everything in its power to discredit and stop that news story from publishing. This is also the reason why I like social media, Game Nexus does so much impactful reporting on hardware.

echelon_musk• 2 months ago

How the UK Security Services neutralised ‘The Guardian’ newspaper (2019) (dailymaverick.co.za)
3 points by indigodaddy on June 2, 2023 | past | 1 comment

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36170406

https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2019-09-11-how-the-u...

cryo3210• 2 months ago

I'm not sure that the Grauniad has a particularly good global reputation for independent and critical journalism. It publishes the same mix of disguised opinion pieces and rather biased junk articles as the other side of the political spectrum.

There isn't a single news source that you can trust as such. You have to compile a lot of them, remove the unverified information and see what is left. Usually not a lot.

daveshistory6• 2 months ago

I sort of disagree with this. I bet if you asked liberals and progressives in a country like America for a foreign newspaper they read -- if they do read one -- in most cases it is probably the Guardian. So it may be only the best of a bad bunch but it does have that reputation.

piltdownman• 2 months ago

I mean they operate as a trust and wear their journalistic bias proudly on their sleeve; in terms of intent their altruism is self-evident.

That said, no British media is exempt from adherence to D Notices and tenets of their legal system like the concept of a super-injuction, whereby a court order prevents the reporting of the fact that the injunction exists at all.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super-injunctions_in_English_l...

That the term was coined by a Guardian journalist covering the 2006 Ivory Coast toxic waste dump scandal should be context enough as to their motives and constraints.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RJW_v_Guardian_News_and_Media_...

zipy1242• 2 months ago

Whilst not commenting on that, a fascinating quote from the article you are replying to is:

"Viner also oversaw the breakup of The Guardian’s celebrated investigative team, whose muck-racking journalists were told to apply for other jobs outside of investigations."

This tells you something about why you might feel that way.

Devasta• 2 months ago

The Guardians role in modern UK society is to launder right wing talking points through a few layers of progressive sounding rhetoric so that the average person on the street can say "Well if even The Guardian agrees, maybe there is something to it."

A worthless rag of a paper.

zipy1242• 2 months ago

fascinating article thank you for posting. Everyone should read this!

JdeBP7• 2 months ago

It is interesting to look at the details and see who the (news) 'media' are in this case. Going through the details, I find 1 instance (under Kemp) of the BBC, and everyone else is the 'usual suspects', the Telegraph, the Mail, GB News, the Sun, the Times, and so forth.

The Guardian is only mentioned in context of exposing these conflicts of interests; and whilst I am surprised to find LBC and Nation Cymru as not being transparent about their experts and commentariat, I don't see The National mentioned at all, nor The Herald, The Scotsman, the Metro, the Financial Times, and The i.

This may tell us that these experts only appear in the 'usual suspect' news media. Or it may tell us that this report didn't look at a wide range of U.K. news media. The latter seems unlikely given the inclusion of some niche publications (I've never even heard of London Loves Business until today.) and things like Nation Cymru, so I am more inclined to suppose the former.

pjc50• 2 months ago

the Telegraph, the Mail, GB News, the Sun, the Times

Indeed. These are pay-to-play propaganda and should not be accorded the dignity of "newspaper". Peter Oborne's resignation from the Telegraph is still worth reading: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-31510152

gib444• 2 months ago

And The Times and The Sun aren't even British. They're owned by News Corp which is American

And The Telegraph is about to become German

GB News is quite likely Russian ultimately lol

k1m5• 2 months ago

The report doesn't say the media mentioned is an exhaustive list of the media that failed to disclose ties to the arms industry, which is what you're assuming.

You mention the Guardian. I took one of the names listed in the report, Richard Barrons, and quickly found an article in the Guardian where he's quoted but his ties to the arms industry are not disclosed: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/mar/20/britain-def...

JdeBP7• 2 months ago

Not quoted as saying that there should be some sort of budget or spending increase, which is the sort of evidence being presented in this report, but merely some historical context statement about how the armed forces had been 'right-sized for the era'; and with his political ties also mentioned.

That said, I wouldn't be surprised if AOAV had a blind spot with respect to The Guardian. However, that doesn't show one; and they did do lists of news media for several of the 19 (e.g. Richards) indicating that they aren't just picking 1 example publication for each person. Which is why I'm still inclined towards this telling us that there is a certain subset of U.K. publications in which this occurs.

If they hadn't mentioned Nation Cymru I'd be inclined towards this telling us that the report is highly London-centric and not reflective of 'U.K. media'. But they did.

kitd• 2 months ago

The survey excluded veterans with no commercial ties. Maybe those publications not mentioned used them instead.

JdeBP7• 2 months ago

Yes, and I was slightly disappointed, from a statistical point of view, that they didn't tell us how many people they excluded from the original sample for this reason. That could have told us things.

If (say) they threw out 967 to leave those 33, then one possible explanation that that leaves the door open for is that journalists are so used to there being no conflict of interest, it being the case the majority of the time, that they don't check in the minority of cases where there is.

I suspect that they didn't throw out anywhere near as many as that, though. But, still, I would have liked to have been told the figure.

jrrv• 2 months ago

LBC certainly falls within the "usual suspects"

Pxtl• 2 months ago

I am surprised to find LBC

Why? From afar my vague impression of LBC is that it's talk radio opinion slop, even if it puts in some effort to avoid the cartoonishly-far-right conservatism endemic to that genre.

daveshistory6• 2 months ago

Not wrong, that format requires a regular parade of guests with some kind of subject matter expertise, and if it's a military or national security topic, most of those subject matter experts are inevitably from a military or at least military policy background.

eduction2• 2 months ago

How much of that is down to the Guardian being disinclined to air views seen as pro military? Or not asking the sorts of questions where such views would naturally be called upon. For example a left publication is less likely to be concerned about a(n alleged) lack of military readiness.

squeegmeister• 2 months ago

Manufacturing Consent continues being relevant

itopaloglu83• 2 months ago

For the unfamiliar.

Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media by Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky

dredmorbius• 2 months ago

And based on the earlier concept by Walter Lippmann, first expressed in his 1922 book Public Opinion, which arguably birthed 20th century putatively impartial professional journalism.

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Opinion_(book)#Manufact...>

genewitch2• 2 months ago

how can anyone trust any media report? Even if it is reported from multiple outlets? In the US the sum is around 39 billion dollars for pharma advertising, nevermind our military-industrial complex, as well.

How can any media that has underwriting or advertisers actually do genuine reporting? Ask yourself this!

The only way to really report on the "news" is to not be supported by advertisers or underwriting.

I've known this since Dr. Naji Dahi's class in 2002, with upkeep by Adam Curry and John C. Dvorak, as well as having worked for ABC and a KKR Joint that's all up in "media".

coliveira• 2 months ago

This is the biggest illusion of the media. They portray themselves as informing in an independent way. But any quick analysis will show that they can only report what their clients let them. And in the West their loyalty is to wealthy families and big corporations in the US and Europe.

genewitch2• 2 months ago

i used to have a great way to sum this all up but i stopped arguing with people via that medium so i have since forgotten my spiel. It's not that the media will lie, necessarily - although let's not pretend they're above lying - it's the editorial staff get to choose what runs and what doesn't. If there's a new study saying acetaminophen or whatever is actually more dangerous than we thought, it won't get air on normal media for a long time. Hard to get earnest reporting on wars when defense contractors are a major underwriter, hard to report on businesses when most of them are at least partially owned by the same companies that own the media outlets and/or are major advertisers.

I really need to sit down and think for a while to remember how i used to explain this, because it nearly always got a "oh... that kinda makes sense... dang"

gyanchawdhary2• 2 months ago

[flagged]

br1212• 2 months ago

"our country isn't ready for war" is more difficult to disproof than "solar panels only last for 15 years", so while I agree that disclosures should go for every conflict on interest, it makes sense that the research focused only on this portion of them

gyanchawdhary2• 2 months ago

i dont buy it ..if the concren is undisclosed affiliations, then study all undisclosed affiliations .. instead we get a defence only study, because "defence industry ties" are assumed to be inherently suspect ..

Regardless, when the topic is national security, defence- ector experience is often exactly the expertise you want... not some acadmic or commie whod rather we not

thesamethrowawa2• 2 months ago

It is interesting that any US-centric article causing political flame wars immediately sinks here, but anything generating similar "debate" on UK issues is allowed to sit on the front page, accumulating hundreds of comments. I don't think the conversation here is evolving in way that HN tries to foster, so hopefully this one is shadow-flagged (or however the internal mod tools work) soon.

thesamethrowawa2• 2 months ago

Still up here a few hours later huh, despite clear propaganda that is nothing to do with TFA.

roysting• 2 months ago

I wish we had a requirement for every corporation (non-profit, for profit, or politician) to disclose any and all “links”. The fact that there is so much resistance to that notion should tell people all they need to know about how toxic the people’s relationship is to these entities.

austinallegro• 2 months ago

TL;DR

Military Experts Named:

Nick Carter Chris Deverell James Everard Nick Houghton Mark Carleton-Smith Rupert Jones Richard Kemp Stuart Peach David Richards Patrick Sanders Richard Shirreff Sir Peter Wall Ben Wallace Alan West Penny Mordaunt Greg Bagwell Richard Barrons Tim Collins Richard Dannatt

Media Outlets Named:

The Telegraph Daily Mail Express The Independent iPaper The Sun LBC Sky News Times Radio Channel 4 News

flumpcakes8• 2 months ago

Surely all experts are employed in some form in their field? Should we have their entire CV read out before their expertise is given on a subject matter?

Unless there is a clear conflict of interest, such as an "expert" urging a particular course of action which aligns to benefit their employers, then the audience should probably just engage their critical thinking a bit more.

The majority of UK experts will probably have opinions that align with UK ethics/morality/society and urge options that benefit the UK state and it's allies. I would assume that would be an absolute given too.

When I watch Chinese citizens give their expertise on matters, I know that it will probably align with the Chinese state and benefit them (as opposed to strictly the UK state). Have people lost all of their critical thinking skills?

epolanski2• 2 months ago

If somebody is discussing about defense in the media the viewers/readers should know that the person works for the defense industry in a commercial role.

Presenting them merely as experts because they are "former X" creates a false impression of impartiality.

Ntrails• 2 months ago

For talking heads/opinion you have, I would say, two choices:

    - Retired people with historic experience.  The longer since they were actively involved in the sector, the less useful they will be of course.  There is also going to be something of a demographics bias here.
    - Currently employed people, and given their primary skillset is "Defense industry expertise" I'm going to posit that they always have a commercial role in the defense industry.  Maybe there's some subset with a non-commercial role or a purely political role... but both of those have their own implications too

k1m5• 2 months ago

Unless there is a clear conflict of interest, such as an "expert" urging a particular course of action

That's exactly the issue

notahacker2• 2 months ago

The listed supposed conflicts of interest mostly aren't any clearer than the baseline assumption "ex generals will generally favour more defence spending" which anyone with more than two brain cells should already be working on.

How is an General Everard being a patron of an armed forces charity, a software company enhancing onboarding experiences, a skills training company or even an "informal network of strategic thinkers" who write blogs likely to influence his defence spending views more than being a general?

It's not like it's standard journalistic practice to provide the entire resume of any other type of commentator.

daveshistory6• 2 months ago

You're asking that question in 2026?

nephihaha• 2 months ago

Tip of the iceberg. The Ministry of Defence and Foreign Office, among others, determine the direction of BBC news.

bell-cot• 2 months ago

While I'm neither a Brit, nor a professional historian, my understanding is that corruption - meaning everything from foot-dragging delivery to inferior & defective goods to exorbitant prices to outright theft - is an ageless problem in the UK military equipment & supplies business. And it was an ageless problem before the Acts of Union (1707, England & Scotland) had even created the UK. And it has rather often been a problem at such scale as to have serious strategic consequences.

(Not that the UK's gov't actually required outside corruption to ruinously squander military budgets. Try asking a naval historian about Britain's post-WWII aircraft carrier construction & refit fiasco.)

My point: News sources failing to flag defense sector conflicts of interest is a minor & downstream fuss over mediocre journalism. The real problem, from the PoV of someone who really cares about the UK and its future, is that Britain both wastes vast resources and punches far below its weight, due to its massive defense sector corruption & incompetence.

Sam6late• 2 months ago

It seems the same goes for international media to some extent.This example passed as nothing although it should have been everywhere: The general reportedly stated that the UK Ministry of Defence could stage a "mutiny potentially up to a coup d'état,if Jeremy Corbyn -as a potential Prime Minister) attempted to Leave NATO. https://monthlyreview.org/articles/anatomy-of-a-propaganda-c...

UK media fails to disclose defence sector links in nearly 60% of cases

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