The obsession with Russia in the defence review is wrong. The real risk is from fascists wherever they come from, and Russia is a long way from being the only threat in that case.
This is the audio version:
This is the transcript:
Who is going to defend us from fascists? I ask the question because the UK has had a defence review, and the underlying assumption of this defence review is that the great threat that we face is Russia.
Now that's been the underlying assumption of every single defence review in the UK since 1945. And so far, Russia has not launched an attack on the UK.
I'm not saying it won't.
I'm not saying it will not launch attacks on our neighbours, because clearly it has on Ukraine. And it might on the Baltic States, for example, and we are allies of these places.
But my point is that Russia has changed dramatically in that period, and that the state that we now face is not the state that we did until the time of the fall of the Communist Party in the USSR, as it then was.
Now we are facing a fascist state.
Then we faced a communist state.
To pretend that they're the same is completely untrue, and to pretend that Russia is the only threat in the world because it is currently a fascist state is as untrue.
If fascism is really the biggest threat that we face, as personified by Russia at present, but as it was personified by Germany in 1939, we are not naming our enemy correctly if we say it is Russia.
The enemy that is the greatest threat to the UK is a fascist state, and fascism is on the rise everywhere in the world right now.
Donald Trump is, in my opinion, a fascist. What he's doing in the USA by removing human rights, by removing the rule of law, by undermining democracy, by threatening judges, by expelling people, by falsely imprisoning people, by removing their right to protection under the law; all of that is the action of a fascist.
And we have fascists in Europe.
We have fascists in Hungary.
We have a far-right leader in Italy.
We have a far-right political party that looks to be remarkably close to being neo-fascist in the UK, in the form of Reform. And the Conservative Party aren't very far away either these days.
These things are, all of them, collectively, a threat to people in the UK. Our freedoms, those things that it is said that people fought for in World War II, our right to free speech, our right to be who we are, our right to decide our futures, our right to reflect diversity and equality and inclusion in our societies, the right to protest, whatever it might be; all of those things that we stood up for, they are all in jeopardy right now.
Even the Labour Party has people in it who say we should ignore diversity, and inclusion, and equality because Reform has, and therefore Labour must as well. But, to do that is to acknowledge that fascists are right, because fascists are the people who promote the idea that we should live in a white, male-dominated world. That's one of the core ideas within that political philosophy, and it's even in Labour.
So, shouldn't our defence review be naming the real enemy of freedom in the UK, because the role of government is to protect our freedoms.
It's not to protect the geographic space.
It's not to say that come hell or high water, we are right.
The role of government is to protect our freedoms, to be who we want to be, and fascism is threatening that.
So where's the UK policy for defence against the USA, or against Hungary, or against the risk that is now developing once more in Poland, or anywhere else, come to that?
That is what worries me. We have a defence review that names Russia as if it is the single ogre in the world, when it isn't. And I'm also ignoring all the problems that exist in Asia, because they are massive as well, and fascism is alive and well there as it is in Europe and in America.
Put all that together, and we have a defence review that, to me, simply doesn't record correctly who the enemy's going to be that we've got to defend ourselves against. And as a consequence, it's actually targeting all the wrong things.
Will 12 submarines defend us from fascism? My suggestion to you is that it won't.
But cyber defence will.
Having a proper politics will.
Upholding the rule of law will.
Making sure that we have a functioning democracy will.
Making sure that we can explore these ideas around the world will.
Supporting our soft power through having a proper overseas aid policy will.
Making sure that we bring foreign students here so they can see the advantage of all of this will.
But building submarines won't.
Defence is something that I believe in, but I believe in defending the rights of people, and this government, with its defence review, is, I think, failing us badly because that's not its criteria for success.
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What about a proper investigation into external interference in UK politics in this century.
In particular who funded Brexit?
Rumour has it that the establishment sometimes makes up threats in order to spend on military might, and to colonise countries in order to steal their minerals and resources. The USA has been the leader in empire building over the last 80 years, having learnt their lesson from the British.
Further reading
The Secret Team: The CIA and Its Allies in Control of the United States and the World by L. Fletcher Prouty (2011) https://amzn.eu/d/dDjvTwJ
The Invisible Doctrine: The Secret History of Neoliberalism (& How It Came to Control Your Life)
by George Monbiot and Peter Hutchison (2024) https://amzn.eu/d/gfJcnxG
The Global Coup d’État: The Fourth Industrial Revolution and the Great Reset (2025) by Jacob Nordangård. https://amzn.eu/d/hEQrg5b
Fourth paragraph, do you mean ‘Baltic States’?
Yes
Having lived through the 70s and 80s as an adult, the threat of nuclear war is further away than in the early 80s but I would concur that the threat of fascism – and internal war – is very close. The USA currently is trembling on the edge of armed response to ICE raids, and no doubt Trump will use any of those, or fabricate something, to declare a state of emergency etc. The UK is not there yet, but false flag operations or manufactured provocations of vulnerable individuals are not beyond the UK secret services. We already have selective actions against those perceived against the state’s involvement in genocide; socialists are on the Prevent list; it’s not a far stretch to declaring groups as internal security threats.
Sounds like the UK government is planning on a conflict in the artic sea after all the ice has melted. We aren’t going to stop climate change, are we?
Putin updated Russia’s navy doctrine in 2022. It seems we are responding to him. Russia was meant to have constructed 4 aircraft careers by 2023, it hasn’t. It is all talk. What they have constructed are submarines.
Russia/Putin see the world’s oceans as some kind of lebensraum.
You are making the point that defence cannot be seen just as a matter of hardware. I completely agree. Defence should be part of a properly integrated strategy involving economics, politics and diplomacy. Perhaps we need a specific foreign policy review?
However, a defence review has got to focus on the mix and deployment of forces. It is not an either-or situation between political factors and forces in being.
Having scanned the review, it does mention other areas of threat and involvement around the world. Any significant involvement outside Europe can only be as part of an alliance.
It does mention cyber warfare but the review is lacking in hard numbers.
We import about 36% of GDP of which 90% comes by sea. We do need a contribution to western naval forces. Other allies can do more in other areas. That’s the advantage of an alliance system. Russia may not be even the main threat here.
Deterrent submarines have to be well away from the role of hunting enemy warships. Seven SSN -so called ‘hunter killer subs’ is a modest total as some will be under maintenance or in transit to operational areas. The French are the only other European country to have SSN.
We need statesmen or stateswomen who are capable of seeing the big picture and communicating it the population. I don’t see much of that.
Let me try to get this straight. The Government will very substantially increase Defence spending claiming to protect us, while at the same time, through an unnecessary austerity programme, they are attacking the poorest and most in need, and actually causing them harm and distress. And they want our support. Over the top, chaps!
You summarise it well
“Follow me, lads! I’m right behind you….”
Excellent video and thanks for articulating your thoughts so eloquently – sadly our anaemic democracy like that in the USA is on life support and I cant see enough people willing to turn things around; it is also useful to have an enemy – at the end of the cold war the next enemy became the muslim population so well explained by Peter Oborne in “Why the West is Wrong about Islam”.
The video has not done that well.
Does YouTube not promote this sort of thing? I am beginning to wonder.
I see you’re too much of a moral coward to respond to my query regarding Islamic extremism, the very obvious danger it represents to the UK and why you refuse to say anything about it. It’s real. The head of MI5 says that 75% of it’s work is to counter Islamic terror threats.
Fine. You’ve said that evil flourishes when people do nothing.
Maybe next time there is a far-right terror attack, you can say “told you so”.
But the next Islamic terror attack? The blood will be on your hands. I hope you’re proud of yourself.
Why did I ignore your comment?
Because it is so very obvioiusly Islamophobic, and I am not.
I condemn all terrorism wheover does it.
Prejudice can only foster it.
And you are exactly not the sort of person we need to address any such threat.
Don’t call again.
We were sitting in the front porch with the front door open yesterday after getting home from my trip to the dentist. We heard a heavy aircraft noise, it wasn’t very high from the sound, but the clouds were lower, so we didn’t see it. Probably around 1.30 pm or a bit later, didn’t look at the time.
Looked it up on Flightradar24, and it was an RAF plane – basically from what we understand from its description – a spy plane that had come down from Scotland I think. Circled over Liverpool John Lennon Airport, then headed off to who knows where! Flightradar can only give info on what it gets, and it wasn’t getting this. While we were watching it on the app it seemed to be heading roughly West. That means nothing of course – might double back or whatever. I’m so sorry, I can’t remember what kind of aircraft it was exactly. But the sound of it really alerted us to something really big going over.
So I think that maybe some surveillance is going on. Shrugs. I don’t know.
Oh, and as to your comment on this video not doing well – I guess most people would rather not think about stuff like this. Unfortunately I think that we should. So *Thank You* Richard. 🙂
Yes, there was an almighty sonic boom over Caernarfon at about that time yesterday. We see (and hear) many planes from RAF Valley, but apparently yesterday’s plane was a USAF sonic jet with an accompanying refuelling plane. It really was quite terrifying I thought a plane had crashed.
Talking of fascists, I see Sir Kier has again pronounced (suggesting that regardless of the circumstances) there will be “No Scottish Referendum on Independence on my watch.”
Sounds pretty fascist to me.
I can’t imagine this (not my) PM instigating a ‘war’ against the very fascism he seems intent on upholding.
Too late. We are already in a fascist state.
Agreed