Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what assessment he has made of the potential speed and efficiency of the deployment of the armed forces in the event of conflict in East-Central Europe.

We do not comment in detail on military planning but I can confirm that the UK holds units at high readiness able to deploy at short notice should the Government decide to do so.

In the NATO context, the Alliance has taken a series of decisions to improve the speed and efficiency of its response to any potential crisis. For example, a decision at the Wales Summit in 2014 established the Very High Readiness Joint Task Force (which the UK led in 2017) as a spearheaded element of the NATO Response Force.

At its Summit in July we expect the Alliance to agree a Readiness Initiative and work to improve Military Mobility that will further strengthen NATO's capabilities.