Extraordinary letter from former UK defence attach at Moscow embassy - we warned you about Putin

[kpete]

Extraordinary letter in
@ft
from former UK defence attaché at Moscow embassy - we warned you about Putin but you listened to the City instead

Letter: A defence attaché despairs at inevitability of conflict
From Carl Scott, Air Commodore (Retired), Oakham, Rutland, UK


The recent article by Maria Stepanova “The war of Putin’s imagination” (Life & Arts, FT Weekend, March 19) was exemplary. However, one jarring note was the unfounded notion that no one expected this aggression from the Kremlin.

I served as the UK’s defence attaché in Moscow for five years, 2011-2016, during which time this long, dark march to war was obvious, the path to conflict lit by the many pronouncements emanating from the dark red walls of Vladimir Putin’s palace.

We reported the inevitability of conflict in detail, regularly and with the despair of Cassandra. One of the earliest reports opened with a line from Sherlock Holmes, whose statue stands outside the British Embassy wall: “There’s an east wind coming all the same, such a wind as never blew on England yet. It will be cold and bitter, Watson, and a good many of us may wither before its blast.”

The evidence of Putin’s chosen path was never concealed. His many declarations were meant to be heard and understood: the colossal rearmament programme, the demand for more complex, more lethal weaponry; the militarisation of society; the distortion and seizure of the popular narrative; domination of education, the media and the courts to exclude contrasting views and, ultimately, the alienation and destruction of those among the Russian people who understood the folly of his declared ambition.

The list is remorseless, the consequences could not be ignored. But they were.

It was not until I returned to the UK on the eve of our withdrawal from the EU, a manoeuvre which greatly emboldened those in Moscow, that I understood how our society had changed in the years I was serving overseas.

All was subjugated to the City, all served the interests of our lucrative status as a safe haven for corrupt, and corrupting, wealth. The values we were demanding of other nations had long since faded from our own actions.

I despair at the decisions Putin has taken, but even more at the prospect of finding credible leadership at home in the UK among those who have compromised so long with his regime and the wealth it offered.

Carl Scott
Air Commodore (Retired)
Oakham, Rutland, UK

More information can be found at https://www.ft.com/tour.
https://www.ft.com/content/857d2ccd-2853-43ba-b6b9-88e04b42ba93

Link to tweet

?s=20&t=v-vIPceRBCO68_HGXFi55Q

[orwell]

1. Power speaking truth...

...to power.

Something that has become rarer and rarer.

Good on 'ya Mr. Scott...

[Glorfindel]

2. The Holmes/Watson statue at the British Embassy in Moscow

We reported the inevitability of conflict in detail, regularly and with the despair of Cassandra. One of the earliest reports opened with a line from Sherlock Holmes, whose statue stands outside the British Embassy wall: “There’s an east wind coming all the same, such a wind as never blew on England yet. It will be cold and bitter, Watson, and a good many of us may wither before its blast.”

[Ray Bruns]

3. It was clear to anyone who was paying attention.

[Yorkie Mom]

5. Yes.

[lagomorph777]

4. Brexit was a Poo Tin plot, just as Trump was.

The UK will suffer for it, for a very long time.

[obamanut2012]

6. Trump destabilized NA, Brexit Europe

Putin played all his cards then, and it worked.

[yaesu]

7. We were warned about putin way back in 1992

From .gov research:

February 1992: "Operation Provide Hope" Yeltsin stopped in Paris on February 6, 1992, on his way back from the United States and Canada. He appealed for more Western aid and warned that the failure of his economic program could produce a Russian dictatorship.

After the breakup of the USSR the West did promise aid to help Russia economically & help with its transition from a communist state to a functioning capitalist state. The West failed on both accounts, and the reasons are many. As we saw in post WWI Germany things never go well when a country slips into economic and social misery.