Why is Putin really trying to interfere in the UK election?

Who says Britain is no longer a Great Power? To those of a declinist cast of mind, it must stand as a rebuke that, even with everything else on his plate, Vladimir Putin still regards our elections as worth interfering in. And, what’s more, those elections are so important that the Aussies are taking enough of an interest in them to consider that Russian interference newsworthy.  

At the same time as it’s heartening that the Australian Broadcasting Corporation considers this a big deal it’s also, I suppose, a little dismaying that our own Broadcasting Corporation didn’t seem to notice. But there we are. ABC uncovered what it thinks looks like a Russian influence operation in the form of five ‘co-ordinated’ Facebook pages pushing out propaganda for Nigel Farage’s Reform party.