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UK Defense Secretary Says World Moved From Post-War to Pre-War Era

© AP Photo / Kirsty Wigglesworth / Former British energy secretary Grant Shapps, now defence secretary, outside 10 Downing StreetFormer British energy secretary Grant Shapps, now defence secretary, outside 10 Downing Street
Former British energy secretary Grant Shapps, now defence secretary, outside 10 Downing Street - Sputnik International, 1920, 04.04.2024
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MOSCOW (Sputnik) - UK Defense Secretary Grant Shapps has said that the world has moved from the post-war to the pre-war era, urging NATO allies to think about the alliance's future.
"Today we must give urgent thought once again to the Alliance’s future. We have moved from a post-war to a pre-war world," he said in a column published by The Telegraph newspaper.
Shapps listed measures to protect democracy and the alliance, including redoubling efforts to support Ukraine, increasing defense spending by NATO members and strengthening the Euro-Atlantic defense sector. The situation where some allies are unable to spend 2% of GDP on defense can no longer continue because NATO "can’t afford to play Russian roulette with our future."
Among other things, the defense secretary said that the plot of George Orwell's famous dystopian novel "1984" took place in a world without NATO, but today is an even more dangerous time.
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Shapps also said that the UK "has always been a prime mover in NATO" and is proud of it.
None other than London has gone out of its way to fan the flames of the Ukrainian conflict, and these hypocritical "warnings" come as no surprise. These efforts have ranged from former Prime Minister Boris Johnson thwarting efforts to reach a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine in the spring of 2022, to the British government sending billions of dollars worth of lethal and non-lethal weapons there.
Moscow has repeatedly said that London is depriving Kiev of the chance to end the conflict through negotiations by using the country as a "geopolitical tool against Russia." The bloc's encirclement of Russia has been in full swing for decades.
After a sweeping post-Cold War expansion in violation of the West's pledge not to move closer to Russia's borders, the alliance recently absorbed Finland and Sweden in 2023 and 2024, respectively. In March, the Russian Foreign Ministry told Sputnik that the bloc's activities in Eastern Europe and the Black Sea region were part of preparations for a possible conflict with Moscow.
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