(Bloomberg) -- Russia is using tactics inherited from Soviet Union spies to wage a covert war on western countries, according to a British lawmaker from Prime Minister Theresa May's Conservative Party.
Bob Seely, a former soldier who was elected to Parliament in 2017, said Vladimir Putin's government considers non-military methods of attack to be potentially more powerful than conventional warfare, and was deploying social media, political front groups and its television news channel RT as weapons.
“From fake news aimed at Europe to the propaganda of RT, and from the occupation of Crimea to the streets of Salisbury, Russia is waging a very modern kind of conflict on the West -- as well as on the Russian people themselves,” Seely said in an emailed statement. “Putin's tactics owe much to the ‘active measures' practiced by the KGB during the Cold War, subverting truth to undermine our faith in our institutions. The coming years will test our resilience in multiple ways.”
Britain's relations with Russia are at their worst since the Cold War, following the poisoning of former spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in the English town of Salisbury this year. After years in which Russia's wealthy were invited to base themselves in London without questions being asked about how they made their money, the Home Office is reviewing visas. Roman Abramovich, who became well-known as the owner of Chelsea soccer club, has been unable to renew his permit to enter the country.
Seely, who sits on Parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee, has attempted to show how Putin's Russia is attacking the West, and on Monday published the result, “A Definition of Contemporary Russian Conflict.” Tom Tugendhat, who chairs the committee, described the paper as “a critical element in understanding how Russia and other powers are using often malign influence to achieve their strategic goals.”
According to Seely, the modern Russian method is based on a model developed by the KGB to destabilize opponents. Putin is a former KGB officer.
To contact the reporter on this story: Robert Hutton in London at rhutton1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Flavia Krause-Jackson at fjackson@bloomberg.net, Andrew Reierson, Paul Jarvis
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