Britain is sending 1,000 troops to eastern Europe to prove to Russia that Nato is “not flaky”, Defence Secretary Ben Wallace has said.
The commitment came as Prime Minister Boris Johnson flies to Brussels today (Thursday) to meet Nato's secretary general Jens Stoltenberg..
Mr Wallace told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme of the troop deployment: “What this is really about is saying to President Putin, ‘Nato is not flaky. Nato will stand by its members, big or small’.”
The Cabinet minister added: “We want a dialogue, we want a way through this, but also Russia is now deploying over half its combat troops of a whole nation of Russia on the borders of Ukraine and in Belarus, and we’re not just going to let that happen without Nato having a response to defend its own members.”
Mr Wallace said the troops could end up in any Nato country where there are consequences of an invasion of Ukraine including the Baltic states, Poland, Romania and Nordic nations.
“Should Russia invade Ukraine I think we can expect very large movements of people as refugees and that in itself can be very destabilising to small and medium-sized states,” he said.
When in Brussels, Boris Johnson is expected to reiterate an offer to strengthen the alliance’s defences should Russian aggression in eastern Europe increase.
Following the meeting, he is scheduled to fly to Warsaw in Poland for talks with the country’s leaders and to meet British troops stationed there, amid fears over a Russian invasion into neighbouring Ukraine.
