Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 3 April 2025. © Richard Kemp

A report in the New York Times this week suggests British soldiers have been operating in Ukraine since the start of the war. It describes heavily-armed, plain-clothed British ‘commandos’ escorting a Ukrainian general from Kyiv into Poland for onward travel to an American base in Germany not long after Russia invaded. Assuming this is accurate, those soldiers are likely to have been SAS troops. Whenever British diplomats or intelligence officers are stationed in danger zones, it is standard practice for them to be protected by the SAS, usually out of uniform, and they may also be assigned other tasks if necessary, including the sort of thing described in this article.

The same article goes on to say that the British had placed small teams of officers in Ukraine after the invasion, in contrast to the Americans, who would not allow any of their servicemen to be deployed in the country until much later in the war. Even then, they were restricted to Kyiv for the most part.

The US approach characterised President Joe Biden’s extreme caution over Ukraine, whereas the apparently more free-ranging British presence, albeit no doubt discreet, reflected Boris Johnson’s bullishness. This would have had considerable advantages, enabling our military advisers to gain greater confidence among Ukrainian commanders and leading to an increased ability to influence the course of the war. It would also have given our forces improved insight into the situation on the ground, beneficial in assessing what military assistance was required and how best it could be configured.

Such knowledge was useful to British decision makers and to our allies alike, with whom information and guidance would have been shared. No doubt such activity played a significant part also in helping our politicians and diplomats to rally support among some of the more equivocal national leaders. When he was prime minister, Rishi Sunak only admitted to small numbers of British soldiers being in Ukraine for diplomatic protection, medical training and unspecified other tasks. But the Germans blew the lid off the deployment of our forces to assist in operations involving Storm Shadow cruise missiles donated to Ukraine to fight the Russians.

In April last year, the Kremlin-controlled news agency RT released an intercepted phone conversation between two Luftwaffe generals discussing the British presence on the ground in Ukraine for Storm Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 20 March 2025. © Richard Kemp

President Trump is considering giving up US command of Nato, held by American generals since Dwight D Eisenhower became the first supreme commander 75 years ago. This has further shaken those already panicking about the prospect that Trump might be contemplating pulling out of the alliance altogether. They are right to panic about the state of Nato – but not because of Trump.

We hear never-ending boasts that Nato is the most successful defensive alliance in history. Perhaps it was once, although that was never really put to the test.

I and many other soldiers spent years of our lives manoeuvring armoured divisions across West Germany and rehearsing battles against the Soviet 3rd Shock Army as it rolled across the Inner German Border. It never came, but was that because Nato deterred it or it just didn’t intend to? Certainly Nato is no deterrent to Russian aggression today.

Look at Ukraine. It may not be a Nato member, but when Putin invaded, its defence became Nato’s number one priority. Innumerable summit speeches were packed with hard-charging rhetoric from Western leaders who promised to support Kyiv to the end, and fell over themselves to be filmed with President Zelensky in his besieged capital.

But Churchillian words never measured up to his dictum of ‘action this day’. Yes, lots of military aid poured into the battlefront, but never anything like enough to allow Ukraine to prevail. Putin must have been chuckling to himself and his sycophantic henchmen in the Kremlin, as his threats of escalation and nuclear war scared Nato leaders into stumbling procrastination. No tanks, no planes, no long-range missiles. Then when they eventually plucked up enough courage to gingerly send them, it was too late, too few, and too many restrictions on their use.

As a result it looks likely Ukraine will now end up settling with Russia on Putin’s terms, with 20 per cent of their sovereign territory in his hands.

Weakness provokes. Imagine a new scenario. Having licked his wounds from Ukraine, Putin stirs up the ethnic Russian population in the Baltic republics. Russian militias form in Latvia, take control of Russian population centres and then invite Russia in ‘for protection’. Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 11 March 2025. © Richard Kemp

Polling in Ukraine shows that most people now want the war to end with a peace deal, rather than fighting on to retrieve the land seized by Russia. Recent developments have proved to those who did not already know it, that there can be no victory without dramatically increased support from the US, which did not happen under Biden and is certainly not going to happen under Trump.

They know therefore that Ukraine will have to cede territory, a reality underscored yesterday by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Obviously not trusting Putin, whatever deal he might agree to, Ukrainians want a back-stop from the West. Andriy Yermak, Zelensky’s chief of staff, said today that ‘Ukraine must be given security guarantees that lend credibility to a future ceasefire agreement.’ According to Trump, such guarantees will have to come from the Europeans. The Europeans are not in a position to give any guarantees whatsoever; and Starmer’s proposed peacekeeping force, if it were to happen, would certainly not supply them.

Yarmak also said that Europe must apply economic pressure to prevent Putin returning to the attack by sanctions and seizing frozen Russian assets. European sanctions would count for little without US support and it seems unlikely that governments would be bold enough to take control of frozen assets given the legal difficulties. In any case, despite the voluble rhetoric, they are desperate to get back to business as usual with the Kremlin. After all, since the war began, Europeans have collectively been paying more to Russia in oil and gas revenues than they have provided in financial aid to Ukraine.

Most Ukrainians may simply resign themselves to their fate: loss of 20 per cent of their territory and nothing to stop Putin surging back to the offensive after regrouping his armed forces and rebuilding his economy. But many will not. At the front line I have met several hardened Ukrainian commanders who told me they would never give up the fight against Russia, no matter what the politicians decide. In other circumstances this talk could be dismissed as mere braggadocio.

But such men and their followers in Ukraine today may have far greater power than their predecessors in global resistance movements ever dreamt of. For one thing Ukraine is awash with vast Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 4 March 2025. © Richard Kemp

Sir Keir Starmer rightly says that Vladimir Putin cannot be trusted, and therefore the US needs to provide a security guarantee for any peace deal. What could that security guarantee be? America and Europe have been sending weapons to Ukraine for 10 years, even more so since 2022, and that hasn’t deterred or stopped Russia. It has slowed up Putin’s army and inflicted heavy casualties, but three years on from the full-scale invasion, Russia is still advancing inside Ukraine. Had significantly more munitions been supplied much earlier in the war then the picture today might be different. But that won’t happen now, not even with Starmer’s promised 5,000 air defence missiles. Nor did economic sanctions achieve very much given Western fears of excessive self-harm plus continued unrestrained Russian trade with many countries including China, India and Turkey.

President Zelensky’s number one security guarantee would be membership of Nato but that is off the table. Nor is there any prospect of any country threatening military action in response to Russia breaching a peace deal or launching any further aggression.

Starmer’s and French President Macron’s idea of a security guarantee is sending a European coalition of the willing into Ukraine to ‘defend’ a ceasefire. That could only happen with the consent of Russia. But Foreign Minister Lavrov has repeatedly said that will not be allowed and any Nato forces on the ground in Ukraine will be regarded as combatants and attacked. It doesn’t matter what flag they might fly, they would be seen in the same light. Indeed allowing peacekeepers in would make no sense from the Russian perspective given that Putin’s most oft-repeated excuse for invading Ukraine is the alleged encroachment of Nato towards Russian soil.

Furthermore Starmer and Macron have both made clear that a peacekeeping force could not be committed without a US ‘backstop’, presumably meaning the American cavalry would ride to the rescue if European forces bit off more than they could chew. During his visit to the White House last week, Starmer failed to persuade President Trump to agree to any such thing.

Even if these two apparently insurmountable obstacles could be overcome, does Britain have the military capability to lead the force Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 25 February 2025. © Richard Kemp

Boris Johnson says the UK defence budget should ‘get to 3 per cent [of GDP] by 2030. 2.5 per cent is not enough’. Hang on a minute. In 2022, when he was prime minister, he said 2.5 per cent was enough and he pledged an increase to that amount. And then two years later, with a flourish, Rishi Sunak unveiled exactly the same promise. So what became of Johnson’s earlier undertaking? Is it possible it was only words rather than the action he now demands?

At the time of Johnson’s alleged increase, Labour’s shadow defence secretary, John Healey, attacked his proposal, claiming the increase was required immediately, not in eight years’ time. He was absolutely right, the more dangerous world that Johnson said justified the increase had already engulfed us, not least with Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

But, when appointed defence secretary, Healey’s plans were to get to 2.5 per cent at some undetermined time in the future. Only now, under growing pressure from President Trump, Labour has been forced to bite the bullet and up the budget to 2.5 per cent; still not ‘immediately’, but by 2027.

Even this rise, however, will barely cover the defence equipment black hole between existing commitments and budgetary allocation and will not enable significant additional capabilities.

Those increased capabilities are sorely needed. In the second half of last year we heard two shocking statements from the upper echelons of British defence. In October Healey admitted the armed forces are ‘not ready to fight’. And not long before that the Chief of the General Staff, Sir Roland Walker, said the Army must be ready to ‘fight a war in three years’. The problem with war is that it often comes along when you least expect it and maybe we won’t have those three years. The armed forces should of course be ready to fight and ready to fight immediately.

When it comes to defence our political leaders seem to be like rabbits in the headlights. Even as the war in Ukraine reminded the world how vital conventional defences continue to be, plans to cut our already minuscule Army by over 10,000 men continued apace. Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Mail, 22 February 2025. © Richard Kemp

On first impression, the grime rapper Stormzy has little in common with Field Marshal Lord Kitchener.

But should conscription be reintroduced in Britain, it would be the likes of Stormzy, Ed Sheeran and footballing ace Harry Kane tasked with reprising the moustachioed general’s immortal refrain: Your Country Needs You.

Last week, Sir Keir Starmer said he was ‘ready and willing’ to put British boots on the ground in Ukraine. My first reaction was to laugh. Like it or not, our military is on its knees.

Since the end of the Cold War, successive governments have slashed defence spending leaving us with an army that would struggle to defend Dover let alone hold back a Russian advance over the steppes of eastern Europe.

The British Army currently has just over 74,000 full-time personnel of which around just 20,000 are battle-ready soldiers. Russia, on the other hand, boasts close to 1.5 million active soldiers, making it the second-largest fighting force in the world behind its close ally China. Our army is slightly smaller than that of Romania and slightly larger than that of Armenia.

Considering Ukraine shares an unenviable 800 mile-long border with Russia, any Nato force stationed there would need to be formidably large, highly-skilled and ready to combat Russian aggression at a moment’s notice.

Short of discovering a division or two of soldiers behind the sofa, I’m not quite sure what Starmer is thinking. The British Army is already responsible for maintaining a pair of permanent military bases in Cyprus and a garrison in the Falklands, as well as keeping obligations in the Baltics and other parts of the world. That’s before you factor Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Express, 18 February 2025. © Richard Kemp

Sir Keir Starmer is ‘ready and willing’ to deploy British troops in a peacekeeping force for Ukraine if President Trump’s negotiations with Putin lead to an end of the war. He may be willing but his army is not ready. Since the Cold War it has been run down to less than 75,000 regular troops and is desperately short of tanks and ammunition. Even as Putin advanced across Ukraine the British Army was cut even further with political leaders prioritising health and social welfare above the growing threats of aggression.

Starmer refused to match the Tories’ inadequate pre-election promise of an increase in defence spending to 2.5% of GDP. The harsh reality is that if there is no boost this year, capabilities will have to be cut even further.

In its current state I doubt the British Army would be able to sustain even a contribution of 5-10,000 troops to a peacekeeping force which may need up to 100,000 to effectively police the 800 mile ceasefire lines.

America says it’s out of the game, but what about the EU, recently so enthusiastic about creating its own army? Germany says ‘nein’: According to Chancellor Scholz: ‘It is out of the question for us to send German soldiers to Ukraine.’ Emmanuel Macron in France dismisses the idea of ‘a huge force’ to patrol the buffer zone as ‘far fetched’. Poland too has ruled out participation as has the Spanish foreign minister. The rest seem to be firmly perched somewhere on the fence.

All of these armies, except Poland’s, have been run down in much the same way as the British. And they are all totally reliant on the US, a long standing thorn in the flesh for President Trump. Worse still, their political leaders have allowed Putin’s nuclear chest-beatings to deter them, and that is why Ukraine is where it is today. Fearful of sending adequate weapons to allow Kyiv to defend itself, is it realistic that they will now deploy troops with the muscle to seriously enforce a peace agreement? And if they do, what will happen the first time Putin threatens them?

Image: Number 10/Flickr

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 17 February 2025. © Richard Kemp

After warning European Nato members to stop freeloading on the US, President Trump has contemptuously sidelined Europe from immediate negotiations with Russia over ending the Ukraine war. Whether anything will come of this we don’t yet know. Putin told Trump he is interested in peace but that means nothing and Russia has been stepping up the tempo of its operations on Ukrainian territory in recent weeks.

Although the US special envoy for Ukraine, General Keith Kellogg, has said Russia will have to make territorial concessions and give undertakings against future aggression in Europe, any settlement is likely to end with a frozen conflict roughly along current front lines, with Russia in possession of around 20 per cent of Ukrainian sovereign territory.

Sir Keir Starmer and President Emmanuel Macron seem to be contemplating taking the lead on a non-Nato peacekeeping force to police the approximately 800 mile ceasefire lines if the fighting ends. The Nato Secretary General as well as other military experts have estimated a force of up to 100,000 would be needed. Germany seems unlikely to send troops to Ukraine, fearful of an all-out war with Russia, and Poland has ruled out participation.

So the job would fall mostly to Britain and France. France’s foreign minister Jean-Noel Barrot has said ‘Who will bring the guarantees? It will be the Europeans’. Meanwhile at around the same time, Macron dismissed the idea of a ‘huge force’ to patrol the buffer zone as ‘far-fetched’.

Starmer says he will consider putting British boots on the ground. But how can an army of now fewer than 75,000 regular troops sustain a sizeable force on rotation for a protracted period?

Let’s not forget as well: without an immediate increase in the defence budget, there will have to be further cuts to UK forces this year. Since taking office Starmer has repeatedly equivocated on any increase in both size and time-scale and his Chancellor has pretty much ruled it out. Continue reading →