Self-inflicted wounds are the deadliest

A British battleship was once a sign of national pride; today a destroyer represents a billion pounds stolen from social services.  Victor Davis Hanson

The Guardian looks at the the Royal United Services Institute's report on Britain's armed forces that includes this harsh assessment:

The UK will never again be a member of the select club of global superpowers. Indeed it has not been one for decades.

Of absolutely no surprise is the Guardian banging on in paragraph two about how it's mostly due to the cost of replacing Trident–even though we could replace Trident every year on what the Government sends to Brussels for no return whatsoever.

"Never again" isn't quite true.  If you define superpower as the United States (the only member of the club), then no, Britain won't match it.  The United States is on literally a higher order of magnitude.  However, in 2004, Britain was the second most powerful nation on Earth–even if it was a distant second.  It had a combination of wealth, culture, science, diplomatic power and capacity for force projection that only the USA exceeded–and Britain had access to American intelligence and technical knowledge not available to anyone else.  That's a position that Britain can reattain.   All  it requires is a commitment by the government to defence,  admitting that the Socialist experiment is a failure and telling the European Empire to go back to the other side of the Channel and stay there.

In other words, to once again become a nation of free men.

That's the easy part.  The hard part is regaining the national pride and confidence that is the most essential element of a civilisation's survival.