John Healey tells Commons crews working hard to prepare warship after criticism over slow response to drone attacks
HMS Dragon will set sail in “the next couple of days”, the defence secretary has said, meaning the British destroyer may not arrive in the eastern Mediterranean until after the weekend.
John Healey told the House of Commons that navy crews were working “tirelessly, 22 hours a day” to prepare the warship, as he faced accusations of not acting fast enough to protect British interests in the region.
The Labour minister said proposals to deploy the warship were discussed six days ago and then signed off about 36 hours after a drone struck the RAF airbase at Akrotiri on Cyprus.
That was on the fourth day of a joint US-Israel attack on Iran, which began after a highly visible six-week-long buildup of US forces in the Middle East and led to an Iranian retaliation against 10 countries within 24 hours.
