Britain has just refused to be the USA’s and Germany’s sacrificial lamb. Last week, we reported how both Washington and Berlin made the UK to bell the Russian cat but backed out when it came to providing long-range strike support to Ukraine.
According to a report in the Times, UK will provide long-range support to Ukraine only if it gets backing from the US. The UK says that its action is still bound by the US guidance system, which is essential to ensure the missiles hit their targets.
So, UK has smartly put the ball in USA’s court now, making it clear it is not willing to take the Russian bullet alone. According to US sources, President Joe Biden has not yet made a final decision. On UK’s part, it’s a big U-turn. Just last week, when UK foreign secretary David Lammy arrived in Kyiv, he reportedly gave Ukraine the nod to use long-range Storm Shadow missiles inside Russia.
A thrilled Ukraine wasted no time in providing UK with a list of potential targets in Russia, which featured command centers, fuel and weapons depots, and places of concentration of troops among others.
Later on, UK found itself in Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s line of fire as both US and Germany announced they were not planning to give approval to Ukraine.
UK’s nod to provide long-range support to Kyiv antagonised Russia big time. Last week, Putin expelled six UK diplomats after accusing them of espionage and threatening Russia’s national security. Then, Dmitry Medvedev, former Russian president and a prominent Kremlin figure, issued a provocative statement. He said Russia will ‘sink’ the tiny island called Britain. He said, “The island called Britain is likely to sink in the next few years,” and added that Russia’s hypersonic missiles could make that happen “if necessary.”
But the biggest warning to UK came in the form of a Russian flotilla.
On September 13, The UK Ministry of Defense issued an urgent press briefing. The ministry said a massive flotilla of Russian vessels and warships, including a submarine, was spotted in UK waters. The UK’s Royal Navy, stunned by Russia’s bold action, scrambled its HMS Iron Duke to shadow the Russian vessels.
Russian fleet remained in international waters, adhered to laws and exercised the right of innocent passage.
But the message from Moscow was loud and clear: UK is not far away from Putin’s warships and missiles. UK should know what it’s subscribing for by backing Ukraine to launch strikes in Russia. It’s only after these threats that UK is now timidly declaring that it will not go it alone.
Sergey Mironov, a Russian lawmaker, recently described how since the World War 2, the UK has remained involved in subversive work aimed at changing the government in Russia.
The Russian MP said, “For centuries, this was the case: the UK either directly tried to harm Russia, or tried to use it against a common enemy, as during the World War II. At the same time, the British have always tried to sit on their island with impunity. But times have changed – modern military and information technologies allow not only to expose spies, but also to strike back. Explicit or implicit, but no less painful.”