Stop The War!

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At the top of this post, Resistance Radio presents our WARRIOR CREED video/audio podcast from Tuesday 2nd June 2025, with a transcript provided - Stop The War!

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Read on now for our free Radical Dispatch.

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Cartoon credit: Bob Moran

Stop The War!

- A Radical Dispatch

1) PM Starmer Places UK on War Footing

PM Keir Starmer has declared that Britain is now on a war footing against Russia.

Click to play:

PM Keir Starmer: “Today, following through on this review, I want to set out three fundamental changes that we're going to deliver. First, we are moving to war fighting readiness as the central purpose of our armed forces. When we are being directly threatened by states with advanced military forces, the most effective way to deter them is to be ready. And frankly, to show them that we're ready to deliver peace through strength. Now Britain has the finest servicemen and women in the world. We're showing them the respect that they deserve by delivering the biggest armed forces pay rise in 20 years and by pledging today that we will end the hollowing out of our armed forces. We'll build a fighting force that is more integrated, more ready, more lethal than ever, backed by a stronger strategic reserve, fully trained and ready to mobilise at any time. Second, everything we do will add to the strength of NATO. As we step up to take greater responsibility for our collective defence, the NATO alliance means something profound: that we will never fight alone. It is a fundamental source of our strategic strength. That's why our defence policy will always be NATO first, something that's written through this review. The transformation we are driving in our defence must add up to Britain's biggest contribution to NATO since its creation. So that when we're building new capabilities at home, we are making our allies safer too, strengthening Europe and strengthening our bridge to the US as Britain's first partner in defence. Third, we will innovate and accelerate innovation at a wartime pace, so we can meet the threats of today and of tomorrow as the fastest innovator in NATO. Now this doesn't mean replacing people or hardware. Quite the opposite. It means learning the lessons of Ukraine, which I've discussed many times with President Zelensky, to ensure that every capability we have works seamlessly together. Drones, destroyers, AI aircraft, each different branch of our armed services fully integrated to create an army which is 10 times more lethal by 2035. And in delivering all of this, we are more ambitious than ever for the change it can bring. To deliver not just security for our country, but renewal tool. After the Cold War, many nations cut defense spending, freeing up public funds, creating what was called a peace dividend, which people felt in their public services and in the quality of their lives. Faced with new circumstances today, we must deliver for working people again to seize now a defense dividend for the British people, using this moment to drive jobs and investment throughout the country, like here in Govan, providing local opportunities, skilled work, community pride, ensuring that everyone across the United Kingdom has a role to play in this effort, yes, but also that everyone has a stake in its success. I want to spell this out very simply: to achieve this, we're going to build, we're going to use this investment and this once in a generation reform to drive renewal up and down the nation, creating new jobs, creating skills and opportunity, driving huge growth industrial capacity.”

Ignore Starmer’s sabre rattling. Do not panic. Britain is not headed into WWIII against Russia.

Firstly, this strategic defence review was long overdue and just happened to fall on Starmer’s head. Secondly, along with all other NATO member states, Britain’s increased defence spending to meet our 3% NATO obligations has long been demanded by the Americans and Trump during his first term onwards. It was coming regardless. Thirdly, having had no choice but to announce this review, which will cost him in higher taxes, Starmer framed it in warmongering terms so as to sell it to his pro-Ukraine metropolitan voters who fear Putin.

Below is a summary of what this defence review entails.

The Times reports 2nd June 2025:

The Times reports 2nd June 2025:

The Ministry of Defence has published their own graphic explaining the basics of the review.

And the full review can be found here:

The problem PM Starmer will have, making this review a double-edged sword, is how to justify the tax rises this review will likely entail.

The Times reports 2nd June 2025:

“The PM spoke of moving Britain to a position of ‘warfighting readiness’ and pledged a new era of ‘peace through strength’. Britain, he said, was about to become a ‘battle ready, armour-clad nation’. Strong words. But he was less sure-footed when it came to explaining how he would pay for it all. Repeatedly pushed by broadcasters, he refused to depart from his line that spending 3 per cent of GDP would remain only a ‘commitment’ rather than a guarantee. ‘We are committed to spending what we need to do to deliver this review’.”

Tax rises are expected, and they will make Starmer even more unpopular.

The Times reports 2nd June 2025:

Ministry of Defence sources are already briefing corporate media about how far short Starmer’s pledges fall and the further increases in the defence budget that he will be obliged to make.

The Times reports 3rd June 2025:

“Britain will be forced to agree to spend 3.5 per cent of national income on defence by 2035 as part of a Nato push to rearm and placate President Trump despite having no plan to pay for it, The Times understands. Senior figures in the Ministry of Defence have been left baffled by Sir Keir Starmer’s position on spending — namely to avoid committing to spend 3 per cent of GDP on defence in the next parliament. A senior defence source said Britain would “without a doubt” have to sign up to a much higher target in three weeks’ time at the Nato summit in the Hague. The new target will be 5 per cent, which will include 3.5 per cent by 2035 on defence and a further 1.5 per cent on military-related needs, such as infrastructure, they said. The UK would not have a choice, the source said, adding that Mark Rutte, the Nato secretary-general, had already agreed to the new target with the US president.”

The reason this has all landed on Starmer’s head, and why he has no choice in the matter, is due to Trump’s historic complaint that the UK and other NATO member states have not been paying their treaty-agreed 3% of GDP on defence.

In an era where the US military is pulling back from world empire, and hence cutting back on its own commitments and spending, Trump’s point is that NATO member states need to start looking after themselves.

The majority of European countries do not meet their 3% commitment, while America is overspending on European defence, as the below table of even the top ten spenders demonstrates.

The Times reports 2nd June 2025:

Trump is correct. Europe meeting its NATO defence spending obligations, while America reciprocates tariffs on trade, are both measures designed to level the playing field as a consequence of Trump’s managed decline of the American empire.

Radical Media reports 10th April 2025:

“Since WW2, the US empire had non-reciprocal trade arrangements in place with the rest of the world. These provided prosperity to developing nations in return for security with the - many times physical - US troop presence on the ground…Trump needed to rebalance the world stage, which means levelling out the trade terms in return for pulling back on military presence around the world, and allowing each country to take more responsibility for its own concerns. This was inevitable, the fourth turning in a great generational cycle. Better for the US to manage its decline on their own terms than to allow chaos to emerge in total collapse.

This heralds a tactical retreat from the American unipolar world that emerged after the initial collapse of the Soviet-era bipolar world. We are returning gradually to a multipolar world, the likes of which humanity has not experienced since pre-WW1.”

2) Russia Stalling Ukraine Peace Talks Until Starmer is Out

We are not about to start WWIII. None of what PM Starmer has said will reverse the peace negotiations that are already under way between Russia and Ukraine.

The Times reports 2nd June 2025:

“Peace talks between Kyiv and Moscow have ended after little more than an hour, with the two sides said to have discussed a new exchange of prisoners. Ukrainian and Russian delegations met in Istanbul for the second round of ceasefire negotiations on Monday, a day after Kyiv launched a large-scale drone attack on Russian military airbases. Ukrainian negotiators said after the talks that further exchanges of prisoners of war and the release of Ukrainian children forcibly taken to Russia had been discussed. They did not say what discussions were had around ending the three-year conflict.”

These peace talks will continue. This is despite the Ukranian drone offensive inside Russia, which had been pre-approved 18 months ago.

The Times reports 2nd June 2025:

The lead Ukranian demands are fanciful and will eventually be abandoned.

The Times reports 2nd June 2025:

And while Ukraine’s demand in the Istanbul leg of these peace talks were more realistic, Putin has no reason to meet with Zelensky as demanded.

The Times reports 2nd June 2025:

Putin knows that Zelensky will not remain long after the war, and has no reason to prematurely reward him by meeting him.

Likewise, the Russians are stalling in Istanbul by not submitting their written demands because they know that Starmer too is a lame-duck Prime Minister.

The Times reports 2nd June 2025:

Russia has gone further, stating that no European country - the UK included - are to be trusted to negotiate the peace.

Click to play:

Russian ambassador to the UN: “We understand presently that the Minsk guarantors and on the whole EU countries and the United Kingdom are absolutely unfaithful to their word and they cannot be a party to any future agreements on the resolution to the Ukrainian crisis whatsoever. They are blinded by primitive Russophobia, their maniacal desire to inflict a defeat on our country on the battlefield using the Ukrainians who are left alive. Mr. President, we very much should like to hope that the 10th anniversary of the adoption of Resolution 2202 will be a good opportunity for our European colleagues to finally get back to reality, to stop provoking Zelensky and his henchmen towards futile confrontation. He himself, at any cost of clinging power, attempting to save his skin, is willing to engage in any provocation to prolong hostility.”

The Russians are waiting for a replacement of the globalists by the populists across Europe, just as they waited for the same with MAGA in the US. The Russians do not see a partner in any of the existing globalist leaders across Europe, and such a sentiment is based in some historic justification.

3) Ukraine Will Not Join Nato

PM Starmer used his speech to pander to NATO and his EU friends by promising a NATO-first approach.

The Times reports 2nd June 2025:

Nato chief Mark Rutte has recently reemphasised his desire to see Ukraine on a NATO membership track, while tacitly acknowledging that this will not be part of any ceasefire agreement.

Click to play:

Nato chief, Mark Rutte: “Well, you know that when it comes to Ukraine in Washington, there was a clear commitment by all 32 allies that there is an irreversible path for Ukraine to come into NATO. Not with an end date, not understanding this as part of a peace settlement, but clearly as a longer term commitment by all 32 allies and we are building that bridge as we speak with the command in Wiesbaden with, in Poland JTAC, which is capturing all the lessons, and of course all the other cooperation ongoing between NATO countries and Ukraine. Thank you so much.”

But Moscow is demanding that Ukraine not be granted accession to NATO. The Russians will get their wish, even as Kellogg the US peace envoy admits.

The Times reports 2nd June 2025:

The American Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth has also made this clear.

CBS reports 12th February 2025:

“U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said a peace agreement between Ukraine and Russia must include security guarantees for Ukraine, but that they ‘should not be provided through NATO membership, but must instead be backed by capable European and non-European troops’."

Just as Kellogg said, this is a reasonable and “fair” Russian demand. It has been acknowledged among US foreign policy circles for years.

The Washington Post reports 16th June 2021:

We explain why in the below extract.

Radical Media reports 2nd March 2022, extract:

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Eventually, matters with this new regime came to a head with Ukraine’s touted and potential NATO membership.

This was a red line for Russia. In the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, America feared Soviet nuclear missiles that were placed 103 miles from the US border, and they took action. This led to thirteen days of attempting to avert all-out nuclear war, known as the Cuban Missile crisis.

After the pro-American Maidan uprising (or coup) in Ukraine, Russia similarly feared rapid NATO expansion leading to missiles at their own border. We have now returned to similar tensions, but the inverse. This is a map depicting NATO’s Eastward expansion since 1997.

And the below is a map depicting the asymmetry in US and Russian military power globally.

These two maps go some way to explaining why Russian felt threatened by the 2014 regime change in Ukraine. US Military officers have been aware of and warning of precisely this reaction by Russia for some time. This is because they are trained to think about international affairs in strategic terms.

…With this background, and context, it is now possible to see what Russia’s interests are in Ukraine, and how to bring this conflict to an end without provoking World War III. The assumption here is that readers do wish to avoid Armageddon. The assumption here is also that - despite the voices of hysterical politicians and geopolitically ignorant media pundits desperately calling for escalation - few war hawks will personally leave to fight Russia themselves….this will likely end with Ukraine being split into two. Putin will probably maintain control East of the Dnieper River, and insist on a return to a neutral regime West of the river. That is, unless certain rabid Western politicians get their way and manage to spark a nuclear catastrophe. A blackout of reliable geostrategic insight, coupled with now proven and prolific war propaganda in our media, can only provoke precisely that. Only sober political analysis can aid deescalation, but that is precisely what is being discouraged right now. Readers should ponder why. Finally, it may also be an idea to never fund Nazi battalions.

4) Nigel Farage Knows Ukraine Will Not Join Nato

Just as they waited to see the back of Biden and welcome Trump in the US, the Russians will wait to see the back of PM Starmer and welcome PM Nigel Farage in the UK.

Radical Media reports 19th June 2024:

“Ukraine will eventually have to seek a peace deal with Russia, Nigel Farage insisted yesterday, creating a clear divide between his party and the Tories over the conflict.

The Reform UK leader said negotiations with the Kremlin – which could lead to the partitioning of Ukraine – were inevitable as he laid out the party's policies on defence.”

Farage knows that Ukraine will not be joining NATO. This is despite pronouncements made by Farage’s former party leader Richard Tice, and what Farage has recently said to appease Tice.

Radical Media reports 19th February 2025, extract:

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…And Ukraine will not be joining Nato, regardless of what Nigel Farage recently stated with long term Ukraine war supporter Richard Tice sat next to him.

Click to play:

Nigel Farage: “Again, it's back to the previous question. I don't want to prejudge how these negotiations go, but I would have thought that if we're going to get Putin into a place and Zelensky into a place where we could have a reasonable negotiation, I would have thought, looking ahead, it's probably essential that Ukraine joins NATO. That's going to need to be part of this negotiation.”

But Russia has made this issue clear.

The Times reports 18th February 2025:

“Russia will not accept the deployment of troops from Nato countries to Ukraine as part of any peace deal, Moscow’s top diplomat has said following US-Russia talks in Riyadh. ‘The appearance of troops from Nato countries … under a foreign flag, the flag of the European Union or the national flag, is unacceptable,’ Sergei Lavrov said. He also said that Russia welcomed President Trump’s comments that inviting Kyiv to join Nato had caused the war in Ukraine. Britain and Sweden, both Nato members, have said they would consider putting troops on the ground in Ukraine in the event of a peace deal.”

So too had Nigel Farage, in no uncertain terms, before he reentered the political frontlines.

Click to play:

Nigel Farage: “I have thought for 30 years that the NATO policy, the EU policy, of expanding ever eastwards was a huge strategic error. Yes, we know the Russians can be paranoid, but why poke the Russian bear with a stick? And if Vladimir Putin's one demand is that we state clearly that the Ukraine is not going to join NATO. Why don't we do it? Well, some of you may say, isn't that appeasement? Isn't that giving in? But ask yourself a different question. What possible strategic benefit or asset could it be to us for the Ukraine to join NATO? Absolutely none whatsoever that I can see. So I think what Boris Johnson needs to do is to rethink the geopolitics of all of this, to convince other EU leaders, to convince the Americans that that is what we need to say. We take away Putin's Casus Belli. And actually, I think if Putin gets that, he won't invade and a war can be avoided. That's my view. That's my take. No one I speak to thinks the Ukraine joining NATO is a good idea, yet nobody, but nobody out there says what I've just said, that we should state clearly that they’re not going to join.”

It is our view that this earlier version of Nigel Farage is the one that will get his way on Ukraine. Not the latter more recent version that is seeking to appease voters on his path towards becoming Prime Minister.

…We also stated last December that the former head of Mi6 Alex Younger had also taken this position, after we published our analysis.

Radical Media reports 11th December 2024:

Click to play:

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5) PM Starmer in Panic About Farage

In his speech, Starmer also appropriated a clumsy caricature of patriotic MAGA language to feign patriotic support of the armed forces as a result of sheer panic at his haemorrhaging of votes to Reform UK.

In this way, the UK’s defence review was a much needed double edged sword that provides relief to the beleaguered armed forces while doing heavy political damage to Starmer for looking desperate to appease his deserting Farage supporting voters. His tone was the result of a dawning realisation that the tide has well and truly turned against him in Britain. Even the corporate media have turned on Starmer over Farage.

Click to play:

“Talking like a human being, where you just resort to talking points and dodging questions/The speed of the decline in your popularity is historically unprecedented. Isn't this speech today an admission that you have failed and Nigel Farage understands voters better than you?/Nigel Farage has five MPs. You've got 403. Are you panicking because Reform is so far ahead in the polls, it seems? Is he living rent-free in your brain? You went to a state school. Your dad worked in a factory. Your mum worked in the NHS. So why is a public school-educated former city trader got more in common with the red wall than you have? / Reform UK say you're running scared of them, that you're sounding increasingly like them with some of the policies and announcements you've made recently, this is a speech that was very defensive wasn't it? / Are you not worried people will ask why you're holding a press conference about Nigel Farage four years out from a general election instead of focusing on your plans for the country? / You went into the election promising to freeze national insurance and keep the two-child benefit cap. You've since raised national insurance on businesses and now you're considering axing the cap. Isn't attacking Nigel Farage's economic credibility a bit rich?”

And living rent free in PM Starmer’s head is indeed what Farage seems to be doing.

Click to play:

PM Keir Starmer: “Nigel Farage, Nigel Farage, Nigel Farage, Nigel Farage, Farage, Nigel Farage, Nigel Farage, Nigel Farage, Nigel Farage, Nigel Farage, Nigel Farage, Nigel Farage, Nigel Farage, Nigel Farage, Nigel Farage. Nigel Farage.”

Notice how in his panic PM Starmer has even appropriated MAGA talking points such as his use of NATO-first, taken from America-first, and his lifting of the phrase ‘peace through strength.’

The Times reports 2nd June 2025:

Here is President Trump being introduced by Defense Secretary Hegseth at Al-Udeid Air Base in Doha, Qatar 16th May 2025, with that phrase ‘peace through strength’ on a banner over his head:

And here we are using that same MAGA phrase back in 2024 when meeting the Russian ambassador to London:

PM Starmer knows that he is fast losing the country. Even veteran anti-war icon and left wing politician George Galloway has openly backed Farage over Starmer with the following words…

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