My latest post is on Heathrow's big outage, the mysterious wave of British substation fires and what's behind them. Is it enemy action.. or something more mundane? open.substack.com/pub/jonathan...

Coming up on A Long Time in Finance, we look at the history of Scunthorpe and British Steel..

Generals calling for rearmament often talk about the UK facing a "1937 moment". But what actually happened in the late 1930s, are there similarities and what can we learn? We talk to historian Dan Todman about the economic & military parallels. pod.fo/e/2c9967

Coming up this week on @ALTIFpodcast: in the wake of Trump's proposal for a mineral deal in Ukraine, we look at the greatest minerals carve up of all time - in the Middle East - and ask: "how did that all work out"?

Latest post: What's left of British shipbuilding?

After the failure & rescue of H&W, I look at re-shoring, shipbuilding & defence - and the difficulties of rebuilding lost industrial capacity.

There's also a plea for more sane defence procurement!
open.substack.com/pub/jonathan...

There is something almost Oscar Wilde like about Janan Ganesh's willingness to invite ridicule from the unwashed

Finally someone explodes the tosh about 2.5% of GDP or whatever arbitrary level of defence spending being "unaffordable".

Out now on @altifpodcast: 1976: THE YEAR BRITAIN WENT BUST. We talk to @duncanweldon.bsky.social about when Denis Healey, G&T in hand, was called back from Heathrow's VIP lounge to the Treasury to announce Britain was applying for a $3.9bn loan. Listen to see what happened next! pod.fo/e/2a69cc

I recently set up a Substack called Business Adventures. The first post is about how Britain built an experimental atomic plant at Scotland's northernmost tip, about nuclear innovation, and what can be learned from this extraordinary physics experiment jonathandrewford.substack.com/p/the-dounre...

This short novel - by an anonymous British officer based on his service in Afghanistan - is a very moving read, capturing both the pity of war & the human dilemmas of those swept up in it. If you want to know what it felt like serving in Britain's Vietnam, here it is.. strongly recommended

Germany's banking system is stuck in the past..

Out today on A Long Time in Finance: WHY GERMANS DON'T DO IT BETTER. We talk to the brilliant author and economic commentator @EuroBriefing about why he thinks Germany's economy went from wirtschaftswunder 2.0 to kaput

IT'S OUT on A Long Time in Finance: we look back with author
@edconway.bsky.social at the Bretton Woods Conference of 1944, the only ever formal attempt to reorder the international monetary system, and consider what an increasingly protectionist world can learn from it. pod.fo/e/28c959

Even with these 2 year extensions, the UK's AGR nuclear fleet will all have blinked off by 2030, just when Ed Miliband's target to decarbonise the electricity industry has to be achieved...

Out today on A Long Time in Finance podcast: THE JOHN STONEHOUSE AFFAIR - we discuss with author Philip Augar how the Reggie Perrin like disappearance of a relatively obscure British MP and City financier 50 years ago became a global news sensation. pod.fo/e/285d6b