Protecting Poland from Putin’s provocation: Britain joins EASTERN SENTRY
The Cable | No. 37.2025
Welcome to the 60th Cable, our weekly roundup of British foreign and defence policy.
On 10th September, Polish forces shot down at least 19 Russian drones which had entered the country’s airspace in what is being seen as an escalation by the Kremlin against the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO). While the incursion thankfully led to no casualties, it highlights NATO’s limited counter uncrewed aerial system (C-UAS) capabilities – in particular those of European NATO allies – to respond to such a provocation without depleting already limited stockpiles of air defence missiles. Likewise, it is yet another example of Russia probing the political will and unity of both NATO and the European Union (EU).
So far, the political response has been strong, with NATO launching a new mission – EASTERN SENTRY – to enhance air, land, sea and cyber capabilities across the alliance’s eastern flank. His Majesty’s (HM) Government has announced that the United Kingdom (UK) will contribute Eurofighter Typhoon jets to join the mission alongside allied forces from Denmark, France and Germany.
However, the ability of European countries to produce the equipment and munitions for C-UAS remains an ongoing problem. More should be done to scale up the production of interceptor missiles, but cheaper forms of tackling the challenge should also be found. Anti-aircraft artillery and, in the near future, direct energy weapons, such as Britain’s DragonFire military laser will be essential for the security of Europe against an adversary which is willing to test the continent’s defences.
Welcome back to The Cable!
Sir Keir Starmer, Prime Minister, spoke to a number of world leaders over the last week, which included:
On 11th September, the Prime Minister spoke with Emmanuel Macron, President of France, and Friedrich Merz, Chancellor of Germany, in separate phone calls. Both calls focused on Russia’s violation of NATO and Polish airspace, with all leaders involved agreeing that it was clear Moscow is ‘continuing to ramp up its aggression…through a campaign of increasingly belligerent actions’. In the call with Merz, Sir Keir underscored the importance of defending NATO from both conventional and sub-threshold threats posed by Russia. With Macron, the Prime Minister discussed how the UK and France could bolster Poland’s defences.
On 12th September, Sir Keir held a call with Karol Nawrocki, President of Poland, in which he congratulated the new President on his election. The Prime Minister also reiterated the ‘UK’s steadfast support to Poland and NATO’ following the incursion of Polish airspace by Russian drones.
John Healey, Secretary of State for Defence, gave a speech at the Defence Investment Summit on 10th September, in which he laid out why Britain needs to enhance its defence industry. Using the drone incursion into Polish airspace as a case in point, Healey stated that: ‘we’re in a new era of threat. This demands a new era for defence.’ He went on to highlight that deterrence capability ‘rests…on the power of industry…when a nation is under threat, its forces are only as strong as the industry that stands behind it.’ The Defence Secretary also made the case for the so-called ‘defence dividend’, the need to reform the procurement processes in the Ministry of Defence (MOD) and the necessity of developing a skilled workforce, all central factors in the recently published Defence Industrial Strategy. He concluded by saying:
Defence is changing. Our relationship with business will change. We’re a government with a clear plan backed by record investment. We are opening new doors. We are bringing people together in new ways, and we are drawing on new talent and expertise. And together, we will provide not only the security we need today, but the prosperity that we need for tomorrow.
New figures released by the MOD showed a 6% rise to £31.7 billion in expenditure on the defence industry by HM Government, with figures covering the 2024-2025 financial year. This includes a 21% uplift in investment in the weapons and ammunition sector. Following the announcement, Healey said:
This record investment shows how we are making defence an engine for growth, supporting jobs and prosperity for British working people and boosting businesses across the United Kingdom.
The MOD is set to launch a new Test and Evaluation (T&E) Marketplace to act as a hub for users to access T&E facilities and support services, while also giving industry a single ‘portal’ to promote their capabilities. T&E facilities are specialised facilities found across the UK, which are used to ensure defence systems are safe and reliable. The Marketplace is expected to launch by the end of 2026, but a pilot scheme will be rolled out earlier in the year with select industry partners.
For additional defence news stories, follow this link to the DSEI Gateway news portal.
On 15th September, the MOD announced that the UK’s largest drone production facility will open next year in Swindon, at the cost of £400 million. The new factory, operated by Tekever, will allow for ‘large-scale production’ of Tekever platforms in Britain – including the Royal Air Force’s (RAF) StormShroud capability. The site will support the full drone production lifecycle, ‘from rapid prototyping to manufacturing and research and development.’
The UK and the United States (US) will sign a new multi-billion pound deal to ‘turbocharge the build-out of new nuclear power stations’ and create a ‘new golden age’ of nuclear power during the state visit to Britain by Donald Trump, President of the US, starting on 16th September. The Atlantic Partnership for Advanced Nuclear Energy will ease regulation barriers to allow companies to build new nuclear power stations at a faster rate in both countries, and cut the average licensing period for nuclear projects from up to four years to two. The announcement also revealed at least five new commercial nuclear projects to be developed between British and American energy companies, which include up to 12 Advanced Modular Reactors in Hartlepool and Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) for data centres to be built in Nottinghamshire.
How competitors frame Britain
TASS reported on a statement made by Andrey Kelin, Russian Ambassador to the UK, in which he claimed that HM Government has been ‘unable to provide…evidence of Russian military involvement in launching drones into Poland’. Kelin stated that Kyiv might have carried out the incursion as a ‘false flag operation’ before asserting that Moscow ‘has no interest in escalating tensions…with NATO’. The Kremlin is up to its old tricks again; feigning innocence and acting like the victim is a tried and tested method for Moscow, but its actions can only be considered as aggressive and escalatory.
Following the announcement that the Crown Prosecution Service has dropped charges against the two British individuals accused of spying for the People’s Republic of China (PRC), the Chinese Embassy to the UK released a statement, claiming that the entire case was ‘fabricated and malicious slander’. It went on to warn ‘certain individuals in the UK to stop this kind of self-staged anti-China political farce’. While this case has been dropped, Beijing is not an innocent actor, having been accused of spying and other means of subterfuge against the British state.
The Pacific Future Forum: Enhancing British collaboration with Japan
By Hirohito Ogi, Senior Research Fellow, Institute of Geoeconomics, Japan
It was impressive to see participants at the Pacific Future Forum (PFF) rigorously discussing future operational concepts, defence industrial mobilisation and international collaborations among partners onboard the HMS Prince of Wales. Such discussions were confined not only to the maritime domain where the carrier strike groups mainly operate, but extended to issues across multiple domains, including how to draw lessons from drone warfare in Ukraine in maritime settings. This indicates the UK’s diverse strategic interests and willingness to collaborate with its partners, such as Japan, through a variety of policy options.
The Japanese media tends to simplify the implications of Operation HIGHMAST, and ponders to what extent Britain would – and could – assist Japan’s defence effort in regional contingencies. Such a question is, however, based on an incorrect assumption that Japan’s international partners always act like the US, its only treaty ally with defence commitments.
Probably, Japan has been accustomed to the asymmetrical security relationship for too many years. But the UK is not the US. Japan has to think about how to expand symmetrical collaborations with partners such as Britain, Australia and South Korea in an uncertain moment, when the US alone may not be able to sustain the free and open international order.
This would require creative solutions between both rims of the Eurasian continent in sharing advanced defence concepts, technologies, industrial capacity and experiences in public-private partnerships to augment their capabilities mutually. The PFF in Tokyo possibly hinted at opportunities for Japan in such diverse and nuanced collaborations.
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