October 1, 2023 - 4:45pm
The UK Defence Secretary Grant Shapps announced today that Britain is deploying RAF Typhoon fighter jets to Poland, pre-empting a possible Russian incursion into Eastern Europe.
Speaking at the Conservative Party Conference in Manchester, Shapps vowed to support “our Nato ally from the growing threat of Russian interference”. With Poland’s election taking place later this month, the minister claimed that this timing “is the most powerful way of showing Putin that this Conservative government will protect democracy and freedom from any despotic tyrant who threatens our allies”.
Shapps’s comments follow an interview published this weekend with the Sunday Telegraph, in which he outlined plans to increase military support and training for Ukrainian forces. While the UK is currently western and central Europe’s biggest military spender, the Defence Secretary suggested to the newspaper that the Government’s current target of devoting 2.5% of GDP to defence is a “staging post” on the route to an even larger figure.
Reiterating this goal at the Party Conference, Shapps said, playing on Neville Chamberlain’s famous 1938 speech about why Britain should avoid intervening in Hitler’s annexation of the Sudetenland, that Ukraine is “not a far-off country of which we know nothing”. Extending this expression of solidarity to Poland, he stated that “landing today, British pilots will join in exercises with Polish and other allied air forces in a powerful display of Nato’s commitment to defencing democracy.” He added that Poland requested the move.
After initial support, Poland has cooled in its Ukraine stance, a development reflected in its declining foreign aid, while both President Andrzej Duda and Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki have in recent weeks made comments suggesting that Volodymyr Zelenskyy should not take help from the neighbouring country for granted. Morawiecki stressed that Poland would focus on arming its own troops, rather than using up a large portion of its defence budget on the Ukrainian military. Duda went further, comparing Ukraine to a “drowning person” and adding that “a drowning man is extremely dangerous, capable of pulling you down to the depths.”
Shapps told the Sunday Telegraph that British troops could be deployed to Ukraine for the first time in the war, and during his speech on Sunday claimed that he wanted the UK to be “at the very heart of Nato”. In addition to the jets, he also announced that hundreds of British troops would be deployed to Kosovo in the next few days to reinforce the Nato peacekeeping mission ongoing in the country, in what he called a “powerful demonstration of our Armed Forces’ unparalleled capabilities and expertise”.
Fears of Russian “interference” in Poland follow warnings earlier this year that Vladimir Putin has the Baltic states of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia in his sights. “As Conservatives, we will always put our nation’s security first,” Shapps said in Manchester, “and that means our support for Nato is unwavering”.
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SubscribeThe contradictory narratives of Shapps and co are mind boggling.
Earlier this week Shapps essentially said Russia was on the back foot, its strategic objectives for 2023 spiked, and its Ukraine ambitions defeated. Today he says Putin also has his sights on Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. How is that feasible?
Let’s be clear: Russia is struggling in Ukraine. Russia is fighting a traditional land war with artillery. Spearheading a move into Latvia, Lithuania or Estonia would take months of military build-up and be visible to the whole world, armchair generals and real generals alike.
There is no need to station a few RAF Typhoons in Poland to pre-empt a threat from Russia. The USAF has a dozen F22s and more besides already in Poland. This is ad hoc political posturing for home consumption, which does the opposite of presenting a strong and strategic defence plan for Poland. Voids such as Shapps shouldn’t be anywhere near government. Luckily, his time is nearly up. Worryingly, the replacement isn’t any better.
How can anyone take someone like Grant Shapps seriously, we don’t even know if thats his real name
I’d forgotten about his “Michael Green” alias. He truly is a man of many faces. You can see how he endears himself to the Sir Humphreys, willing as he is to do their bag carrying.
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another MP with the Whiff of WEF
Neocon more like
The move into Ukraine took months of military buildup, which was visible to the world, but too much of the world refused to believe the evidence of their eyes. The narrative is not at all contradictory, You’re thinking like a Westerner, not like Putin. We should have all learnt that lesson by now.
Or maybe our leaders wanted Russia to feel forced to invade? It is degrading them militarily and economically, and the western rich are making money off the taxpayers back whilst the masses are paying for all these weapons purchases gifted to Ukraine
Tory Party Conference – bit of macho nonsense from Defence sec. Hardly new is it.
It’s not designed to be a week of carefully considered policy assessment and formulation.
A very foolish and dangerous speech by Mr Shapps. Hopefully everyone will ignore him, and RAF pilots will have some fun at taxpayers expense, and then fly home safely,
I wonder what the majority of Polish citizens think about this escalation of the war with their country being made a target
Who is “ interfering” in the Baltics? If you foolhardy Brits think that America will ever commit ground forces to Poland or Eastern Europe, then you are sadly mistaken. American mothers simply will not send their sons to die on the eastern front and neither will anyone else. So quit with the tough guy act. We know you guys are really a bunch of weenies and you’ll run as soon as the mushrooms start to sprout.. We will be glad to help with some past date artillery ammo. Injoy you little war, tata.
I wish I could agree with you, Micah, but it is not farfetched to think that the Moron-currently-occupying-the-Whitehouse will someday try, at the very least, to commit US forces to fight in Ukraine. The US is already in this simply because said Moron is neck-deep in Kiev-based corruption.
He may be sending the Jets to Poland so the future transfer to the Ukraine is faster, maybe the Ukranians will start training the day the jets arrive
It’s the US taxpayer that has overwhelmingly funded the war