𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

Vladimir Putin will continue trying to “export chaos” until he is forced to back down, the new head of MI6 will warn.

The UK is facing an “aggressive, expansionist and revisionist” Russia, with Kremlin-inspired sabotage, kidnap, misinformation and murder plots set to “continue until Putin is forced to change his calculus”, Blaise Metreweli will declare in a speech today.

The spy chief, known as “C”, will vow that MI6 will continue to apply “pressure” on “Ukraine’s behalf”.

The head of the British military Chief of Defence Staff, Sir Richard Knighton, will later on Monday warn that Russia wants to “challenge, limit, divide and ultimately destroy NATO.”

The gloomy warnings come as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky arrived in Berlin, Germany, for talks with American diplomats on a US-proposed peace plan.

Ms Metreweli, who took up office in October, will highlight the threat posed by an “aggressive, expansionist, and revisionist” Russia.

She will say: “Putin should be in no doubt, our support is enduring. The pressure we apply on Ukraine’s behalf will be sustained.

“The export of chaos is a feature, not a bug in the Russian approach to international engagement, and we should be ready for this to continue until Putin is forced to change his calculus.”

Ms Metreweli will warn that the rules of conflict are being rewritten by Russia.

The MI6 chief will add: “The defining challenge of the twenty-first century is not simply who wields the most powerful technologies, but who guides them with the greatest wisdom. Our security, our prosperity and our humanity depend on it.

“We all have choices to make ahead about how we deal with the undercurrents shaping the world. About how, in our new, faster, more dangerous and tech-mediated world, it will be our rediscovery of our shared humanity, our ability to listen, and our courage that will determine how our future unfolds.

“It is not what we can do that defines us, but what we choose to do. That choice – the exercise of human agency – has shaped our world before, and it will shape it again.”

And the Chief of the Defence Staff, Sir Richard Knighton, will on Monday warn “the situation is more dangerous than I have known during my career”.

Highlighting the increased probability of Russia invading a NATO country, he is expected to say: “The war in Ukraine shows Putin’s willingness to target neighbouring states, including their civilian populations, potentially with such novel and destructive weapons, threatens the whole of NATO, including the UK.

“The Russian leadership has made clear that it wishes to challenge, limit, divide and ultimately destroy NATO, in former President Medvedev’s words, aspiring to “the disappearance of Ukraine and the disappearance of NATO – preferably both.

“The response requires more than simply strengthening our armed forces. A new era for defence doesn’t just mean our military and Government stepping up – as we are – it means our whole nation stepping up.”

Discussing the societal response needed, Sir Richard will say: “Our armed forces always need to be ready to fight and win – that’s why readiness is such a priority.

“But deterrence is also about our resilience to these threats, it’s about how we harness all our national power, from universities, to industry, the rail network to the NHS.

“It’s about our defence and resilience being a higher national priority for all of us. An ‘all-in’ mentality.

“And that will require people who are not soldiers, sailors or aviators to nevertheless invest their skills – and money – in innovation and problem solving on the nation’s behalf.”

The Kremlin said on Sunday that Nato Secretary General Mark Rutte’s remarks about preparing for war with Russia were irresponsible and showed that he did not really understand the devastation wrought by World War Two.

Rutte, in a speech in Berlin on Thursday, said that NATO should be “prepared for the scale of war our grandparents or great-grandparents endured” and asserted that “we are Russia’s next target”.

The Kremlin has repeatedly dismissed claims by NATO and some European leaders that it plans to attack a NATO member as “nonsense” used by European leaders to whip up anti-Russian hysteria.

“This seems like a statement by a representative of a generation that has managed to forget what World War Two was actually like,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told state television reporter Pavel Zarubin.

“They have no understanding, and unfortunately, Mr Rutte, making such irresponsible statements, simply does not understand what he is talking about.”