There is growing concern that support for Ukraine could be waning and Poland’s national security agency last week said Russia could attack Nato in three years’ time if Putin is allowed to prevail. So, the UK’s gifting of two Royal Navy minehunter ships is tactically, as well as strategically, significant, and sends a strong message to the rest of Nato that we must do everything to prevent a wider war in Europe.
The maritime offensive by Ukraine has been far more dynamic than the land battle and the innovative use of long-range attack drones has scuttled the Russian Black Sea fleet’s domination of Crimea and Ukrainian ports, which, vitally, has allowed to grain to keep flowing out of Ukraine and money flowing in. So successful has this been that the Russian Navy has had to flee to ports in Russia, where it can no longer have a significant impact on the war.
These UK minehunters will enable a free flow of commercial shipping into Odessa and elsewhere, but, probably as significantly, they can enable Ukrainian forces to attack directly into Crimea, and get behind the vast Surovkin defensive line, which is creating a stalemate in the mud of the land battle.
The UK and Norway are leading in developing the Ukraine navy into a most effective defensive and offensive force. With the help of the the Dutch, 1,000 marines are being trained in littoral or coastal operations, which could be significant in turning the Russian attackers.
These ships will put Turkey very much in the spotlight too, as it will have to let them through the Bosporus. Istanbul has hitherto been disinclined to do this, but Turkey is a Nato country that has been a little too close to Russia and needs to decide where its true loyalties lie – and quickly.
We are coming to a stage in this war in Europe, where countries like Hungary need to come off the fence too. Russia is now getting on a “total war” footing, with 30 per cent of GDP to be spent on weapons and a never-ending stream of Russian menfolk to be thrown into the meatgrinder, with no concern of the casualties that now sit at a staggering 350,000. Those in the West, and in particular Europe, need to assimilate this Russian move and quickly too, because if we do not provide Ukraine with all the hardware and software it needs to defeat Russia in Ukraine, we will be likely to be at war with Russia, as predicted by Poland in the next few years.
President Zelensky is on his way to Washington, where support to Ukraine post-23 December is in doubt. These ships will be a flip to him and something he can wave at US politicians. Unfortunately, the insularity of the American domestic press is probably insulating the States from the very real prospect of war with Russia. President Putin is, of course, delighted with this, and his disinformation and propaganda machine is at full sail trying to spread disunity among Nato allies, and stirring up Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran to further deflect support from Ukraine.
But if we are prepared to give Kyiv two ships, we should also give it more tanks and persuade the US and Germans to do likewise. If the Ukrainian navy and marines can make significant in-roads into Crimea, there is a chance that an armoured punch of significant strength from the north could link up with these forces and paralyse the entrenched Russians; but they will need a lot more Challenger 2s and Abrams, protected by the F16s, which should be close to the horizon pretty soon.
We are at a seminal moment in the war in Ukraine and the world is too focused on Gaza and not Russia. However dreadful Gaza is, it is not a long-term security threat to the UK, but failure in Ukraine could lead the UK and Nato into direct conflict with Russia. A war like this in Europe could be as devastating, if not more so than the Second World War – nothing, the Covid inquiry, the cost of living crisis, migration or climate change is more important than preventing war in Europe, and Washington and Westminster need to get this now.
Colonel Hamish de Bretton-Gordon OBE is a former commander of UK and Nato CBRN Forces