Yesterday (10th of September), the Ministry of Defence released a clip of the Secretary of State for Defence, Wes Streeting, speaking in Parliament, replete with his Union Jack and Ukraine flag lapel pins.
In his statement, Streeting claimed that:
“The UK is not at war with Russia, nor do we seek confrontation with Russia, nor do we have any quarrel with the Russian people.”
This statement was made despite the fact that Boris Johnson admitted in an interview with the Daily Telegraph in November, 2024 that the UK was fighting a proxy war against Russia, in Ukraine, and more importantly this was said despite the financial commitments made by the previous Starmer government of £25 billion, backed by £3 billion in military assistance, “for as long as it takes”.
So far, the Burnham government has not given any indication that it will renege from this commitment.
Streeting’s rhetoric belies the recent deal with Zelensky’s government, sharing the blueprints for the French/UK SCALP missiles and the provision of Storm Shadow missiles, which have already been used to hit civilian infrastructure in Russia. Only 3 days ago (8-9-2026), the MOD announced a £100 million package to provide Patriot ‘defence’ missiles to Ukraine, including;
“Britain’s commitment to provide over 120,000 drones to Ukraine this year continues, with 25,000 delivered to date, a figure set to ramp up ahead of the winter. These include interceptors that take out Russian drones, reconnaissance drones that enable the Armed Forces of Ukraine to see what is happening on the battlefield and behind enemy lines, as well as attack drones that help Ukraine take the fight to Russia.”
Once again, we see the current Labour tendency to put a large gap between rhetoric and reality. We see rhetoric of defence, and the reality of pouring arms into Ukraine backed up with a Russo-phobic, warmongering media campaign. All to persuade us that our enemy is Russia. We are daily seeing posts from the right-wing media warning us of a likely war with Russia, a constant ramping-up of militaristic language.
The bigger question is, who is our real enemy?
It’s no accident that UK media has been feeding us stories about the need to cut benefit spending in the UK.
The Foreign Affairs Commentator for the Daily Telegraph, David Blair said on the 6th of September that;
“…the UK’s state pension triple lock is fiscally unsustainable and must be scrapped to prioritise national defence spending.”
Kemi Badenoch likewise in an interview for the Today program, on the 10th of September, argued for cuts in relation to housing benefit. She said;
“What we’re doing is making sure that people are protected, but capping the amount that people get on benefits because we need to look after our national security.”
At a time where the working classes are being tightly squeezed by increases in the cost of living, housing, privatisation of our NHS and constant restrictions on public services, the right-wing defaults to attacking working class people by seeking to impoverish them by cutting back on pensions and benefits for those people who are really struggling, in favour of pouring money into the pockets of their friends in the Industrial Military Complex.
It’s obvious that our real enemy is closer to home. It is those in our country who think nothing of turning the economic screws on working class people, making housing and rents more expensive, with food and energy bills ever increasing, getting further beyond the reach of ordinary people.
This is the real enemy that we need to be fighting against; poverty, injustice and governments who act in the interests of rich elites, and not in the interests of the people.
The real enemy are those who would deny us a decent wage, good social housing, pensions that give our old people a dignified life, provide our young people with a decent job and worthwhile apprenticeships. The very people who work to deny us the dignity of a decent standard of living.
Our real enemy and our real fight is much closer to home.
Allistair Lomax, Socialist Labour Party