Ex-NATO chief warns Brits to stock up on list of items to be ‘ready for war’
The UK's former defence secretary who went on to become chief of NATO for several years has told Brits they need to 'move away from peacetime mode' and get ready for the prospect of a war.
Lord Robertson was the UK's defence secretary between 1997 and 1999, and then got the job as NATO secretary general from then to 2003, and has come up with a list of things UK households should have a stockpile of just in case.
He described Brits as 'under-prepared, under-insured, under attack and not safe', and suggested there should be an information campaign so people were 'genuinely aware of the risks and dangers they face'.
According to The Scotsman, he warned people at the Wigtown Book Festival that the UK was very vulnerable to the electricity supply being disrupted.
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Used to our comforts as we are, the idea that we might flick a switch or turn a tap and it not do anything in the event of an attack is something Brits would find very unsettling.
As such he recommended that UK households keep themselves stocked with certain items including candles, torches with fresh batteries and water.
He suggested that a 'battery operated radio' might also be useful for keeping up with the latest developments in the world should an actual war break out.
You'd probably want to know what was going on in the world if there's a war on but the uncertainty over energy supply is something a future populace may have to contend with.
He said: "Have you all got torches with live batteries in your house? Have you a radio with batteries in it and candles for when the electricity supply is cut off? Have you got containers for water, which you could produce?"
"We need to get off a peacetime mode of thinking and move in an agile way.
"We have to accept a degree of responsibility, over time, for doing that. Having everything plugged into electricity means we are going to be blank in terms of information."
He also reportedly told people they needed to 'wake up' to a world of new threats, pointing towards the recent spate of cyber attacks on businesses as evidence 'the UK is already under daily attack from aggressive acts'.
Other experts have claimed that Russia is already effectively waging war on the UK through a series of 'grey zone' attacks which are designed to disrupt countries across Europe.
They range from acts of propaganda designed to sow misinformation among a populace to acts of outright sabotage.
While not significant enough by themselves to constitute a blatant attack by one nation upon another, the simple fact of the matter is that acts are being committed against the UK by those who would not do them if they were friendly or even neutral towards us.
Joe Harker