In an effort to further expose Vladimir Putin’s “lies,” Liz Truss today vowed to declassify more MI6 intelligence on Russian activity if she becomes prime minister next month.
If she moves into Number 10, the Foreign Secretary, who is widely expected to win the ongoing Tory leadership contest, assured her that Ukraine would have “no greater ally” than Britain.
Since Russia’s most recent, brutal invasion of Ukraine six months ago, Ms. Truss has maintained that “Putin cannot prevail” through his military offensive.
Today also commemorates Ukraine’s independence from Soviet rule, which occurred 31 years ago.
Britain “was one of the first countries to recognise Ukraine’s independence,” the Foreign Secretary remarked.
She continued by saying that the UK was “now leading the way in supporting our friends in their fight to prevent Putin from turning the clock back through force of arms.”
Ben Wallace, the defence secretary, claimed that Russia was in a “very fragile position” and had already lost about 80,000 of its armed forces in the six-month conflict. Mr. Wallace is backing Ms. Truss in the race for the Tory leadership.
The Ministry of Defense has widely disseminated intelligence on the buildup of Russian troops and the success or failure of their advances throughout Russia’s full-scale attack on Ukraine this year, which started on February 24.
This has been done to combat Russian misinformation regarding the invasion’s objectives—the Kremlin has consistently only referred to it as a “special military operation”—which has been the focus of the invasion.
If she is elected prime minister on September 6th, Ms. Truss promised in an article for the Daily Telegraph that she would go even further to “expose Putin’s playbook to the world.”
With the help of our international partners, we will continue to step up our efforts to combat Russia’s and other authoritarian regimes’ attempts to sow confusion and undermine global stability by using disinformation.
“As prime minister, I will go further by doing everything I can to expose Putin’s playbook to the world, including declassifying more intelligence,” he said.
“My government will strategically use intelligence to expose the Kremlin’s efforts to undercut and destabilise freedom-loving democracies,” it said.
“Lies will be exposed, and barbarism will be called out where it exists.”
“I will counter malign activity from potentially hostile states and others who threaten global security with the same tough approach,” he said.
Ms. Truss reaffirmed her commitment to raising UK defence expenditure to 3% of GDP by 2030 and called Russia’s invasion of Ukraine a “sharp dose of reality for the free world.”
Should she succeed Boris Johnson in Downing Street, she also reiterated British backing for Ukraine.
The Foreign Secretary said, “If I become prime minister, I will do all I can to make sure the torch of independence in Ukraine continues to burn bright.”
“Putin cannot win.” The UK will be President (Volodomyr) Zelensky’s greatest friend at this difficult time under my leadership.
According to rumours, Ms. Truss is thinking of making a trip to Ukraine one of her first official actions as president as a way to publicly support Kiev.
Speaking on the Today programme on BBC Radio 4, Mr. Wallace said that Russia’s halting progress in Ukraine could now be gauged in “metres per week, not miles.”
The Defence Secretary said, “It is grinding in limited areas of the nation in an effort to advance—completely contrary from the three-day special operation that it proclaimed at the outset of this, six months ago.”
“We very much agree, well, we do accept, the type of assessments of Russian casualties to be over 80,000 of their military troops, if you mix fatalities, wounded, and desertions.
That’s 80,000 in six months as opposed to the 15,000 they lost in Afghanistan over a ten-year period.
“I believe that Russia is now in a very precarious situation.”
Mr. Wallace said that Ukraine is placing itself in that situation in an effort to regain land that Russia still controls.
He said that Ukrainian soldiers’ morale was “leagues ahead” of that of their “poorly-trained” Russian foes.
Although the Defence Secretary stated “we can toughen up the requirements,” he opposed the notion of a general ban on Russians receiving UK visas.
I don’t like seeing Russian senior officials’ spouses or billionaires’ wives having fun in Greece or the south of France, or on big boats throughout the globe,’ he said. “Their army is committing war crimes in Ukraine.”
I believe it to be extremely incorrect.
In an open letter published today in the Kyiv Post newspaper, Ms Truss’s opponent for the Tory leadership, ex-chancellor Rishi Sunak, also assured Ukrainians of continuous UK assistance.
He wrote: ‘Whatever the changes occur in our nation, we Brits will always be your biggest ally.
In order to guarantee that you have access to food and medicine, we will continue to provide humanitarian help. We will also continue to house your loved ones until they can return home securely and sleep comfortably.
“And when they do, I pledge that the UK will be a steadfast ally and assist Ukraine in reestablishing itself as the successful, aspirational nation you are.”