Beautiful Virgin Islands

Monday, Jul 21, 2025

Britain's spy chief claims intelligence scoop on Putin's invasion of Ukraine

Britain's spy chief claims intelligence scoop on Putin's invasion of Ukraine

Spies in the United States and Britain scored an intelligence scoop by uncovering Russian President Vladimir Putin's decision to order the biggest attack on a European state since World War Two, Britain's foreign spy chief said.

Putin used an early morning address to the nation on Feb. 24 to order "a special military operation" against Ukraine just three days after recognising two Russian-backed rebel regions of Ukraine.

For months, U.S. and British ministers and Western security sources had warned that Russia could invade Ukraine. They stepped up warnings that an invasion was imminent in the weeks and days ahead of Putin's declaration.

Ahead of the Russian invasion, Moscow repeatedly dismissed those claims as anti-Russian hysteria or disinformation designed to tempt Putin into a war.

"U.S. and UK intelligence communities uncovered Putin's plans for Ukraine," Richard Moore, the chief of Britain's Secret Intelligence Service, known as MI6, said on Twitter.

"We exposed his attempts to engineer 'false flag', fake attacks to justify his invasion," Moore said. "This attack was long planned, unprovoked, cruel aggression."

Moore, though, did not give any sense of where the intelligence had come from.

Such was the concern over Putin's intentions in recent weeks that snippets of U.S. and British intelligence were released into the public domain as part of an attempt to deter an invasion and caution allies about a possible war.

U.S. and British intelligence including maps of the expected invasion's course, details on Russian military numbers, formations, intent and posture, and even dates for a possible invasion, were put into the public domain.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson repeatedly cited intelligence when issuing warnings about Russia.

Putin said he ordered "a special military operation" to protect people, including Russian citizens, subjected to "genocide" in Ukraine - an accusation the West calls baseless propaganda.

Spies spoke of how Putin had changed in recent years.

"Putin has gone through the looking glass," former MI6 chief Alex Younger told the BBC. "I think he has changed."

"He is isolated, badly advised and in a state of a sort of messianic certainty, dangerously combined with a high degree of frustration," Younger said.

WATCHING PUTIN


CIA Director William Burns, a former ambassador to Moscow who speaks Russian, told the Wall Street Journal on Dec. 6 that he did not know if Putin, Russia's paramount leader since 1999, had made up his mind to invade.

Burns said he had been sent to Moscow by President Joe Biden in November to convey directly to Putin the concerns about the military build up around Ukraine and to warn of economic sanctions if there was an invasion.

"There are lots of things that are possible, as I have learned the hard way over the years in watching Vladimir Putin - most of my white hair came from the two tours that I spent in Russia, particularly when I was ambassador," Burns said.

"It is always very difficult to gauge, you know, Putin's intent," Burns told the Journal.

MI6, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and their eavesdropping partners - GCHQ and the NSA - have a mixed record on spying on the Soviet Union and then post-Soviet Russia, according to public records.

In Soviet times, Moscow was extremely difficult for the CIA and MI6 to work in, and both agencies lacked sources for considerable periods.

Moscow was able to steal nuclear secrets from the Manhattan Project and British intelligence was, for a time, riddled with KGB double agents.

Few spies predicted the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union, and spy agencies largely failed to foresee - or failed to escalate a warning to political leaders - about Putin's abrupt annexation of Crimea in 2014.

The apparent prescience of British and American spies on Putin's invasion of Ukraine contrasts sharply with the faulty intelligence which was used to justify the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Before that war, President George W. Bush said that intelligence gathered by the United States and others left no doubt that Iraq was concealing what he intimated were weapons of mass destruction. No such weapons were found.

Newsletter

Related Articles

Beautiful Virgin Islands
0:00
0:00
Close
Man Dies After Being Pulled Into MRI Machine Due to Metal Chain in New York Clinic
NVIDIA Achieves $4 Trillion Valuation Amid AI Demand
US Revokes Visas of Brazilian Corrupted Judges Amid Fake Bolsonaro Investigation
U.S. Congress Approves Rescissions Act Cutting Federal Funding for NPR and PBS
North Korea Restricts Foreign Tourist Access to New Seaside Resort
Brazil's Supreme Court Imposes Radical Restrictions on Former President Bolsonaro
Centrist Criticism of von der Leyen Resurfaces as she Survives EU Confidence Vote
Judge Criticizes DOJ Over Secrecy in Dropping Charges Against Gang Leader
Apple Closes $16.5 Billion Tax Dispute With Ireland
Von der Leyen Faces Setback Over €2 Trillion EU Budget Proposal
UK and Germany Collaborate on Global Military Equipment Sales
Trump Plans Over 10% Tariffs on African and Caribbean Nations
Flying Taxi CEO Reclaims Billionaire Status After Stock Surge
Epstein Files Deepen Republican Party Divide
Zuckerberg Faces $8 Billion Privacy Lawsuit From Meta Shareholders
FIFA Pressured to Rethink World Cup Calendar Due to Climate Change
SpaceX Nears $400 Billion Valuation With New Share Sale
Microsoft, US Lab to Use AI for Faster Nuclear Plant Licensing
Trump Walks Back Talk of Firing Fed Chair Jerome Powell
Zelensky Reshuffles Cabinet to Win Support at Home and in Washington
"Can You Hit Moscow?" Trump Asked Zelensky To Make Putin "Feel The Pain"
Irish Tech Worker Detained 100 days by US Authorities for Overstaying Visa
Dimon Warns on Fed Independence as Trump Administration Eyes Powell’s Succession
Church of England Removes 1991 Sexuality Guidelines from Clergy Selection
Superman Franchise Achieves Success with Latest Release
Hungary's Viktor Orban Rejects Agreements on Illegal Migration
Jeff Bezos Considers Purchasing Condé Nast as a Wedding Gift
Ghislaine Maxwell Says She’s Ready to Testify Before Congress on Epstein’s Criminal Empire
Bal des Pompiers: A Celebration of Community and Firefighter Culture in France
FBI Chief Kash Patel Denies Resignation Speculations Amid Epstein List Controversy
Air India Pilot’s Mental Health Records Under Scrutiny
Google Secures Windsurf AI Coding Team in $2.4 Billion Licence Deal
Jamie Dimon Warns Europe Is Losing Global Competitiveness and Flags Market Complacency
South African Police Minister Suspended Amid Organised Crime Allegations
Nvidia CEO Claims Chinese Military Reluctance to Use US AI Technology
Hong Kong Advances Digital Asset Strategy to Address Economic Challenges
Australia Rules Out Pre‑commitment of Troops, Reinforces Defence Posture Amid US‑China Tensions
Martha Wells Says Humanity Still Far from True Artificial Intelligence
Nvidia Becomes World’s First Four‑Trillion‑Dollar Company Amid AI Boom
U.S. Resumes Deportations to Third Countries After Supreme Court Ruling
Excavation Begins at Site of Mass Grave for Children at Former Irish Institution
Iranian President Reportedly Injured During Israeli Strike on Secret Facility
EU Delays Retaliatory Tariffs Amid New U.S. Threats on Imports
Trump Defends Attorney General Pam Bondi Amid Epstein Memo Backlash
Renault Shares Drop as CEO Luca de Meo Announces Departure Amid Reports of Move to Kering
Senior Aides for King Charles and Prince Harry Hold Secret Peace Summit
Anti‑Semitism ‘Normalised’ in Middle‑Class Britain, Says Commission Co‑Chair
King Charles Meets David Beckham at Chelsea Flower Show
If the Department is Really About Justice: Ghislaine Maxwell Should Be Freed Now
NYC Candidate Zohran Mamdani’s ‘Antifada’ Remarks Spark National Debate on Political Language and Economic Policy
×