I am writing this from Warsaw, where I am attending a meeting NATO conference.
The military, security and political figures here have been clear to me about their fear of this Vladimir Putin – which loses another 6,000 troops Ukraine every month than he can recruit, according to Western intelligence, is seriously considering doing something crazy.
“It’s a matter of when, not if,” as a senior Baltic security source put it to me last night.
In short, the concern is that Putin is about to stage a direct ‘provocation’ with a NATO country, most likely one of Estonia’s Baltic states. Latvia or Lithuania.
The most chilling theory is – thank goodness – no direct invasion triggering World War III. Instead, it is a false flag operation in which Russia would secretly kill its own citizens, as shocking as that may sound, as a pretext for taking action against NATO.
For example, ‘Ukrainian’ drones could be flown to civilian targets in the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, which is sandwiched between Lithuania and Poland on the Baltic Sea. Putin could falsely claim that such an attack was launched by Ukrainian forces from one of those two NATO countries – which would in turn be his excuse to attack Ukrainian forces supposedly hiding there.
The target itself would be unimportant: it could be an empty building or a few tents near a NATO base.
No troops or civilians need be injured. But the Russian people would be told that their forces had successfully attacked a Ukrainian unit and that a ‘warning’ had been sent to NATO.
Vladimir Putin is losing 6,000 more Russian troops in Ukraine every month than he can recruit
Andy Burnham, pictured with Volodymyr Zelensky, struggles with the defense budget
In this way, Russian military actions in and against the West would be normalized for the first time.
For any readers who think that killing his own people would be out of the question even for Putin, the terrible fact is that he has almost certainly done it before. In 1999, he apparently ordered the planting of bombs in four apartment buildings in three Russian cities, an atrocity that killed more than 300 people.
Just as Hitler set fire to the Reichstag in 1933, blaming the fire on a “communist conspiracy” and using it as a pretext to seize absolute power in Germany, the apartment bombings paved the way for Putin to become an all-powerful Tsar, unleashing the second Chechen war, censoring the domestic media, stealing the assets of his political rivals, and throwing his enemies in jail.
But even if Putin didn’t go as far as a false flag operation, he could try something else. For example, he could claim that there was a “humanitarian crisis” in Kaliningrad, making up the story that Russians were starving there while he inflicted hardship on them by secretly blocking supplies to the exclave.
This, he said, could only be solved by sending large numbers of Russian troops to help. He could order them to march into Kaliningrad from Russian-controlled Belarus.
But since Belarus does not share a land border with Kaliningrad, troops would have to cross Lithuania via the 40-kilometer Suwalki Gap: the shortest path between Belarus and Kaliningrad, crossing Lithuanian and Polish territory.
Once again, the Russian armed forces would operate directly on NATO territory for the first time.
Earlier this year, the German armed forces carried out precisely this second scenario. In that simulation, America refused to intervene publicly, Germany took no action, while Poland mobilized its troops but did not send them across the borders.
The conclusion of that war game? Putin succeeded in destroying NATO’s crucial Article 5 clause on ‘mutual defence’, endangering Eastern European countries and achieving a crucial victory.
Finally, there is a third option: a major non-military ‘hybrid’ attack using Russia’s well-developed cyber and sabotage capabilities. This could include, for example, targeted assassinations through hired proxies, or attacks on Western power plants, water treatment centers, submarine cables, hospitals or other critical infrastructure. The aim would be to paralyze society and sow division and unrest.
Last year, the Kremlin’s digital thugs hacked Jaguar Land Rover’s computer systems. The attack closed the company for five weeks, affected 5,000 other businesses and cost the British economy £1.9 billion. Now imagine this being repeated for days or weeks on end in the NHS, in banking and pensions, in food retail.
The next Pearl Harbor may not be an attack on our military preparedness, but on the resilience of our society.
All that should be alarming enough. But as our world becomes more dangerous, our new Prime Minister seems to be concerned with gimmicks like cheaper buses or small cuts in VAT on fuel bills.
Andy Burnham deals with the most important issue of our time: the defense of the empire.
At Prime Minister’s Questions this week, he was called by MP Tan Dhesi Work chairman of the defense committee, telling him that “vibes” would not defend our island – a criticism of his boss’s incessant social media campaigns.
Burnham may be dangerously complacent, but others in Europe have seen the light.
Poland has rapidly increased its military budget, the Baltic republics are taking action and even Germany is investing billions in rearmament. Why then is Britain giving up its military leadership role in Europe?
In fact, we learned yesterday that Burnham plans to pay billions from Britain’s shrunken defense budget to hand over the Chagos Islands to Mauritius, a Chinese ally, in one of the most cowardly national submissions I have seen in my life.
The Prime Minister appears equally committed to the hated Northern Ireland Veterans Act, which will force brave ex-servicemen through the courts under often false pretenses: a policy that Labour’s own ex-Armed Forces Minister Al Carns has rightly declared ‘unfit for purpose’.
Tory leader Kemi Badenoch gets it and promises to cut the bloated social bill, scrap the Chagos sell-off and increase our defense spending to 3 percent of GDP by 2030.
She understands that the purpose of rearmament is not to fight, but to deter. Should she win the next general election, which may be much sooner than Burnham claims, there will still be a lot to do.
First, we lack conventional weapons. The dismal state of the Royal Navy is an embarrassment to our seafaring nation. We are desperately short of tanks, planes and troops, and we need a larger reserve.
Second, drones, especially those equipped with AI and swarm technology, are rapidly changing the way modern wars are fought. Our capabilities here lag far behind those of Ukraine and Russia.
Third, the “hybrid” integration of military and non-military tools, including civilian satellite intelligence and advanced software, will further dictate warfare.
As a former Tory MP, I am ashamed of the way my party cut back on defense when in power. I’m very happy that Kemi is turning things around, realizing how much still needs to be done.
Deterrence is expensive – but is always cheaper, in lives and money, than fighting. Every day Burnham delays, he risks a terrible reckoning.
Dr. Bob Seely MBE is the author of The New Total War
