Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 25 August 2023. © Richard Kemp

Those predicting the decline of Russian influence in Africa after Yevgeny Prigozhin’s suspected assassination could not be more wrong. Mateusz Morawiecki, Poland’s prime minister, is right to think that, under Putin’s direct control, Wagner will become even more effective – and more dangerous. He was talking about the threat in Eastern Europe, but the same applies elsewhere in the world, especially Africa where Wagner has fuelled instability, bolstered authoritarian regimes and plundered natural resources.

We don’t yet know how Wagner will be restructured or led in the post-Prigozhin world, but those are second order questions. The most important fact is that the group’s malignant political, military and economic activities will undoubtedly endure. They are far too valuable for Moscow to allow them to wither, given the group’s ability to insert itself in key strategic regions and fuel anti-Western sentiment. To see how effective this has been, just look at the influence they have over the government of Mali.

As commercial contractors, Wagner fighters are able to project Russian military force where its open use would be politically impossible. Economically, too, the group is crucial, generating huge revenues for the Kremlin war chest from gold, diamonds and other minerals, often smuggled out of Africa to evade Western sanctions.

As the war wears on, Moscow will need not only to maintain these activities but also expand them, and getting rid of Prigozhin may have helped to enable that. It removes a man who had become too powerful and allows Putin to secure greater loyalty from African governments that he maintains in power with the help of Russian mercenary services. That Prigozhin, even after the aborted coup, was allowed to meet national leaders and diplomats at last month’s Africa-Russia summit in St Petersburg is a testament how seriously the Kremlin takes this matter.

In many cases, African leaders are firmly locked in to their proxy relationships with Russia, whoever is in charge. An adviser to President Faustin-Archange Touadéra of the Central African Continue reading →

Article published in The Sunday Telegraph, 19 August 2023. © Richard Kemp

Nato appears to have abandoned hopes of a Ukrainian victory. Speaking in Norway, secretary general Jens Stoltenberg’s chief of staff, Stian Jenssen, said that a peace deal might involve Kyiv ceding territory to Russia in return for Nato membership.

His comments sparked fury in Ukraine, and rightly so. While Jenssen later apologised for the way he had expressed his views, he did not retract them. Stoltenberg’s subsequent insistence that peace talks will happen on Kyiv’s terms will not have quashed suspicions that Jenssen has revealed how the West really sees the war.

A recent US intelligence assessment indicated that Kyiv’s counteroffensive will fail to achieve its objective of cutting Russia’s land corridor to Crimea. The gloomy conclusion drawn by some is that despite ongoing offensives by both Russia and Ukraine, neither side will make gains of strategic significance.

The answer to this apparent stalemate is not to pressure Ukraine into conceding Russian annexation of its land, but to change the facts on the ground. That can only be done by redoubling efforts to supply Kyiv with sufficient combat resources to drive Russia out, if not this year then next.

Yet two years after the ignominious retreat from Afghanistan, the West seems again to be on the brink of embracing defeat. A peace deal on these terms would mean victory for Russia and defeat for Ukraine. How could surrendering territory to the aggressor be anything else?

We must instead give Kyiv the support that we have failed to provide so far. The latest reports from Washington tell us nothing new. They only confirm identical assessments made in February, which predicted that shortfalls in equipment and force strength would lead to the failure of the counteroffensive. Continue reading →

Article published by Ynetnews.com, 11 August 2023. © Richard Kemp

Iran is clearly Israel’s number one security threat — but it may come as a surprise that it is also Britain’s. With its nuclear weapons program and network of terrorist proxies in Lebanon, Syria, Gaza, Judea and Samaria and elsewhere, the danger from Tehran has long been understood in Israel.

Now the Sunday Times has revealed that UK Home Secretary Suella Braverman believes Iran to be the biggest threat to Britain’s national security. Even more so, it seems, than the growing hostility from Russia since the UK so strongly backed Ukraine following Putin’s invasion last year.

In February, the Metropolitan Police Service, Britain’s policing lead on counterterrorism, reported that 15 Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) terrorist plots against Iranian dissidents and British citizens had been identified in the UK during the previous year. Braverman believes the IRGC is stepping up its activities even further, including attempts to recruit organised crime gangs to target regime opponents.

Iran’s terrorist targeting of the UK and British interests elsewhere goes way back. Several years ago, when I worked in British intelligence, we knew that IRGC cells in the UK were actively laying the groundwork for terrorist attacks on our own soil, as well as elsewhere in Europe, both against dissidents and to be launched in the event of a major US or Israeli attack against the Iranian nuclear programme.

In 2015, Israeli intelligence enabled British security agencies to disrupt a bomb factory in north-west London, including three tonnes of ammonium nitrate, that had been set up by Iran’s terrorist proxy Hezbollah under the direction of the IRGC. Turned into explosives this material would have been enough to kill hundreds of people. During the campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, the IRGC and its proxies killed large numbers of British soldiers as well as over 1,000 American and allied troops. Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 7 August 2023. © Richard Kemp

While all eyes are on the land war in Ukraine, the greater strategic prize for Kyiv could well be found in the war at sea – something quite remarkable for a country without a conventional navy. In two days, two major Russian ships have been hit by maritime attack drones, both operating in the vicinity of Novorossiysk, Russia’s main Black Sea oil port which exports 600,000 barrels a day.

They illustrate both Russia’s vulnerability at sea and the potential opportunity to inflict severe economic damage on Moscow. This was particularly true of the attack on the oil tanker Sig, thought to have been sailing to Feodosia on the Crimean coast to load a cargo of jet fuel. Damaging or even sinking vessels like the Sig and the Olenegorsky Gornyak will have an impact on Russian military logistics, but the consequences go well beyond that.

Just hours before the Sig was hit, the Ukrainian State Hydrographic Office issued a warning that the whole of Russia’s Black Sea coast, from Taman to Sochi, was now a ‘war risk’ zone to all ships. That followed a declaration from Ukraine’s ministry of defence in July that all vessels heading to Russian controlled ports on the Black Sea may be treated as carrying military cargo.

Perhaps that was considered rhetorical payback for Moscow’s threats against shipping headed to Ukrainian seaports. But backed up by the two drone strikes in a few days – with perhaps more to follow – the latest warning could be enough to deter many civilian cargo vessels from plying to any port in the designated area, inflicting a severe shock on Russia’s economy.

To understand the extent of this threat to Moscow, just follow the oil exports. They have become the lifeblood of Russian government revenues. The oil trade – mainly to China and India – generates the foreign currency needed to keep the rouble in equilibrium. And for all the talk of Russian pipelines, Putin is still reliant on Black Sea Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 30 July 2023. © Richard Kemp

ime is not on the side of the Ukrainian armed forces in their long-running counter-offensive. They are battling not just against the strongest Russian defences but also the clocks of eastern European weather and US electoral politics.

Despite frustration at the slow pace of Ukraine’s advance, no one can question the need for extensive ‘battlefield shaping’, in military language, before attempting to break through the heavily defended Surovikin line and striking deep into Russian controlled territory. After all, before attacking into Iraq in 1991, the US-led coalition conducted a shaping air campaign that lasted almost as long as the Ukrainian advance has so far.

Denied any comparable ability to soften up enemy defences with airpower, Ukraine’s preparation has had to rely on reconnaissance in force, missiles and artillery to whittle down front line positions and hit headquarters and supply lines while probing for weaknesses to exploit with ground forces. Now it looks like the Ukrainians have identified the most favourable axis of attack, from south of Zaporizhia towards Melitopol, and they seem to be committing elements of the Nato-equipped and trained 10th Operational Corps. Of the various options, that would be the most productive, potentially enabling Kyiv to break Russia’s land corridor from the east, isolating Crimea and cutting off forces in the west of the country.

But if and when Ukrainian troops succeed in smashing through the first line of defences – which they have not yet achieved – the road ahead will be very long and very bloody. They face mile after mile of obstacles including tank traps, barbed wire and minefields, plus dug-in infantry, pillboxes, machine guns, tanks, artillery fire, combat planes, attack helicopters, drones and missiles.

War is more unpredictable than any other human activity, and no one, not even those directing events in Kyiv or Moscow, can possibly Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 21 July 2023. © Richard Kemp

With no significant breakthrough after six weeks, it is worth asking whether Ukraine’s counter-offensive can ever succeed, for it certainly doesn’t look to be succeeding now.

Compare the glacial but costly progress today to the lightning victories at Kharkiv and Kherson last autumn. Back then Kyiv’s forces were advancing against a withdrawing enemy that was pulling back to redeploy troops, trading space for time. Having now built up their forces through mobilisation and dug extensive defence lines, this time the Russians aren’t going anywhere.

That has left Ukraine with one option: launching frontal attacks against heavily defended positions, almost akin to the Western Front in World War I where trench lines ran continuously from Switzerland to the sea, with neither side achieving a decisive breakthrough for four years. Such an outcome today would leave Kyiv vulnerable to shifts in Western opinion, given the possibility of a Trump presidency or European fatigue. This is something President Zelensky must be aware of; and it is perhaps causing great consternation.

The question to be asked is: are the Ukrainians prepared – militarily, politically, financially – to carry out months and potentially years of these attacks to penetrate 1914-18 style defensive belts of tank traps, barbed wire, minefields, bunkers and trench lines? The UK Ministry of Defence has described these Russian fortifications as ‘some of the most extensive systems of military defensive works seen anywhere in the world’.

In the south, which appears to be Kyiv’s main effort at the moment, the terrain is mostly open farmland, with few covered approaches, making surprise, which is a critical factor for success in war, virtually impossible. That lack of surprise only compounds Kyiv’s combat inferiority. Continue reading →

Article published in The Daily Telegraph, 17 July 2023. © Richard Kemp

With the counteroffensive in its sixth week, still moving slowly and at considerable cost but without any significant territorial gains so far, Ukraine was in need of a tangible success. That was delivered in last night’s dramatic attack against the Kerch Bridge, the longest in Europe and a major symbol of Putin’s power.

The crossing is one of the most heavily guarded objects under Russian control anywhere, beefed up after it was damaged last year, apparently by a vehicle bomb. Hitting a bridge protected by land, sea and air is a notoriously difficult military feat, even in the era of precision strike. Yet Ukrainian forces have demonstrated they have that capability, reportedly attacking this time with naval drones. The strike makes it clear that there is no safe place for important Russian targets in occupied Ukraine, even far from the front lines.

The Kerch hit was much more than just symbolic. The bridge is an important logistic artery for Russia, delivering troops and combat supplies into Crimea and so to the front lines in mainland Ukraine. Only the roadway seems to have been damaged in this attack. But this strike has shown that the railway spans, which carry the greater volume of combat supplies, are also highly vulnerable, and cutting the road will have had a measurable effect on Russian supply lines.

The only other ground route from Russia to the primary southern battle zone is via the ‘land bridge’ along the north coast of the Sea of Azov that was seized in the early months of the war. Supply lines through this corridor have also been attacked by Ukraine, but there are severe limitations. GMLRS missiles (usually fired from the Himars vehicle) cannot cover the whole land bridge. The Ukrainians have only small stocks of Storm Shadow cruise missiles with their greater range.

Hitting Russian logistics hard is vital to Ukraine’s counteroffensive as it reduces Russia’s combat power on the defensive lines that must Continue reading →

Article published by Ynetnews.com, 14 July 2023. © Richard Kemp

From December last year until this March, Russian-Israeli PhD student at Princeton University Elizabeth Tsurkov was carrying out academic research in Iraq, in her words ‘a country where pro-Iranian militias operate freely, carry out assassinations in broad daylight, blackmail people.

She is now, according to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in the hands of the most dominant of those militias, Kataib Hezbollah, who reportedly kidnapped her in Baghdad four months ago. Kataib Hezbollah is designated as a terrorist group by the US, has conducted lethal attacks against American targets in Iraq and Syria, and fought alongside other Iranian proxies to prop up the Assad regime. It has a long track record of kidnap and murder in Iraq and has made repeated violent threats against Israel.

Like its counterpart Lebanese Hezbollah, which helped train and arm the group following its formation in 2003, Kataib Hezbollah is funded and directed by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force, an organ of the Iranian government. Its management body includes representatives from the IRGC and Lebanese Hezbollah. It is also substantially funded by the Baghdad government and is an integral element of the Iraqi security forces. Despite that, its primary allegiance is to Iran and it has frequently refused orders from Baghdad and threatened Iraqi political leaders.

This means that even if Iraq’s Prime Minister Mohammed Al Sudani demands Tsurkov’s release, it is Tehran that will call the shots. Although he will likely have known of her kidnapping for the last four months, the fact that she remains in captivity may mean he has been overruled.

On the other hand, perhaps he has no interest in securing the release of an Israeli ‘enemy’ because of the damage that would do to Continue reading →