BRITAIN faces war with Russia within the next five years, the previous head of the British Army has warned.
Former Chief of the General Staff General Sir Patrick Sanders, 59, said the UK must accept that armed conflict with Vladimir Putin by 2030 is a “realistic possibility”.
Gen Sir Patrick, who retired from the military last year, cautioned that the Army is currently too small to survive more than the first few months of such a war.
And he added that he did not know how many more “signals” ministers needed to realise it must strengthen the nation’s defences.
He said: “If Russia stops fighting in Ukraine, you get to a position where within a matter of months they will have the capability to conduct a limited attack on a Nato member that we will be responsible for supporting, and that happens by 2030.
“I don’t know what more signals we need for us to realise that if we don’t act now and we don’t act in the next five years to increase our resilience … I don’t know what more is needed.”
The former rifleman fell out of favour with the Government while leading the Army for being seen as too outspoken against troop cuts.
It was announced under the previous government that the Army would be reduced from just over 80,000 personnel as of October 2020 to 72,500 by 2025.
Gen Sir Patrick said: “At the moment, the British Army is too small to survive more than the first few months of an intensive engagement, and we’re going to need more.
“Now the first place you go to are the reserves, but the reserves are also too small.
“Thirty thousand reserves still only takes you to an army of 100,000.
“You know, I joined an Army in the Cold War that was about 140,000 regulars, and on top of that, a much larger reserve.”
Gen Sir Patrick said he was disappointed the Strategic Defence Review published last month “didn’t touch on this at all”.
Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves last month committed to the defence budget rising to 2.6 per cent of the UK’s GDP by April 2027.
And PM Sir Keir Starmer pledged the UK would spend 5 per cent of GDP on national security within 10 years, with 3.5 per cent of that amount going to core defence matters.
But Sir Gen Patrick said that during his time at the head of the Army there had been unsuccessful “conversations” with the government about building bomb shelters for civilians and underground command centres for the military to prepare for an attack.
He said: “It always came down to a conversation of it being too costly and not a high enough priority and the threat didn’t feel sufficiently imminent or serious to make it worth it.
“Finland has bomb shelters for 4.5 million people. It can survive as a government and as a society under direct missile and air attacks from Russia. We don’t have that.”
Despite the biggest threat coming from Russia, Gen Sir Patrick also warned that Iran could act through proxies “to attack British interests in the UK”.
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