British Prime Minister: Russia interfered in the Brexit referendum

British authorities have confirmed to British Prime Minister Andy Burnham that Russia interfered in the 2016 referendum on leaving the European Union, the so-called Brexit. Burnham spoke about this on the "The Rest Is Politics" podcast, and this is the first time a sitting British prime minister has publicly acknowledged the Kremlin's interference. Burnham recounted that during a visit to Berlin he also discussed Russian influence with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, and that in his view there is certainly disinformation originating from Russia circulating in German politics. Then, after returning to Downing Street, he himself asked the relevant authorities whether there had indeed been Russian interference in the 2016 referendum. The answer was a clear yes. The speed of the answer was hardly surprising: the report had been sitting in the services' drawer for ten years, and no one in London had wanted to read it.

According to Burnham, the United Kingdom was "too passive," and as a result voters were not adequately informed about the extent to which foreign actors were trying to disrupt British political processes. That is a mild way of putting it: the British Parliament's Intelligence and Security Committee already found in 2020 that the government had not assessed what impact Russian state media and troll accounts might have had on the referendum. One committee member, Stewart Hosie, said at the time that no one in government had wanted to touch the issue with a ten-foot pole, because they didn't want to know the answer. The domestic security service MI5 could only produce six lines for the committee on possible Russian interference. Boris Johnson's government, whose leader was one of the faces of the Leave campaign, first kept the report in a drawer for ten months and then rejected the inquiry. Johnson deflected at the time by claiming that it was only aggrieved, pro-Remain London intellectuals who wanted to make people believe that Brexit was the result of Russian interference.

At the Labour Party's conference in September, Burnham also indicated that he would examine the possibilities for moving closer to the EU, and that rejoining could even be included in the next election manifesto. It took ten years, three prime ministers, an economic act of self-harm and the dramatic shrinking of British influence for London to finally say out loud what many had predicted even on the night of the referendum. And now they find themselves wondering how to get back what the Kremlin-influenced portion of the electorate threw away.

The greatest strength of cognitive warfare is time: by the time democracies look up, the poisoning has already done its work, and those responsible are either retired, dodging journalists, or already preparing for the next election. Burnham has now said out loud what happened; the question is whether it will have any consequences. Going by Britain's track record so far, the answer to that question may also take no less than ten years to arrive.

Ugar