A British former Nato chief
said last night there will ‘never be peace in Europe’ while Vladimir Putin remains
in charge of Russia and called for ‘massive rearmament’ in the West.
Speaking at the Chalke Valley
History Festival, which is sponsored by the Daily Mail, General Sir Richard
Shirreff said Western armed forces – including those of Britain – had been ‘cut
to ribbons’ as a result of ‘successive complacent thinking’ in the past 15
years.
General Sir Richard, who was
the deputy supreme commander of Nato when Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimea
region in 2014, likened the current situation to the months leading up to the
Second World War and said Western nations have to push for the ‘defeat of
Putinism’ and the ‘defeat of the Putin regime’.
This will require ‘massive
rearmament’, he added, but warned that the Russian president has to leave
office to avoid further conflict.
‘There will never be peace in
Europe while Putin is in the Kremlin or while the Putin regime is in the
Kremlin. We are now back where many of your fathers, my father, my mother were
in 1938,’ he said.
‘And many of your grandparents
were in 1938. We are facing a blood-stained autocrat in the Kremlin who has
brought the politics of iron and blood back to Europe, inflicted unspeakable
suffering on a democratic peaceful neighbour in order to satisfy his political
ends.’
The retired general was
speaking ahead of next week’s meeting of Nato members in Madrid, where
Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky will address leaders.
General Sir Richard’s
criticism of defence cuts in recent years come as the Army is set to make
further cutbacks which could see troop numbers fall to 73,000.
The plans were outlined as
part of a defence review last year and were criticised in April by the then
chief of the Army, General Sir Mark Carleton-Smith – who has since been
replaced by General Sir Patrick Sanders.
General Sir Richard was
speaking yesterday after the publication of his 2016 book War With Russia: A
Menacing Account.
He warned in the tome that
Russia would invade Ukraine and then focus on states in Eastern Europe. His
claims were savaged by figures including the then Foreign Secretary Philip
Hammond.
Addressing a huge outdoor
audience at Chalke Valley, near Salisbury, General Sir Richard said the 2014
invasion of Crimea – which he said fell ‘like a ripe plum into Putin’s hands –
should have been the ‘strategic wake-up call’ that Western nations needed about
Putin’s intentions.
He said it gave the Russian
president a ‘clear run’ that led up to his invasion of the whole of Ukraine in
February.
General Sir Richard praised
the effectiveness of Ukrainian forces in defending their country from Russia’s
attacks, but warned that their current losses – which he put at up to 200
soldiers killed in action each day – are unsustainable.
