Moscow

BRITAIN faces war with Russia within the next five years, the previous head of the British Army has warned.

Former Chief of the General Staff General Sir Patrick Sanders, 59, said the UK must accept that armed conflict with Vladimir Putin by 2030 is a “realistic possibility”.

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Gen Sir Patrick, who retired from the military last year, cautioned that the Army is currently too small to survive more than the first few months of such a war.

And he added that he did not know how many more “signals” ministers needed to realise it must strengthen the nation’s defences.

He said: “If Russia stops fighting in Ukraine, you get to a position where within a matter of months they will have the capability to conduct a limited attack on a Nato member that we will be responsible for supporting, and that happens by 2030.

“I don’t know what more signals we need for us to realise that if we don’t act now and we don’t act in the next five years to increase our resilience … I don’t know what more is needed.”

The former rifleman fell out of favour with the Government while leading the Army for being seen as too outspoken against troop cuts.

It was announced under the previous government that the Army would be reduced from just over 80,000 personnel as of October 2020 to 72,500 by 2025.

Gen Sir Patrick said: “At the moment, the British Army is too small to survive more than the first few months of an intensive engagement, and we’re going to need more.

“Now the first place you go to are the reserves, but the reserves are also too small.

“Thirty thousand reserves still only takes you to an army of 100,000.

“You know, I joined an Army in the Cold War that was about 140,000 regulars, and on top of that, a much larger reserve.”

Gen Sir Patrick said he was disappointed the Strategic Defence Review published last month “didn’t touch on this at all”.

Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves last month committed to the defence budget rising to 2.6 per cent of the UK’s GDP by April 2027.

And PM Sir Keir Starmer pledged the UK would spend 5 per cent of GDP on national security within 10 years, with 3.5 per cent of that amount going to core defence matters.

But Sir Gen Patrick said that during his time at the head of the Army there had been unsuccessful “conversations” with the government about building bomb shelters for civilians and underground command centres for the military to prepare for an attack.

He said: “It always came down to a conversation of it being too costly and not a high enough priority and the threat didn’t feel sufficiently imminent or serious to make it worth it.

“Finland has bomb shelters for 4.5 million people. It can survive as a government and as a society under direct missile and air attacks from Russia. We don’t have that.”

Despite the biggest threat coming from Russia, Gen Sir Patrick also warned that Iran could act through proxies “to attack British interests in the UK”.

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THE HAGUE — Aboard Air Force One over the Atlantic on Tuesday, President Trump turned his attention for a brief moment from the diplomatic victory he had brokered between Israel and Iran to one that has proven far more elusive.

“I’d like to see a deal with Russia,” Trump told reporters before arriving in the Netherlands for a NATO summit and referencing his private conversations with Russian President Vladimir Putin over the war in Ukraine. “Vladimir called me up. He said, ‘Can I help you with Iran?’ I said, no, I don’t need help with Iran. I need help with you.”

“I hope we’re going to be getting a deal done with Russia,” Trump added. “It’s a shame.”

It was a rare expression of frustration from Trump with Putin at a critical time in Moscow’s war against Ukraine, and as Ukrainian leaders and their allies in Europe desperately seek assurances from Trump that U.S. assistance for Kyiv will continue.

The president will be at the summit in The Hague through Wednesday, where he is expected to meet with leaders from across Europe, including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. “Now we’re going to NATO — we’ll get a new set of problems,” Trump said of the meetings. “We’ll solve a new set of problems.”

The European bloc hopes to leverage Trump’s jubilation over the outcome of Israel’s war with Iran — which saw its nuclear program neutered and much of its military leadership and air defenses eliminated — into a diplomatic success for itself, European officials told The Times. After ordering U.S. precision strikes against three of Iran’s main nuclear facilities over the weekend to assist the Israeli campaign, Trump announced a ceasefire in the conflict on Monday that has tentatively held.

“The message will be that deterrence works,” one European official said. The hope, the official added, is that Trump will feel emboldened to take a more aggressive stance toward Russia after succeeding in his strategic gamble in the Middle East.

In The Hague, discussions among NATO and European officials have focused on Russia’s timetable for reconstituting its land army, with the most aggressive analyses estimating that Moscow could be in a position to launch another full-scale attempt to take over Ukraine — or a NATO member state — by 2027.

In a text message sent to Trump, screenshots of which he posted to social media, NATO Secretary Gen. Mark Rutte fawned over the president’s “decisive action” to bomb Iran, a decision he called “truly extraordinary.”

“Donald, you have driven us to a really, really important moment for America and Europe, and the world,” Rutte wrote. “You will achieve something NO American president in decades could get done.”

Rutte was referencing a new commitment by members of the alliance to spend 5% of their gross domestic product on defense, a significant increase that has been a priority for Trump since his first term in office.

The matter is not fully settled, with Spain resisting the new spending commitment. “There’s a problem with Spain, “ Trump told reporters on the plane, “which is very unfair to the rest of the people.”

But the new funding — “BIG” money, as Rutte put it — could help appease a president who has repeatedly expressed skepticism of the NATO alliance.

As he spoke with reporters, Trump questioned whether Article 5 of the NATO charter, which states that an attack on one member is an attack on all, in fact requires the United States to come to the defense of its allies.

“There are numerous definitions of Article 5, [but] I’m committed to being their friends,” he added. “I’ve become friends with many of those leaders, and I’m committed to helping them.”

Trump has failed thus far to persuade Putin to agree to a ceasefire against Ukraine despite applying pressure to both sides — particularly against Kyiv, which Trump has incorrectly blamed for starting the war.

In the Dnipro region of Ukraine on Tuesday, 160 people were injured and 11 were killed in a ballistic missile strike by Moscow, Zelensky wrote on social media.

“Russia cannot produce ballistic missiles without components from other countries,” Zelensky said. “Russia cannot manufacture hundreds of other types of weapons without the parts, equipment and expertise that this deranged regime in Moscow does not possess on its own. That is why it is so important to minimize the schemes that connect Russia with its accomplices. There must also be a significant strengthening of sanctions against Russia.”

Assuming a similar strategy to the Europeans, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said in an interview on Sunday that Congress should act to enable Trump with leverage against Putin in upcoming negotiations.

“How does this affect Russia?” Graham responded on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” when asked about the war with Iran. “I’ve got 84 co-sponsors for a Russian sanctions bill that is an economic bunker-buster against China, India and Russia for Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine.”

“I think that bill’s going to pass,” he added. “We’re going to give the president a waiver. It will be a tool in Trump’s toolbox to bring Putin to the table.”