Exclusive: Former U.K. Commander in Afghanistan Blasts Biden’s ‘Insane’ Foreign Policies Leading to Ukraine Conflict

In an exclusive interview with Breitbart News on Thursday in light of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, former commander of British forces in Afghanistan Colonel Richard Kemp blasted President Biden’s “insane foreign policies,” including the U.S.’s “humiliation” in Afghanistan, its increasing oil dependence on Moscow, and its obsession with “gender pronouns, political correctness, environmentalism,” as he called to support Ukrainian resistance, depose President Putin, and withdraw support for an Iran nuclear deal, and warned of the increasing Chinese threat. 

The former commander who led British forces in Afghanistan in 2003 and later joined the committee supervising the country’s intelligence services, began by explaining the background for Russia’s recent invasion of Ukraine, claiming there is a “pattern of Putin’s aggression” with a visible “correlation” with the White House. 

“In 2014, when Putin invaded Crimea, [former President Barack] Obama was in the White House,” Kemp said. “Now in 2022 when he invades Ukraine, Biden’s in the White House.” 

“So, we’ve got two weak presidents who [Putin] clearly feels he can act without regard to their reaction,” he added. “So I think that’s one reason why this is happening now.” 

Another factor in the current conflict, according to Kemp, is the “closely connected debacle in Afghanistan” whereby Putin likely saw “what Biden did in Afghanistan, the humiliation of the United States, [and] the humiliation of NATO — who were unable to do anything in Afghanistan” without America.

“He would have looked at that and made his calculations and I think that if anything that encouraged him to do what he’s doing now,” he said. 
Other elements he cited were the longstanding European and German policies vis-a-vis Russia.

“When you add to that the very pro-Russian German policies that’s existed for many years under [Germany’s Angela] Merkel and the European, particularly German, dependence on Russian gas and historic reluctance to do anything in the face of Russian aggression — I think all of those different factors align to lead [Putin] where he got to now,” Kemp argued.

Deterrence

One measure that may have prevented the current conflict would have been utilizing NATO, according to Kemp.

“I think probably the one thing we could have done which would have prevented this would have been to deploy NATO forces into Afghanistan before Putin invaded. I think if there had been a substantial NATO force there, he would not have invaded Ukraine,” he said.

“There was clearly no political will to do that with people making the excuse that it’s not a NATO country,” he added. “Therefore once the attack occurred, there is probably even less political will for NATO to engage directly in the conflict.”

Supporting Ukraine

Being that such a deployment is no longer a viable option, having been “explicitly excluded by most NATO national leaders, particularly in the US and Western Europe,” Kemp cited those options which he believes are still viable. 

“One option is to do everything we can to support the war effort without actually getting involved in it and that is helping to finance the Ukrainian war,” he said. 

“And secondly, continuing to send in weapons and other equipment that they need,” he added. “I think anything that Ukraine asks for they should get from us; anything we can provide that they want, we should give them to help them keep fighting.”

Another move he suggested was to begin preparations for future resistance support.

“On the assumption that looks quite likely that the Russians will defeat the Ukrainian army, we should be preparing to support any resistance movement that grows up after Putin wins and then occupies Ukraine in some form,” he said.

“We should be preparing to provide direct support to resistance in the form of intelligence, surveillance, cyber capabilities and sending in weapons and munitions and other equipment and also undeclared advisers to help whatever resistance exists to help them to be more effective,” he added, noting that it was something we should be prepared “now before it actually starts.”

Putin

The ultimate aim though, according to Kemp, should entail deposing the Russian president.

“Our overwhelming strategic objective should be to get rid of Putin because he is able to stay in office until 2036, so he represents a permanent threat to the West,” he said. 

Accusing Putin of having his “eyes on the Baltic states” in the event he succeeds in Ukraine with limited damage as well as “general aggression against the West” having also demanded the West disarm its nuclear weapons while threatening the West with them, Kemp warned, “we can’t assume that’s an empty threat.”

“So he has to go because he represents Russia and while he’s in the Kremlin, his country is a direct threat to the West,” he said.

Admitting the West “can’t feasibly bring him down ourselves,” Kemp called to do “everything we can to encourage Russians to do so,” including identifying “potential successors to Putin who we believe to be reasonable and moderate and then provide whatever support we can to them.”

The most effective way to bring Putin down, according to Kemp, is to “heavily target the oligarchs who are his allies and make them really hurt both economically and legally, to the extent that they actually do force a palace coup in the Kremlin.”

In addition, the West can “make life very hard for the average Russian to the extent that the dissatisfaction with Putin grows and a movement to depose him becomes effective with popular support.” 

“Those are pretty much the only options that we have on the table,” he said. 

Part of the strategy Kemp suggested to “bring down” the Russian president would be “to make his occupation of Ukraine as difficult and as deadly as possible to be.” 

“It’s not that I want to see Russian conscripts going home in body bags, but I do believe that he should be made to feel real pain over this and it’s not just about stopping this conflict or getting even-handed,” he said, “it’s also about deterring him from further aggression.”

Energy Policies

Calling attention to the current administration’s policies on American energy independence, Kemp blamed the president for increasing oil dependence on Russia.

“I think Biden has brought about this situation of increased oil import from Russia, and it should be stopped,” he said. “Maybe it can’t be stopped immediately, but it should be stopped rapidly.”

“And the same goes for European dependence on oil and gas from Russia,” he added, “and that should be stopped.”

Having gotten into “such a ridiculous situation that it’s very hard to extricate ourselves,” Kemp called to do “everything” now to achieve more energy independence. 

“Getting gas supplies and oil from elsewhere, restoring our nuclear power stations that have been shut down, and doing more things like fracking, which have been stopped (certainly in most of Europe) are alternatives we need to go for,” he said.

“A lot of it’s down to the hard left pressuring to stop us from being self-sufficient, or at least not dependent on Russia, including our environmental lobbies,” he added. “We need to recognize that there’s something even more dangerous to the world, and particularly to Europe, than their environmental concerns.”

Escalation

Asked about a further escalation on Russia’s part, Kemp gave his thoughts on Putin’s strategy.  

“I think he already has resorted to things like thermobaric weapons and cluster bombs and he has the ability to use gas and intensify his campaign,” he said. “And my view is that he went in with a comparatively light touch at the beginning because he just wanted to collapse the Ukrainian government and then effectively take over Ukraine without creating a really intensive counterinsurgency campaign against him.” 

However, if that doesn’t work, Kemp argued, “he’s not going to turn away and say, ‘well, I didn’t really mean it, I’ll just pack up and go home.’” 

“He’s gonna go to the next level of attacks and intensify his attacks in order to bring about the most rapid destruction of the Ukrainian army he can while minimizing Russian casualties,” he said. “Because although Russians are thought to have an endless appetite for casualties, I don’t think that’s true nowadays and I don’t think he wants that.” 

“So he would see that as a destabilizing factor, so those two concerns would cause him to resort to far more extreme weapons than we’ve seen him use so far,” he added. 

Iran

Kemp pointed to the restart of the Iran nuclear deal talks that aided the current conflict.

“I think the Iran deal negotiations are another example of Biden’s insane foreign policies that resulted in Afghanistan [and] that helped result in the Ukrainian situation,” he said. “And his misguided policies over Iran will help make the world a more dangerous place.” 

“To have Russians who have been threatening us with nuclear attack involved as mediators over this deal with Iran is just the parallel universe,” he added. “People would find it unbelievable if they really understood it.”

Kemp called on other members of the Security Council involved in the negotiations to “withdraw their support.” 

“If [Biden] wants to keep pressing on with it, fine, but we shouldn’t be supporting it,” he said. “I think his whole rationale for doing it is completely ill-judged and has no basis in reality.”

China

He then called attention to the Chinese government and its involvement in the conflict.

“We shouldn’t forget China because China supports Putin,” he said. “They may have expressed certain reservations in recent days but there’s no doubt China supports Putin.” 

“They will help defray the damage to Russia from sanctions and other measures against them and they’re likely to buy up all the oil and gas that is available if European countries do actually limit or stop Russian energy supplies — so they will be on the side of Putin,” he added. 

Just as [Chinese] President Xi watched Afghanistan, Kemp warned, “he’s watching what’s happening here as well.” 

“Taiwan is his Ukraine,” he said. “And if the West is able to muster some form of resolve against Putin which does lead to his demise, then I think that might potentially deter Xi.” 

But such a feat will not be easy, he asserted, “particularly given our reluctance to take military action.” 

“If we were unwilling to take military action to defend an ally and friend in Europe because we say they’re not NATO members, well Taiwan is not a NATO member either,” he said. “So if Xi sees weakness, which he [has] already over Ukraine, he will also smell blood over Taiwan and his other territorial ambitions.”

“So as well as trying to curb Putin’s aggression, I think strong action by Western countries and NATO countries will potentially help deter [Xi] as well,” he added. “And if there is no strong action, then it will encourage him.”

The “Weak” West 

Highlighting its relatively high standard of living, Kemp explained how the West’s priorities have distracted it from focusing on existential threats.

“I think the West has lived a very comfortable life for many years without any real threat to its way of life or survival and we’ve become obsessed with gender pronouns, political correctness, environmentalism, at the expense of what is very clearly becoming a real threat to us,” he said.

“And I think that contributed to Putin’s aggression [seeing that] the West was weak and, as he saw it, decadent,” he added.

He urged the West to find a way of “gaining better resolve” through acts such as “building up our armed forces that have been neglected for decades now.” 

“Germany has now agreed to significantly increase its defense budget,” he noted, “which is quite an extraordinary step for them to take.”

He concluded by expressing hope that other European countries would follow suit.

“And that includes Britain, which has been systematically destroying its armed forces over the years, since the end of the Cold War in particular,” he said. “They’ve just cut and cut and cut to the extent that we have so very limited capabilities now, and that needs to be reversed.”

“Not just to be stopped but to be reversed,” he added. “And our forces need to be built up and permanently deployed in Eastern Europe in large numbers in order to deter this sort of aggression against NATO allies.”

In September, Kemp blasted President Biden’s exit from Afghanistan, claiming it was worse than 9/11, calling it “the greatest victory for jihadists,” a “blow for American prestige” which won’t recover for decades, and “the greatest foreign affairs and military catastrophe since the Second World War, without a doubt.”

He also warned then of new threats in the wake of unfolding events there, including another refugee crisis and emboldened adversaries such as Russia, China, and Iran.

Follow Joshua Klein on Twitter @JoshuaKlein