Top NATO chief warns UK facing ‘real risk’ of WW3 with Russia | Politics | News

A senior NATO official has said there is a “real possibility” that the UK could go to war with Russia. James Appathurai, NATO’s Under-Secretary-General for Innovation, Hybrid and Cyber, said: “There is a real risk of war. We’ve heard that from our intelligence chiefs, from our political leaders in Europe. And to make sure war doesn’t happen, we need to be strong. The best deterrent would be to be capable.”

But he said Britain did not currently spend enough on defense to be ready to defend itself. Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer confirmed this week that Britain plans to send British troops to Ukraine if the current Russian occupation ends. He emphasized that this can only happen if there is peace in Ukraine and that MPs will discuss and vote before troops are sent. But the plan raised questions about what would happen if Russia continued to attack Ukraine. All British soldiers are in the country.

British armed forces also supported the US seizure of a Russian-flagged oil tanker in the North Atlantic on Wednesday. Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s government called the raid illegal, and Andrei Klishas, ​​a politician from President Putin’s party, called it a “blatant act of piracy.”

Mr Appathurai told Times Radio: “The UK is taking it from the government’s point of view. Policies are changing. Money is being put in there. But […] Money isn’t flowing fast enough to the defense industry yet. I just got out of an argument an hour ago and this really confirmed this.

“This is a moment of real risk and there will be a debate encouraged by the Russians behind the scenes. We need to step on the gas. We don’t have the capabilities we need.”

US President Donald Trump‘s threat to seize Greenland, part of the Kingdom of Denmark, raised questions about the future of NATO; Some experts predict that the US-led military alliance will end if Trump launches military action against NATO member Denmark.

Denmark has welcomed a meeting with the United States next week to discuss President Donald Trump’s new call for the strategic, mineral-rich Arctic island of Greenland to be brought under American control.

“This is the dialogue that is needed, as the government has requested together with the Greenland government,” Danish defense minister Troels Lund Poulsen told Danish broadcaster DR on Thursday.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday that a meeting on Greenland would be held next week, but did not provide details about the timing, location or participants.

“I’m not here to talk about Denmark or military intervention. I’ll meet with them next week, we’ll have those discussions then,” Mr. Rubio told reporters on Capitol Hill.

Greenland’s government told Danish public broadcaster DR that Greenland will participate in the meeting between Denmark and the United States announced by Mr. Rubio.

“There is nothing about Greenland without Greenland. Of course we will be there. We are the ones who requested the meeting,” Greenlandic foreign minister Vivian Motzfeldt told DR.

The island of Greenland, 80 percent of which lies above the Arctic Circle, is home to approximately 56,000 people, the majority of whom are Inuit.

US vice president JD Vance said on Wednesday that Denmark had “clearly” not done a proper job of securing Greenland and that Mr Trump was “willing to go as far as he had to go” to defend American interests in the Arctic.

In an interview on Fox News, Mr. Vance repeated Mr. Trump’s claim that Greenland is vital to the national security of both the United States and the world because “the entire missile defense infrastructure is partially dependent on Greenland.”

He said that just because Denmark was a staunch military ally of the United States during World War II and the recent “war on terrorism” did not mean they were doing enough to secure Greenland today.