UK BRACED FOR RUSSIAN CYBER REVENGE

BRITAIN was braced for a Russian cyber attack last night as officials warned of swift retaliation for the military strikes on Syria.

Intelligence officers at Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) and the Ministry of Defence are on standby to hit back if the Kremlin wages cyber warfare.

Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson acknowledged the threat yesterday, saying the UK had to take ‘every possible precaution’.

It is feared vital transport systems, water supplies, gas networks, banks, hospitals and even air traffic control could be hacked by Russia in response to the assault on Bashar al-Assad’s chemical weapons facilities.

Intelligence sources also fear the retaliation could involve the online release of so-called ‘kompromat’ – compromising information on MPs or other public figures.

Last night, the Pentagon said there was a 2,000% increase in the number of Russian trolls spreading Kremlin propaganda in the hours after the air strikes. As the fallout from the military action intensified:

US President Donald Trump defended his hailing of the air strikes as ‘mission accomplished’ while the US prepared to announce more sanctions on Russia.

Graphic pictures showed how Assad’s facilities were destroyed by a barrage of 105 missiles from Britain, France and the United States;

The Mail can reveal that military chiefs were so concerned about a Russian counter-strike on a RAF base in Cyprus, that they kept two jets back from the air strikes;

It emerged that Russia was duped into launching a military operation to find a British attack submarine that never made it within strike range of Syria;

In the hours after the strikes, Moscow’s ambassador to the US, Anatoly Antonov, said: ‘The worst apprehensions have come true. Our warnings have been left unheard. A pre-designed scenario is being implemented.

‘Again, we are being threatened. We warned that such actions will not be left without consequences. All responsibility for them rests with Washington, London and Paris. Insulting the president of Russia is unacceptable and inadmissible.’

Russian President Putin condemned the strikes as an ‘act of aggression against a sovereign state’ and accused the US and its allies of violating the ‘norms and principles of international law’.

He even accused America of having ‘staged chemical attack against civilians’ as a ‘pretext’ for the attack.

One Russian politician compared Mr Trump to Adolf Hitler.

Alexander Sherin said he ‘can be called Adolf Hitler No2 of our time – because, you see, he even chose the same time [of night] that Hitler chose to attack the Soviet Union’.

A Russian resolution at the UN Security Council condemning the air strikes was soundly defeated on Saturday night. Moscow gained support from only two countries, China and Bolivia.

Four council members – Ethiopia, Kazakhstan, Peru and Equitorial Guinea – abstained, while the remaining eight members voted against. At the same time, British Prime Minister Theresa May has faced considerable criticism for not recalling the UK parliament to gain approval for the action.

Tory MPs returning from recess this week have been told they have to be in the House of Commons in case there is a vote on her handling of the Syria crisis.

Last night, however, Downing Street officials said they believed a vote was unlikely to take place, although they did not rule out the possibility that opposition parties could force one later in the week.

Mrs May will invoke the Salisbury poisonings, saying that military action was essential to help deter any future use of chemical weapons ‘on the streets of the UK’.

Moscow has already launched repeated online assaults against the UK and intelligence chiefs fear they have the capability to hack into certain critical systems.

Whitehall sources said yesterday Russia was carrying out cyber attacks against the UK ‘all the time’. One added: ‘What is clear, both offensive and defence cyber capabilities are now a reality.’

And one security source told The Sunday Times: ‘We know what’s in the Russian playbook – kompromat-type material – we’re all prepared for that.’

‘Set Assad’s stockpiles back many years’