Brit troops must be ready ‘to fight and win’ to stop Putin, says top army chief
Vladimir Putin's thinly veiled threats to the West and continuing aggression in Ukraine has prompted the UK's top Army chief to say the country's forces must be on high alert.
General Sir Patrick Sanders, the Chief of the General Staff warned that Britain’s armed forces must be prepared to “fight and win” to prevent the spread of war in Europe.
The new head of the Army has not minced his words in a speech made today (June 28), and likens the current situation to the run up to the Second World War, according to PA.
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Britain must be prepared to “act rapidly” to ensure it is not drawn into a full-scale conflict through its failure to contain Russian expansionism, General Sanders will warn.
His latest warning, in an address to a conference organised by the Royal United Services Institute think tank, comes after he wrote to all the troops under his command telling them they must prepare “to fight in Europe once again”.
Defence Secretary Ben Wallace is to issue a fresh call for increased defence spending in the years ahead to counter the growing threat.
His call comes as Prime Minister Boris Johnson prepares to join other NATO leaders in Madrid for a summit at which they are expected to agree the biggest overhaul of the Western military alliance since the end of the Cold War.
It also comes amid repeated comments from Putin about Russia's nuclear capabilities, and readiness to use them in the West.
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“In all my years in uniform, I haven’t known such a clear threat to the principles of sovereignty and democracy, and the freedom to live without fear of violence, as the brutal aggression of president Putin and his expansionist ambitions,” General Sanders said.
“This is our 1937 moment. We are not at war – but must act rapidly so that we aren’t drawn into one through a failure to contain territorial expansion.
“I will do everything in my power to ensure that the British Army plays its part in averting war.”
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