Defence expert explains two ways UK can stop Russia's 'grey zone' attacks

A defence expert has explained the two main ways the UK can defend itself from the rise of 'grey zone' attacks.

Several men were found guilty of burning down a warehouse in an incident that has been recognised as a 'grey zone' attack on the UK by Russia.

The warehouse contained supplies that were intended for Ukraine and the men who set it on fire did so at the direction of people told to target the warehouse by Russian mercenary group Wagner, a proscribed terrorist organisation in the UK, via Telegram.

According to a new government report, Brits are at an increasing risk from these 'grey zone' attacks, and there needs to be 'sufficient resources' directed towards tackling them.

'Grey zone' attacks can range from propaganda and disinformation up to sabotage and assassination on another nation's soil, and at the recent trial, the details of how one of these attacks was orchestrated were laid bare.

The warehouse was targeted because it held equipment that was due to be sent to Ukraine (London Fire Brigade/PA Wire)

Defence Eye author Tim Ripley told LADbible there were two main things the UK could do to defend against 'grey zone' attacks at the direction of the Russians.

He explained that 'as far as the Russians are concerned', it 'works both ways', because the UK and other countries are sending supplies to Ukraine which is being used against Russia, so from their perspective, we're doing it to them too.

“This wave of attacks, I think looking at sort of 70/80 plus across Europe over the past two years, all seem to be linked to things related to the logistic support of Ukraine.

"They are companies that supply military equipment, supplies, training, any kind of link to the Ukrainian war. Some of these are things you can spot in open source. Some things seem to be based on more precise intelligence.

"This is classic sabotage and diversionary forces under part of the classic GRU mission to conduct sabotage behind enemy lines."

Dylan Earl (right) was recruited via Telegram, and got Gatwick airport worker Jake Reeves on his side (CPS/PA Wire)

Ripley described the attacks as 'unintended consequences' that have sprung from supplying Ukraine, which has resulted in 'blowback'.

As for how to defend against it, he explained that 'there's two' things Britain can do about it.

The first is what he calls 'passive means', explaining: "You try and secure the facilities that you think might be attacked, you have proper security.

"You have, unlike a certain RAF Air Base in Oxfordshire, you actually have proper fences with CCTV guards and all that kind of stuff to watch what's going on to stop people breaking in.

"That’s your passive means."

While making targets that are deemed more likely to be attacked a more secure place is one method, the other is the true deterrent to stop further attacks.

Greater protection for sites likely to be attacked is one way to try and stop 'grey zone' strikes (Metropolitan Police/PA Wire)

The alternative is you have active intelligence gathering trying to intercept these groups before they’re actually able to launch their attacks," Ripley told LADbible of the way to catch people.

"You can use that, your GCHQ and your other intelligence agencies to monitor Telegram and all these things, and look at all these adverts on pro-Russian websites trying to recruit people.

"You set up your electronic intelligence agency to monitor who sends emails to these sites and follow them up that way."

The defence expert said that 'an extensive forensic intelligence gathering' that could track people's actions through CCTV and monitoring social media was 'the best deterrent to these activities'.

If we make it 'pretty likely that we will catch them so far anyway', then it reduces the likelihood of future attempts as the risk becomes greater, and Ripley pointed to the aftermath of the Salisbury poisoning, where British intelligence 'showed we could catch them pretty quickly and identify them and track them in a way that's not possible in other countries'.

The work done by intelligence agencies and GCHQ is the other way to stop this, and a strong intelligence service was also named as 'the best deterrent' (David Goddard/Getty Images)

As such, Russia has been targeting people Ripley describes as being 'on the fringes of society' to carry out these attacks.

Warehouse fire ringleader Dylan Earl was a drug dealer who contacted Gatwick airport cleaner Jake Reeves, who in turn recruited criminal trio Nii Mensah, Jakeem Rose and Ugnius Asmena.

Ripley said that the people actually carrying out 'grey zone' attacks for Russia were likely to be 'petty criminals who do stuff for the way they do, it's just another part of their criminal lifestyle'.

He said: "These are people on the fringes of society. Whether they're drug dealers or people involved in people smuggling, all that kind of that sort of almost the grey zone of society who interacts with the intelligence grey zone."

He suggested that some of them 'probably didn't know they were working for the Russians when they did this', as seems to have been the case for driver Paul English who was found not guilty of arson after denying knowing what they were going to do.

The defence expert said Russia was trying to recruit 'petty criminals', and the Met Police said 'young criminals' were being recruited (CPS/PA Wire)

Metropolitan Police counter-terrorism Commander Dominic Murphy said: “More than 20 percent of our work now in counter-terrorism policing comes from a threat from states, and Russia is one of those states now that, as we’ve seen on a few occasions, have really gone over and above to project a threat into the United Kingdom.

“But in this case, as a result of some of the hard work of us and our intelligence agencies, the hostile operating environment for Russia means, of course, they’ve recruited young criminals to undertake their work on their behalf.

“We are seeing it quite a bit within our case work.

“It says something about the fact that we have made it very difficult for some of these states to operate in a historical way with their own agents and officers here in the United Kingdom.

“One of the things we need to do is make sure that we are continuing to work with our intelligence partners as effectively as possible to identify where they are tasking, often young criminals, to undertake their work on their behalf, so that we can intervene and disrupt their activities."