Richard Knighton

Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard John Knighton KCB, born 1969, became the United Kingdom's Chief of the Defence Staff in September 2025 after a career in the Royal Air Force that included commands across strike, intelligence, and joint operations. At the London Defence Conference on 10 April 2026 he told Sky News that Whitehall is rebuilding the Government War Book, a civil-mobilisation framework dating to the First World War and abandoned in the early 2000s, citing both Ukraine and the Iran conflict as drivers.

Knighton's public profile prior to the War Book announcement was largely institutional: he succeeded Admiral Sir Tony Radakin as CDS in autumn 2025 and sits atop the integrated structure of the UK armed forces. His Sky News intervention was notable precisely because senior British military figures rarely use operational planning language in public. The phrase "Government War Book" carried specific doctrinal weight, signalling an institutional decision rather than rhetorical positioning.

The announcement came one week before the Ministry of Defence hosted a 30-nation Strait of Hormuz planning conference at Permanent Joint Headquarters Northwood on 22 April 2026, which Knighton's command structure co-ordinated alongside Defence Secretary John Healey. The simultaneous UK commitments to the Ukraine supply line and Hormuz planning illustrated the breadth of operational demands on the CDS role at this moment.