ISRAELI arms firm Elbit is building its business in Britain by taking top military officials for “informal suppers” and “discreet and private” dinners.

Elbit is a relatively new arms supplier in Britain. Its dinner-with-Elbit approach is very similar to the hospitality offered to officials by the more established arms firms. As a “transparency” measure, government departments list all “hospitality” given to their “senior officials.”

For the MoD, these lists cover everyone who is above the rank of “two star” meaning Major Generals or their equivalents and above. No other department records as many dinners with suppliers as the MoD.

Military spending is also the most privileged of all government spending, the most freely given, the least likely to be cut, and often the most wasteful, as defence firms frequently supply high-tech military kit late, over budget, and unable to work as promised.

Elbit, Israel’s leading arms firm and leading supplier to the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), has long been deeply involved in military action against Palestinians. This might make many wary of the firm. But Elbit thinks its military customers look at its weapons being battle-tested as a positive.

Last year Elbit’s chief executive told investors it was “very much involved” in supporting the IDF in Gaza and when it understood “lessons learned from the war” it would “share it with our customers around the world.”

Elbit likes to share its experience over dinner. The “transparency” releases about MoD hospitality tend to arrive late, and Freedom of Information requests are also often answered slowly, so all the information I recently received about Elbit’s dinner invites comes from 2023. The release included over a dozen Elbit meals, drinks, receptions and other “hospitality” events. But the MoD only had further documents for some of them.

These papers showed that Elbit’s board of directors entertained Air Vice-Marshal Phil Brooker for a “drinks reception” and “informal supper” in September 2023 starting at 7.15pm. The drinks-and-supper were held on HMS Belfast, a former warship now moored on the Thames as a museum.

The Imperial War Museum also does “venue hire” packages aboard the ship. Dress was “smart casual” and according to the invite, it was “Carriages at 22.30” — which is a posh way of saying you should get a taxi home at half ten.

Air Vice-Marshal Phil Brooker was the RAF’s Director Combat Air, Defence Equipment and Support when invited. Elbit is particularly keen to sell its drones to the RAF.

In another invite, General Charles Collins was entertained by Elbit in April 2023. General Collins was then assistant chief of the General Staff. He and the chief of the General Staff were in charge of making sure the army was trained and up to date. Elbit is a major supplier of battle simulation training to the British Army.

In May 2023, shortly after this dinner, Elbit won a £57 million, 10-year contract to run Project Vulcan for the British Army. This involves “driver, gunner, commander” and “crew training” for troops to use Challenger tanks and other armoured vehicles using “simulation.”

In October 2023 Elbit won a £21m, three-year contract for “supply and support for battle simulators” to train British artillerymen using the “105mm light gun and 81mm mortar.” Elbit developed an expertise in running simulated training using a mix of computer screens, artificial recoil effects and other “cutting-edge multi-weapon firing simulations” through its IDF work.

British troops are being trained to use our tanks and artillery by the same company that trained the IDF troops currently chasing Hamas — and also shelling hospitals, churches and schools — in Gaza.

In the email dinner invite, Elbit refers chummily to “General Charlie.” Elbit’s man says he has booked a restaurant in Amport, a picturesque town in Hampshire — the name of the restaurant has been censored. However, Elbit's invite does say: “We have the Private Dining Room at the back of the restaurant — suitably discreet and private.”

The “hospitality information” also shows that Elbit took Mike Cooper, a well-qualified engineer with a long MoD history, to a number of meals, including breakfast and dinner. Cooper is the “Senior Responsible Officer for the Training and Synthetics Group within Army HQ.” A number of the meals happened at the “ITEC2” conference in Rotterdam in April 2023, a conference on military simulators and training.

So there was a Rotterdam dinner which Elbit described as “a good opportunity to introduce our team to you informally and get to know each other better.” Elbit told Cooper that “dress is not prescriptive” at the meal “but we tend to be “relaxed.”

Arms spending has a privileged position in our system — witness Rachel Reeves cutting disability benefit to boost arms spending. There are big reasons for this: Keir Starmer claims he is increasing defence spending while cutting benefits because “national security is the first duty of the government.”

Our most recent active military engagements — Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya — show that “national security” often means “projecting power” in ill-thought-out neo-imperial adventures — but that is where our leaders like to spend most. The top military officers also welcome high spending on glamorous, powerful military kit.

But there are also smaller, linked reasons for arms spending getting priority: arms firms are very active in employing former military top brass and former ministers. They are also very active in offering hospitality to current top brass and serving ministers. This relentless schmoozing helps ensure arms spending comes first, even if the arms end up being overpriced, poorly functioning, or used in pointless military adventures.

Follow Solomon Hughes on X @SolHughesWriter.