Britain’s domestic intelligence agency is devoting more resources to foreign threats than during the Cold War. Its chief calls Russia ‘aggressor number one.’

Britain’s domestic intelligence service is now devoting more resources to countering state threats than it did during the Cold War, MI5 chief Ken McCallum said.

Russia remains “aggressor number one” and is trying to wage “hybrid warfare” in Europe, he said. McCallum said Russia is trying to destabilize European countries while making “minimal and horrifically costly” progress in its war against Ukraine.

Following the expulsion of Russian agents from the U.K., Russian intelligence services are now “scrambling to pay criminals to do their bidding,” McCallum said. “These are not the actions of a great power with the strategic upper hand,” he said.

Officials in several European countries, including Germany, France, and Poland, have previously said Russian authorities are trying to carry out acts of sabotage to intimidate Ukraine’s allies.

Further reading

• Russia is escalating its hybrid attacks on the West. Moscow will make Europe’s life ‘hell’ for supporting Ukraine, Kremlin insider tells Bloomberg.

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