NATO Would Be 'Too Slow' To Counter Russian Strike, Warns Retired Colonel

(Picture: NATO).

A retired British Colonel fears that NATO would be 'too slow' to counter a potential future Russian strike in the Baltic.

Bob Stewart, who is now a Tory MP, told ministers that the NATO fighting force "deploys at the speed of a striking slug" and would be no match for a Russian advance.

Mr Stewart commanded UN forces in Bosnia from September 1992 to May 1993. He said: "NATO would simply be too slow to defend against a Russian force in say somewhere like Estonia or Latvia.

"The Russians would beat us to the draw, the alliance's much quoted article five is in fact a commitment to consult but a not a commitment to act and I wonder how long such a decision might take."

Mr Stewart dismissed NATO's "high readiness task force" which was established in 2014, telling MPs the idea the force could counter a Russian advance in time was "wishful thinking".

He also said that any "high intensity war" would require NATO to "change hugely".  

"It's not good enough to fight at the moment and it would have to change very fast indeed if it was actually to do the very dirty business of killing the enemy and winning the war."

Defence Secretary Warns NATO Over US Patience

Meanwhile, the Defence Secretary has warned NATO members cannot expect US taxpayers to "keep picking up the tab" for European defence.

Gavin Williamson MP told MPs in the House of Commons that allies could not expect US patience to last forever over funding of the alliance. 

He called for defence spending to be raised to more than the 2% benchmark: 

"First and foremost we need to accept we have to invest more in defence, we need allies to step up and spend a minimum of 2%.

"This is something that the UK has led on ever since the Wales Nato summit in 2014."

"But we have to be honest with ourselves, we can't continue to expect US taxpayers to keep picking up the tab for European defence indefinitely, nor can we expect US patience to last forever.

"We as a continent have to step up to responsibility of playing a pivotal role in defending ourselves and not to expect others to do it for us."

Following the latest G7 summit, US President Donald Trump tweeted that the US "pays close to the entire cost of NATO".

Mr Trump claimed the US protects many of the countries that "rip off" the US on trade, highlighting that Germany spends 1% of GDP on defence while the US spends 4%.