Ukraine

Liam Fox Excerpts

Wednesday 25th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Dr Liam Fox (North Somerset) (Con)]

Over the last three months, we have seen a war of choice in Europe. Putin and his close allies have revealed their callous and barbaric nature, plumbing new depths of human depravity and reaching new peaks of human wickedness. Putin has shown a casual and contemptible disregard for human life and a vile disinterest in the suffering of men, women and children as a result of the choice he made, suffering and death that we hoped we would never see on the European continent again. Putin has shown a casual and contemptible disregard for human life and a vile disinterest in the suffering of men, women and children as a result of the choice he made, suffering and death that we hoped we would never see on the European continent again.

A few weeks ago, I was speaking to young people at a university in Poland. There were Polish, Ukrainian and Russian students in the audience. They were bewildered, afraid and angry about what they had seen. It struck me that those young people had no memory of the Berlin wall, the cold war or the Soviet Union—all the more reason for us to repeat to them the lessons we have learnt from history—but what we have seen comes, or should come, as no real surprise to us. Putin told us who he was and what he believed at the Munich security conference in 2007. He told us primarily that he was in denial about the end of the cold war. He believed it had come to an end, rather than that the Soviet Union had been defeated. He said:

“we should not forget that the fall of the Berlin Wall was possible thanks to a historic choice—one that was also made by our people, the people of Russia—a choice in favour of democracy, freedom, openness and a sincere partnership with all the members of the big European family.”

If that was not utterly out of line with the reality of what was happening, I do not know what is.

Putin also made it very clear in that speech that he viewed NATO as an aggressor from the outset, when he said:

“I think it is obvious that NATO expansion does not have any relation with the modernisation of the Alliance itself or with ensuring security in Europe. On the contrary, it represents a serious provocation that reduces the level of mutual trust. And we have the right to ask: against whom is this expansion intended?”

No expansion was intended; it was there as a defensive alliance. If there has been an expansion now, it is because of the threat posed to other European states. Putin has shown that he has been more than willing to carry out that threat in Ukraine.

There is something else in that speech that we should remember, which says something about Putin’s values. He was talking about the unipolar moment. He said:

“I consider that the unipolar model is not only unacceptable but impossible in today’s world…What is even more important is that the model itself is flawed because at its basis there is and can be no moral foundations for modern civilisation.”

We knew from that what Putin was like. How did we get it so wrong? We did it because we in the west substituted wishful thinking for critical analysis. We wanted there to be a peace dividend, understandably, but we wanted it so much that we did not look at the evidence, in rapid succession, in front of our eyes. We had Chechnya, with Grozny razed to the ground in the way we see today in Donbas. The pattern of behaviour is clear. We then saw, in 2008, the invasion of Georgia and we did very little. We saw the annexation of Crimea. When I wrote in February 2015 in an article in The Sunday Telegraph that we should be arming the Ukrainians to stop Putin because they would be next, I was actually described by a senior member of the coalition Government as a warmonger. I am still waiting for the apology, but I guess it will not be coming. Now, in a bizarre and horrible echo of history, we see Putin willing to use the grain supplies that sit in Ukraine as a weapon of war well beyond the European theatre, willing to cut off the supply to the developing world who will starve if they do not get it, in an awful echo of what Stalin did in using famine as a weapon against the Ukrainian people.

[Sir Robert Goodwill (Scarborough and Whitby) (Con)]

Is it not the case that even on the verge of the invasion, when our intelligence sources made it clear an invasion was going to take place, many of our allies in Europe refused to believe it would actually happen?

[Dr Fox]

That is right. I will not dwell on that point, because I do not think it takes us much further forward, but there was again the substitution of wishful thinking for critical analysis. The evidence was there that the troops were being massed on the Ukrainian border. We knew there was an intent to use them and yet in a number of European capitals there was still the triumph of hope over experience. That lack of preparedness among some of the western nations put the Ukrainians at a disadvantage at the beginning of the conflict.

A number of Members have said that the sanctions on Russia cannot be lifted until all Russian troops leave Ukraine. I would go further: the sanctions on Putin and Lavrov and the architects of this war can never be lifted. That is a different question from what happens to the rest of Russia. Of course, there must be a potential new course in a post-Putin era, but our aim must be to increase the tensions within the Russian regime by making it clear that those who stick with Putin and those who are the architects of the war in Ukraine cannot escape from the sanctions—they crossed the Rubicon; they are war criminals. On the other hand, those who choose a different path for the future can have an alternative future. It is very important that our messaging is consistent and utterly clear.

[Mr Ellwood]

My right hon. Friend is linking the impact of sanctions to the military progress and what we should be doing on the ground; he is therefore in danger of coming close to having a strategy, and Britain, the west and NATO must have a grand strategy to deal with a resurgent, adventurist Putin.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Fox]

I am always very wary of compliments paid in the House of Commons as there is generally a sting in the tale. All I will say to my right hon. Friend is that I think we were guilty collectively in the west of wilfully misunderstanding what Putin was doing even when the evidence suggested otherwise. There will be no change in Putin: his behaviour will be repeated if we allow it to be repeated. That is why I agree with what my right hon. Friend said earlier in the debate: unless Putin is defeated in Ukraine, others will follow. That is the nature of Putin—it is the nature, literally, of the beast.

I want to touch briefly on the question of famine. The consequences of the conflict in Ukraine will reverberate far beyond Russia, Ukraine or even Europe. There will be people, especially in the developing world, who will starve to death if we do not get grain stores and other materials released from Ukraine. Putin is waging this war not just on the Ukrainians but on some of the most vulnerable people on our planet today. That is why I refer to the height of the wickedness his regime represents. We must do all we can; I will not go back over the points already raised on why we must if possible move grain through the port of Odesa. If we cannot do so, we must move it by rail to the northern Baltic ports to get it out. But, whatever we have to do, we have to do it together with our allies, because the consequences of failure will go well beyond our own strategic objectives to the suffering of people in this world who have already been hit post pandemic and are already facing supply shocks.

Another question raised earlier in the debate— it was a point also made recently by the Foreign Secretary—is that if Chechnya was crushed, then Georgia, then Crimea, and then Ukraine, what will be the next domino to fall? The next one is Moldova. We still have time to avoid the mistakes we made with Ukraine by ensuring that we arm and train our allies in Moldova who could well be the next target should Putin survive this adventure he is having.

NATO has, again, been referred to. We must ensure that we raise spending among not just the biggest nations in NATO but all nations in NATO. We must make it clear that countries that want the insurance policy have to pay the premiums for the policy as well. But we need to give this a lot more thought too, because we do not want unnecessary duplication of what NATO does, for example by a European Union force. We need to ensure, in procurement, that we are not duplicating and have wise policies across NATO. There has always been resistance in NATO to the idea that some countries specialise in some areas while other countries specialise in others. The bottom line, however, is that the United States is the only country big enough and rich enough to have a full spectrum of military capabilities. Others will have to choose wisely where they spend their money.

We in the United Kingdom provide NATO with a nuclear deterrent, carrier strike, our F-35s, our Tornadoes —[Interruption.] Sorry, our Typhoons; that was a slip back to 2010. We have our investment in space and cyber, but we cannot be expected to have everything. The countries who are more vulnerable to land attack must be willing to carry the burden of those defensive capabilities. They certainly cannot continue to take a ride on the American taxpayer in the way that they have done in recent years, because sooner or later—we had a warning with the Trump Administration—there will be an Administration who are not willing to carry that burden on behalf of European defence. We should regard current events as a very clear warning to us of what could happen if Europe is not willing to carry its defensive burden.

In commending our Ministers for the clarity and generosity of the briefings that they have given us during this conflict and the very clear leadership exhibited by the Defence Secretary and his team, we have to accept, painfully, that what we have seen in Ukraine is—at least to a large extent—a failure of deterrence, because given our lack of reaction to previous incursions by Putin, he believed that we would not act. We can console ourselves with the fact that we have acted and that NATO has been strengthened not just in its military co-operation, but in an understanding of its political nature. Our belief in democracy, the rule of law and human rights has been strengthened by the shared experience that we have just gone through. We have shown that we can, and are willing to, supply Ukraine with the necessary armaments to defend themselves, and we have shown our willingness to sanction Russia and its leaders in a way that we have never done before with a major economy, particularly through central bank sanctions. We must follow those positive developments through with increases in our defence expenditure and a much clearer idea across NATO of which roles are appropriate for which nations and where they need to invest in their procurement budgets. The final lesson for us is that weakness in any of these areas is no friend of peace—only strength is.

[Several hon. Members rose—]