“Together we’re strengthening NATO and boosting our cyber defences,” said Defence Secretary John Healey at RAF Lossiemouth, where he and Germany’s Boris Pistorius marked the first anniversary of the UK–Germany Trinity House Agreement on 23 October 2025. The pair were expected to join an operational sortie on an RAF P‑8A Poseidon, the submarine‑hunting aircraft that anchors Britain’s North Atlantic watch.

The latest move is a fifth “Lighthouse” project under the pact, linking the UK’s new Cyber and Specialist Operations Command with Germany’s Cyber and Information Domain Service through a secure cloud so data, tools and intelligence can move in real time among allies while fending off attacks. London and Berlin will also tighten protection of NATO logistics and transport networks from cyber threats.

In the coming months a German Navy P‑8A will stage through Lossiemouth for side‑by‑side operations with the RAF in the North Atlantic. Germany took delivery of its first Poseidon in early October, bringing the Marineflieger closer to routine deployments alongside UK crews based on the Moray Firth.

What happens in Lossiemouth lands on factory floors across Britain. Since the agreement was signed in October 2024, German firms have pledged £800 million for UK defence over the next decade, with 600 skilled jobs spread across Telford, Swindon, Plymouth and London.

Rheinmetall’s new plant in Telford will restart UK gun‑barrel production for the first time in a decade. The company expects more than 400 jobs directly and via the supply chain, with steel from Sheffield Forgemasters feeding the line.

For South Yorkshire, the supply chain is already lining up. “I am delighted to confirm that Sheffield Forgemasters is working to reinstate gun barrels manufacture…,” chief executive Gary Nutter said when the pact was signed last year - a statement that now looks prescient as the Telford facility moves ahead.

Further south, Helsing will open a Resilience Factory in Plymouth to build SG‑1 autonomous underwater gliders - part of a £350 million UK investment flagged this summer and tied to the Plymouth & South Devon Freeport. The company has since moved to acquire Australia’s Blue Ocean to speed up subsea production.

Two more German announcements round out the picture: ARX Robotics plans £45 million and 90 high‑skilled jobs for uncrewed systems, while Stark will open its first site outside Germany in Wiltshire, creating about 100 jobs to build drones.

On the kit list, London and Berlin intend to buy Sting Ray lightweight torpedoes together, and officials say work is rapidly progressing on a Deep Precision Strike weapon with a range beyond 2,000 kilometres, alongside fresh agreements on bridge‑building equipment for land forces.

For readers in the North, the message is straightforward: patrols from the Moray Firth and new cyber links are only half the story - steel poured in Sheffield and components machined across Northern and Midlands workshops will decide whether this partnership turns into steady work, apprenticeships and export orders over the next decade.