The location of the sailing yacht BRIGHT FUTURE when a Russian warship, the Admiral Grigorovich, fired a warning shot into its path in the English Channel. Over the past few months, Whitehall officials have feared Kremlin retaliation of any forced seizure against the shadow fleet. This is a clear display of aggression off the UK coast. Downing Street’s next move is critical. H/t @StarboardIntel as always!

Anti-terror police arrested Tommy Robinson when he came back from a jolly Putin's Moscow. I hope they asked why he provided propaganda cover for what we now know were Russian attacks on Keir Starmer's home with these lies.

I think that @MarkUrban01 is right: our sleeping politicians are merely reflective of a lack of seriousness across the public as a whole. I was called a war-monger by an acquaintance recently for my advocacy of the need for more seriousness in defence. This will only return when the metal starts to fly, by which time it’ll be too late. We may not be given the chance we had in 1940 to recover.

I find it flabbergasting that Russia ordered a sabotage operation against the British PM on UK soil and yet everyone seems to accept it's just business as usual. This behaviour is why it's essential to defeat Putin in Ukraine. bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c8r2…

Al Carns tears Starmer a new arsehole!! Deservedly so. He's a traitor to our veterans.

The @BBCNews has now confirmed what some of us warned for years. A Russian diplomat ran a sabotage campaign on British soil: arson against the Prime Minister’s own home, and fake far-right and Islamist groups built to turn us against each other. This is not crime. It is how war is fought by powers who don’t want to expose their hand. bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c8r2…

Hard hitting resignation speech by John Healey in the Commons, with a parting shot at the Chancellor ‘Our adversaries don’t follow timetables set by the Treasury,’ he told MPs ‘This is the age of hard power and rising threat, this is not the moment for calibration or incremental change. That means bigger politics, bolder priorities, harder choices,’ he said He repeated his call for Britain to commit to spending 3% of GDP on defence by 2030

Two things happened on the same morning this week. The New York Times published the details of America’s planned drawdown in Europe. And Sweden’s defense commission, with all eight parliamentary parties behind it, published its new security assessment. The Swedish conclusion: Russia may test NATO’s cohesion and the credibility of Article 5 in the relatively near term, if the Kremlin judges the political conditions favorable. Read those two stories together. One describes the political conditions. The other describes what happens when Moscow judges them favorable. Sweden’s supreme commander said it plainly in May: the whole West is rearming, so why would Russia wait? I spent an entire section of this week’s essay on that exact question. The cornered bear does not wait for the door to close. Full essay below.👇 open.substack.com/pub/gandal…

Britain spent a decade choosing to be smaller in the world. Right now the rules on communications, energy and trade are being rewritten. By China. By Russia. By countries that take their own security seriously. We need to be at that table. That's a choice we must make. Strong countries get cheap energy. Weak countries pay whatever the strong ones decide.

The twerps and the spinners in no.10 cant help it. Almost immediately they are out claiming “the biggest increase since the cold war” and “we are spending 2.6% of GDP on defence in 2027”. Those two “lines to take” are the problem. Dishonest and misleading in order to avoid the reality of spending real funds to keep us safe.

Al Carns, the Armed Forces Minister, has resigned, following the Defence Investment Plan fiasco.

I was asked earlier on the BBC why other NATO countries have avoided DIP-like crises. Part of the answer is the large and growing share of spending taken up by nuclear deterrent & adjacent areas, leaving less for conventional forces. That is partly why German conventional spending will be around double UK spending, remarkably, by the end of the decade. Part of the answer is that other countries are willing to allocate amuch higher share of national output to defence. Poland & Baltics nudging 5% of GDP. Healey's letter points out today that UK would be at 2.68% of GDP by 2030 on the DIP settlement he was given. But more important than this is the gap between spending and military commitments: the UK spends more (it is third highest spender in NATO in absolute terms) but also commits considerably more, leaving a wide and in recent years growing chasm between promises & delivery.

11 June 2026 - within the same morning: 🇬🇧 UK Defence Secretary resigns, because the Prime Minister refuses to fund the British Armed Forces 🇮🇹 Italy approves Armed Forces increase by 40,000 troops, adding a division to the Army

Extraordinarily - and this seems to demonstrate a complete disregard of the seriousness of defence at the heart of government - John Healey was only told what the offer was for additional defence funding on Monday afternoon. I am told Number 10 then tried to rush and publish the Defence Investment Plan on Thursday. Then a handbrake was applied by Mr Healey and his military chiefs. The (now ex) defence secretary made clear that racing to release the blueprint without a settlement that had been accepted by him and his team would be a risk for defence and for its soldiers, sailors and aviators. You can only imagine the tone of the exchange that must have taken place - and I know that people were in the MOD until very late last night. But John Healey firmly believes the settlement was inadequate and, if left unchallenged, would not enable the UK to keep the country safe or meet its international commitments - such as help defend Ukraine in the event of a ceasefire with Russia. A key detail is that Mr Healey believes defence spending must be increased to 3% of GDP by 2030, up from 2.3% now. This would guarantee tens of billions of additional pounds for defence. But - despite the stakes and the position of the defence secretary - the Prime Minister and Chancellor agreed just to inch it up to 2.68% of GDP within that time frame, after hitting a new target of 2.6% next year (which is already being inflated by lumping in the 0.1% that is spent on the intelligence agencies). Utterly incredible. What must our allies and our adversaries be thinking, let alone everyone in the UK armed forces and, frankly, everyone in our country? We all rely on a secure UK to live, work, go to school, enjoy holidays, access healthcare, spend time with friends and families. This is not a divine right. It happens because we have security - something that might not be apparent until or unless it is compromised...

John Healey’s resignation letter is absolutely damning of both Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves - he is directly accusing them and the Labour government of not doing what it takes to ensure Britain can defend itself - about the most serious charge it is possible to make

The UK's military chief has written to the prime minister amid concerns that an offer of around an extra £13bn to fund a major investment plan for defence is not enough, Sky News understands. The content of the letter from Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton is not known, but the fact he felt the need to put his thoughts in writing signals the seriousness of the challenge faced by Sir Keir Starmer as he attempts to finalise the long-delayed defence investment plan. The highly unusual move came after the Treasury is understood to have offered the Ministry of Defence (MoD) around an additional £13bn over four years to help fund the purchase of new jets, submarines, ships, drones and missiles. This is at the lower end of a range of between £12bn and £18bn that had been under consideration – and far short of the actual sum of extra money that the military believes it needs to rebuild its hollowed-out ranks at a time of escalating threats. One source said Air Chief Marshal Knighton met with fellow military chiefs to discuss the proposed settlement on Monday. The source said there is thought to have been dissatisfaction expressed by at least one of the service chiefs who were present about the inadequacy of the amount. That has not been confirmed, however. Full story ⬇️ news.sky.com/story/military-…

NEW: No 10 finally confirms that Keir Starmer uses *disappearing messages* function - meaning that countless exchanges with Mandelson may have been lost

One year today since the strategic defence review was published and still no defence investment plan. Inside MoD, they are losing the will

One bizarre question that arises from reading about the fall of the Roman Empire is: "Where the hell are all the soldiers?" On paper, from documents such as the Notitia Dignitatum, the late Roman army was supposed to have had around half a million troops. Larger than ever before. Yet time and time again we see barbarian invasions overwhelm Roman defenses, with an unclear military response. And when engagements do happen, the size of the Roman army reported is often smaller than during previous periods in which the total number of troops and manpower available to the empire was supposedly smaller. So where was this vast Roman army when the Goths spent decades moving throughout the empire, or when the Rhine frontier fell in 406? Or when Rome was sacked and Britain was abandoned in 410? Or when North Africa was overwhelmed and lost? Did it just evaporate?

Good morning from the vineyard and surrounding area.