Army chief: Public face call-up if UK goes to war

Troop cuts mean military is too small to fight against Russia on its own, warns Sanders

THE British public will be called up to fight if the UK goes to war because the military is too small, the head of the Army will warn today.

Gen Sir Patrick Sanders will use a speech to stress the need for the Government to “mobilise the nation” in the event of a conflict with Russia.

With the British Army reduced to its smallest size for centuries, The Telegraph understands Gen Sir Patrick, who has been critical of troop cuts, wants men and women to be prepared for a call-up if Nato goes to war with Moscow.

It comes after a Nato military official warned that private citizens should prepare for an all-out war with Russia in the next 20 years, which would require wholesale change in their lives. Adml Rob Bauer said that nations needed to be prepared to “find more people if it comes to war”, and to consider “mobilisation, reservists or conscription”.

Gen Sir Patrick would not support conscription, it is understood, but believes there should be a “shift” in the mindset of British people, where they think more like troops who are mentally prepared that a war could happen.

Gen Sir Patrick, who will stand down as Chief of the General Staff in six months, will make his speech today at the International Armoured Vehicles conference in Twickenham.

In 2022, he used a speech to warn that the UK was facing its “1937 moment” over the war in Ukraine, and said Britain must be ready to “fight and win” to ward off the threat from Russia.

Vladimir Putin is on the front foot in Ukraine and has tripled Russia’s military expenditure, while Nato is struggling to replenish weapon stocks it has given to Kyiv.

Yesterday, the chief of Norway’s armed forces said the country must increase defence spending in the face of a potential war with Russia within three years, following its neighbour Sweden in urging citizens to brace for conflict.

Yesterday, Grant Shapps, the Defence Secretary, met the Ukraine Defence Contact Group, where he urged others to join the UK in increasing aid spending. This year, the UK plans to raise its contributions to £2.5 billion.

The UK spends 2.5 per cent of GDP on defence, and Mr Shapps has said he would like to increase this to 3 per cent, though he failed to set a date for the target. Cabinet tensions over defence spending have emerged as Penny Mordaunt, the former secretary of state, warned Mr Shapps that Britain’s national interests were at risk unless the Navy kept pace with hostile nations.

All three armed forces are experiencing a recruitment and retention crisis, with the number of fully trained soldiers in the Army set to fall to 72,500.

The number of regular troops in the Army stands at 75,983, although defence sources insisted applications for the Army were at the highest they had been in six years. The Navy is struggling to hire more than the other force, with just 29,000 full-time recruits.

It comes as the military struggles to retain female personnel amid a sexual harassment crisis in the sector.

HALF of the Russian missiles fired at Ukraine yesterday evaded air defences as Kyiv struggled to cope with the threat posed by ballistic missiles.

Eighteen people were confirmed killed and 130 more injured by the longrange barrage across the war-torn country, authorities said.

Oleh Syniehubov, Kharkiv’s governor, said five of the dead and 51 wounded were in the eastern city, where 30 residential buildings had been damaged in the strikes.

Rescue workers sifted through the rubble for survivors, Ihor Terekhov, the city’s mayor, said.

In Kyiv, high-velocity projectiles struck apartment blocks and non-residential, as the Ukrainian capital was awoken by the sound of air raid sirens.

Ukraine’s air force said air defences shot down 21 of the 41 Russian missiles, which were also aimed at Pavlohrad, in the Dnipropetrovsk region.

Twenty of the missiles were downed in the skies over Kyiv, the capital’s military administration said.

Officials said 22 people, including three children, had been wounded across at least three districts of the city.

Some of the damage occurred next to the United Nations office, resident coordinator Denise Brown said.

Russia has escalated its long-range barrages on cities and civilian infrastructure since late last year.

Its forces have taken to using more ballistic missiles, which can travel at speeds of more than 2,000 mph, to evade Ukraine’s complex web of Soviet and Western air-defence systems.

Moscow has recently been accused of using ballistic missiles newly-acquired from North Korea to carry out a number of these attacks. Ukrainian forces have had success in taking down ballistic missiles with the Us-supplied Patriot and the Franco-italian Sampt/t systems, analysts said.

But given Ukraine’s limited supply of the systems and their associated missiles, Russia has been able to attack areas less densely protected by the shield they provide.

“Interception rates vary dramatically based on the munitions the Russians use,” Jimmy Rushton, an independent analyst in Kyiv, said. “Ballistics are extremely difficult to intercept and Ukraine only has a few systems – Patriot, Samp/t – that can intercept them, and they can only be employed in a limited number of locations.

“If the Russians fire them at areas that aren’t defended by one of these scare systems, they can’t do much to stop them.”