It’s not surprising Russia wants to spy on Britain

The British Army’s Field Army Threat Handbook has warned soldiers of potential Russian espionage at UK sites where Ukrainian military personnel are being trained. Possible methods identified include ‘the use of remotely piloted aircraft systems, mobile and foot surveillance, virtual and physical approaches to training providers and interest from investigative journalists’. This is a threat we should take seriously, but it should also serve to clarify the United Kingdom’s current adversarial relationship with Russia.

There is no shortage of gloomy Jeremiahs in the public arena at the moment, arguing that we are unprepared for a potential major conflict, that the armed forces do not have the resources needed to meet their stated commitments and that Vladimir Putin may be sincere when he talks about Russia’s nuclear weapons capabilities. At the same time, there is a strange, lingering sense of detachment from reality, as part of the public consciousness still basks in a Francis Fukuyama-inspired glow of having won the Cold War and put an end to history.

When three men were charged under the National Security Act 2023 in May for allegedly assisting Chinese intelligence, the political establishment expressed such outrage that the ambassador of the People’s Republic (PRC), Zheng Zeguang, was summoned to the Foreign Office for a meeting-without-coffee with the foreign secretary, Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton.