The British ex-minister called on people to go into bomb shelters and prepare for World War III

Former British Secretary of State for the Armed Forces James Heappie argues that Britain must prepare for World War III despite being “far behind”.

Former British Armed Forces Minister James Heappie wrote that many government departments have abandoned the practice of evacuation to a bunker. Preparing the country for war is the best way to maximize the chances of peace, but Britain is “very far behind”, a former defense secretary has warned.

As Sky News reports, in a sign of how alien the idea of ​​armed conflict has become to most officials in Whitehall, James Heappie said many departments had turned down the opportunity to take part in a “whole of government” exercise to practice evacuating a bomb shelter in the event of war.

It was an exercise that former Defense Secretary Ben Wallace insisted on “to get people down into a bunker so they could see what their working environment would be like in war,” Hippie wrote in an article for the Sunday Telegraph.

“In the end, rather depressingly, only defense secretaries, senior military officers and Ministry of Defense officials took part,” laments the British politician.

It was a shame because the exercise “would have shown how outdated many of our current procedures are,” fumed James Heappie, who resigned as secretary of the armed forces last month.

His abrupt intervention comes after Sky News reported this week that the British government has no national plan for defending Britain or mobilizing its people and industries for war, despite renewed threats of conflict.

Officials have begun drawing up a cross-departmental “national defense plan” amid warnings from ministers that the UK has entered a “pre-war world”.

But any return to a Cold War-style state of readiness for war will require political leaders to re-emphasize defense as a truly national concern, sources told Sky News.

James Happy said there was a need to take a fresh look at strategic resilience, such as securing food and energy supplies and repurposing industry for weapons production, as well as spending more money on defence.

Heightening the pressure on Rishi Sunak, he wrote: “Only a stupid Prime Minister fails to see that the long-term trend is towards global instability, which could easily lead to a new Cold War and perhaps something even hotter.” war now, both by increasing defense spending and by focusing on our strategic resilience, is the best way to maximize the chances of achieving peace.”

Hippie said he did not believe World War III was imminent, but praised Sweden for the way it had prepared its citizens for a potential conflict.

He said he received a brochure from Sweden’s minister of civil defense that explained what citizens should do during war, including what food supplies they should carry.

“He gave me a copy of the pamphlet and it’s been on my desk ever since. It’s a stark reminder that war is a national affair and, frankly, in Britain we’re very far behind.”

During a training exercise in the bunker, the former minister said that all secretaries of state – not just the defense minister – had a desk and a bed in the bunker.

This is not so they can survive a nuclear attack “to repopulate our islands after the apocalypse” but “because their departments are as important to the war effort as the Department of Defense.”

It was a fundamental part of working in government during the Cold War – a discipline that has all but disappeared despite renewed threats from Russia following the outbreak of the conflict in Ukraine, as well as the war in the Middle East and concerns about China, Sky News notes.

“I suspect there are many Cabinet members who don’t even know where their desk or bed is in the bunker,” Hippy wrote. “There may be one or two who don’t even know where the bunker is!”

Britain once had a large network of bomb shelters built during the Cold War to help regional governments function in some form in the event of a nuclear attack by the Soviet Union.

However, most of these underground shelters fell into disuse in the 1990s when the Cold War ended.