The Mail on Sunday reported that Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown is planning cuts in the defence budget that will require manpower to be slashed by as much as 15,000, with four of the Army's 40 battalions scrapped and six of the once-mighty Royal Navy's 30 warships taken out of commission.

The British finance ministry, known as the Treasury, dismissed the claims and said the spending review would provide sufficient funding to ensure that the armed forces were equipped for the tasks facing them.

"Far from cuts, the 2002 spending review delivered the biggest sustained increase in defence spending for 20 years and on top of that, we have met in full the cost of campaigns in Iraq, Afghanistan and the war on terror," said a Treasury spokeswoman.

"We are ensuring, and will continue to ensure, that our armed forces are best equipped to do the job we ask of them," she added.

A Ministry of Defence (MOD) spokesman said that the result of the latest spending round was not yet known, and any report on its impact on the armed forces was "purely speculative".

According to the newspaper, the proposed cuts would require Royal Air Force (RAF) numbers to be cut from 49,000 to 39,000, with at least one air base -- probably Coltishall in Norfolk, east England -- closed and 41 Jaguar planes axed.

The Navy will lose four Type 42 destroyers and two Type 23 frigates, the paper claimed.

The Army would lose also four infantry battalions, bringing its strength down from 103,000 to 100,000, according to the report.

"We don't know the results of the spending review and nor does the Mail on Sunday," an MOD spokesman said. "I think this is purely speculative."

"We will wait and see what the outcome of the spending review is before we make any judgment on it."

WAR.WIRE