Former British Defense Minister Ben Wallace, speaking at the Warsaw Security Forum on October 1, asserted that the West must make Crimea “uninhabitable.” RT reported October 1 that “Wallace argued that Russia viewed the Black Sea peninsula as a ‘Holy Mount,’ and that Ukraine should strike where it would inflict the greatest damage.”
Wallace emphasized to the participants: “We have to help Ukraine have the long-range capabilities to make Crimea unviable. We need to choke the life out of Crimea. If it is not inhabitable or not possible for it to function.… I think, if we do that, [Russian President Vladimir] Putin will suddenly realize he’s got something to lose.” Presumably, the long-range capabilities that Wallace proposes are missiles and drones.
He called for giving precedence to an attack against the Kerch Strait Bridge, which connects Crimea to Russia’s Krasnodar Krai region. The bridge fronts out to the south onto the Black Sea. Ukraine had used a truck bomb against the Kerch Bridge in October 2022, which killed three people. This is part of the recent British calls for shutting down passage of Russia’s naval vessels and commercial shipping in the Black Sea and the Baltic Sea, which would landlockthe western portion of Russia.
Wallace was selected by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to be Defense Minister, and he served the first three years of his four year term (2019-23) under Johnson.
