How Putin will use Trump’s weakness to target UK, according to experts and insiders

Vladimir Putin will try to “exploit cracks” in Donald Trump’s administration as a result of his midterms wipeout to intensify his hybrid war on the UK and Europe, security experts have warned. The tactics already favoured by the Kremlin to sow discord and chaos across Europe could become more common, with Russia’s main strategic goal “to contribute to instability across the continent”. Simon Diggins, a security analyst and former colonel in the British Army, said any power tussle in the US that stems from the Republicans’ historic defeat in the midterm elections could result in a “two year gap of uncertainty into which all sorts of nastiness could flow”. Shorts Much of Trump’s second term in power has been preoccupied with foreign policy, from the Iran war to demands that European allies increase their defence contributions. And while the Democrats have won the Senate and the House, taking control of Congress for the rest of his presidency, most of Trump’s foreign policy decisions can still be carried out through executive order, which will be unaffected by changes on Capitol Hill. Still, the cracks in his top team have already begun to appear. In a scathing assessment of the elections wipeout for the Republicans, Vice-President JD Vance blamed the Middle East conflict. “Everyone knows why we lost. And any honest conversation about where we go from here must start there,” he said. Mathieu Boulegue, a Russia and Eurasia fellow at Chatham House, said: “Russia will probably try to exploit whatever cracks emerge in the administration.” The current hybrid tactics, below the threshold of open, conventional war, will continue, Boulegue said, but Putin will be counting on concerns that “there is always a risk of over escalation from the Russian side”. “They want to saturate us psychologically,” he said. ‘You’re on your own’ Trump had already pulled back his support of Nato and made increased defence demands of the UK and other European members, but the result of the elections in the US, according to Diggins, means: “The message for us, the Europeans, is: you’re on your own.” John Lough, head of foreign policy at the New Eurasian Strategies Centre and former Nato first representative based in Moscow, said Trump will not become “more amenable to Europe” and instead could “threaten to pull the rug from under Nato” entirely. A weakened transatlantic bond would be “music to Kremlin ears”, he added. This could mean Russia is more emboldened to mount more hybrid attacks against European democracies like the UK. Boulegue said the threat from Russia “will be consistent” and the strategic goal to contribute to instability across the continent would remain unchanged. Just last month, two Latvian men were arrested within the bounds of RAF Molesworth, an incident which some have suggested could have been linked to Moscow. And on Tuesday, seven European flights were grounded after they were targeted by “malicious” bomb threats – as yet unlinked to Russia, but indicative of the kind of grey war tactics its intelligence forces like to employ. ‘This is a man who is looking for his legacy’ Diggins suggested any threats to Europe and the UK could be cranked up during a window of opportunity when Putin “knows that the ability of the Americans to react is weakened”. At 74, Putin will also be thinking ahead to his legacy and in what state he will be leaving his country in the long-term, Diggins added. This could drive the Russian dictator to more concrete action than just more hybrid warfare, potentially including attempts to expand Russian territory. “This is a man who is looking for his legacy and he has a particular worldview. That Russia is a great power and should be regarded in the same way as America or China,” he said. Putin’s worldview also includes the staunch belief that Russian diaspora populations should be brought back into Russia, something he uses as an excuse to expand its territory. At risk could be “diaspora Russian populations, particularly in the Baltics and Kazakhstan”. While Putin will not want to provoke a response from Nato, he might try and push this line as far as possible, he said. “He’s not going to do anything that would guarantee Article 5 being triggered,” Diggins said. “But he could cause a provocation somewhere like Narva, a city on the border of Russia and Estonia, which is Russian speaking.” “He could manufacture dissent among the Russian speaking population, which is exactly what he did in the Donbas.”