Russian army can outgun British, leaked report warns

10 August 2016

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Assessment by British army’s warfare branch says Russian weapons are more powerful than UK equivalents

Gen Sir Richard Shirreff, Britain’s former top officer at Nato, said British capability is being ‘dramatically hollowed out’. Photograph: Evening Standard/Rex/Shutterstock/Evening Standar/REX/Shutterstock

The Russian army can outgun British troops on the battlefield after military advances by the Kremlin, a leaked report suggests.

The assessment by the British army’s warfare branch, seen by the Times, warned that Russian weapons, including rocket launchers and air defence systems, were more powerful than their British equivalents. The report added that UK and its Nato allies were “scrambling to catch up” with Russia’s ability to use electronic means to hijack enemy drones and disrupt other military transmissions.

The publication was produced in March under the direction of Gen Sir Nick Carter, the head of the army, the newspaper said. It is understood the report is based on one training exercise carried out in Ukraine.

An army spokeswoman said: “The British army conducts regular reviews of potential scenarios in order to improve its readiness to both protect UK influence and protect our people.”

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The report also recommended that soldiers be made more aware of manipulative online tactics used on platforms such as Facebook and Twitter and that they should leave electrical devices at home while on exercises.

The publication, Insights to “Training Smarter” Against a Hybrid Adversary, concluded that one of Russia’s goals in Ukraine was to practise “new methods of warfare as well as testing modern and prohibited weapons”, the Times said.

It set out how the UK could counter Russia’s new hybrid strategy of electronic warfare, drones, propaganda and artillery.

Gen Sir Richard Shirreff, Britain’s former top officer in Nato, told the Times: “What we get from successive governments has been that it is all fine and dandy and ‘aren’t we doing well’. Actually, the reality is that our capability has been dramatically hollowed out.”