The Economist has announced that Major General Alex Turner will become its next defence editor, replacing Shashank Joshi. Turner, reports his new employer, brings more than 25 years of operational experience, deployments across multiple conflicts and senior leadership roles within the British Army.
There is, of course, a long tradition of former military officers joining the less honoured ranks of Fleet Street. Perhaps the good general will bring the sartorial discipline of the Mess into the newsroom.
Whether he will bring an eviscerating eye for the scrutiny of power and defence, though, is another matter entirely.
After all, from 2020 to 2022, Turner commanded 77th Brigade, the British Army’s specialist information warfare formation. He reportedly led “the Army’s information activities formation” during a period when concerns about military involvement in information operations, online influence and domestic narratives were attracting growing public attention.
77th Brigade was established in 2015 to bring together psychological operations, media operations, behavioural analysis and digital engagement capabilities under one command. Named after the Indian Chindits of the Second World War, the brigade has repeatedly been described by the Ministry of Defence as focused on “non-lethal” methods of warfare. A less generous framing might characterise it as a unit dedicated to shaping public perceptions and influencing media behaviour with an eye towards supporting the so-called military-industrial complex.
The brigade’s activities have certainly attracted controversy over its brief years of operation. During the Covid-19 pandemic, this author reported that personnel from 77th Brigade were involved in monitoring online discussion related to government policies. Although the Ministry of Defence insisted that the unit was not targeting citizens and was focused on identifying misinformation, the distinction between foreign information operations and domestic political discourse seemed to have become blurred.
General Turner’s past life matters given he has become one of the most influential voices in the defence ecosystem because the contemporary information environment is now itself a battlefield. Militaries increasingly view narratives, public opinion and media ecosystems as strategic terrain. The purpose of information operations is not merely to communicate facts but to shape how audiences understand events.
To be clear, the role of a defence editor is not simply to report military developments. It involves framing such conflicts, selecting their sources (and perhaps in penning our concerns here, AOAV might fall off the list of General Turner’s potential new voices), determining what constitutes credible evidence and helping readers understand war and the military-industrial complex at large.
Can someone so steeped in years of military service be able to step outside the walled garden of self-affirmation that exists in the defence world and offer the (relatively) impartial eye that The Economist has built up a reputation for?
The Economist has long cultivated a reputation for independence, scepticism and rigorous scrutiny of power. Yet appointing a recently serving senior officer, whose responsibilities included overseeing influence operations, raises legitimate questions about how defence journalism is evolving.
Certainly the space between defence journalism and those knee-deep in profiting from the industrialisation of defence is thin indeed. This month, AOAV reported that nearly 60% of retired senior British military officers with commercial links to the defence and security industries were, at least once, presented in UK media as independent experts without disclosure of those interests. Examining 33 former senior officers who appeared in media coverage between 2015 and 2026, we argued that news organisations have repeatedly failed to provide sufficient transparency about commentators’ financial and professional ties, undermining informed public debate on defence, war and national security.
His appointment raises some interesting questions, then. How should readers assess reporting produced by individuals whose recent careers involved the management of military strategic communications and state influence campaigns? Where can the line be drawn between editorial independence, military expertise and institutional affinity?
So yes, The Economist may be gaining a highly knowledgeable defence editor. His contacts book will be much envied.
Why does this matter? Because the way wars are understood by the public can shape the way they are fought. Media coverage influences public opinion, political decision-making, military spending and support for armed interventions. If defence reporting becomes overly reliant on voices drawn from the military establishment, there is a risk that the perspectives of those most affected by conflict, particularly civilians, receive less attention. Civilians are often the primary victims of modern warfare, yet their experiences can be overshadowed by narratives focused on strategy, technology and national security. Defence journalism serves an important public function when it not only explains how wars are conducted, but also examines their consequences for the communities that live through them.
Perhaps Turner will prove an unusually independent voice. Yet the burden rests with him, and with his new employer, to demonstrate that the instincts of influence, persuasion and institutional loyalty have been left behind. In an age when narratives have become weapons and information itself is treated as a battle-zone, readers are entitled to ask whether those once tasked with shaping perceptions are the right people to explain reality.
The hope is that Turner becomes more willing to engage with those who question the military-industrial complex’s assumptions. A defence editor’s task is not simply to describe war. It is to examine the interests, incentives and consequences that sustain it, and to illuminate the point at which defence can become something altogether darker.
We welcome his call.
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