Reform UK (plc) have appointed a new defence spokesperson. Which is good. Because their last defence spokesperson, a man called Nigel Farage, has personally attended only 5% of debates concerning defence, while Reform MPs generally have only been present at 30% of debates on the subject. However, Reform UK (plc) have had time to formulate a bill that will shield military personnel from human rights lawyers, who are the real enemy here as usual.
Reform UK (plc)’s new defence spokesperson, RAF Wing Commander Angus MacIntyre, comes with 40 years of military experience and the ability to command some wings, and also with no political experience. Reform UK (plc)’s former defence spokesperson, Nigel Farage, says this makes Wing Commander Angus MacIntyre better than the other parties’ defence spokespeople, who have more experience of politics than defence, and have never commanded a single wing in their lives. The Wing Commander’s admirable lack of political knowledge was evident on LBC on Friday morning when even the usually Reform-friendly Nick Ferrari appeared able to surprise him with a question about Reform UK (plc)’s Nathan Gill being in the pay of Russia.
L-r: Nigel Farage and Reform’s new defence spokesperson, RAF Wing Commander Angus MacIntyre
Reassuringly, the Wing Commander does at least see Russia as a problem. Since 2022, the new Reform UK (plc) defence spokesperson has helped coordinate support for Ukraine against Russia with Nato, described President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as “protecting Europe”, secured extra Ukrainian defence funding, and declared he would shoot down Russian aircraft in Nato airspace. In 2022, the former Reform UK (plc) defence spokesperson, Nigel Farage, said he “understood” why Vladimir Putin, the politician he “admires most in the world”, and a “rational player”, had annexed Crimea, saying it was because the Donbas region territories “would rather be part of a greater Russia than part of somewhere else”.
Reform UK (plc)’s frontman Farage also explained, again in 2022, that he knew the Russians used cryptocurrency to cheat sanctions, saying the subsequent 15% spike in crypto values was caused by Russia’s sanctions-driven investment in the sector, in which he himself had continued to invest nevertheless, and on whose behalf he has lobbied, having now received nearly £80m from crypto donors. War? What is it good for? Absolutely nothing, except for Nigel Farage’s crypto shares!
But surely this fundamental difference of opinion on Russia puts the two Reform UK (plc) defence spokespeople on a collision course, as surely as the collision course the pro-Ukrainian Reform UK (plc) defence spokesperson Wing Commander Angus MacIntyre’s British missile would chart towards the Russian aircraft belonging to the former Reform UK (plc) defence spokesperson Nigel Farage’s political hero Vladimir Putin. Luckily the Wing Commander may have such little political experience he doesn’t see this as a problem. Ignorance is bliss.
The new Reform defence spokesperson’s willingness to blast Russian aircraft out of Nato airspace is admirable, though it may be just the excuse the Russians need to start interfering with Europe’s wi-fi-enabled Breville sandwich toasters and wi-fi-enabled pet food dispensers as well as its wi-fi-enabled fridges and wi-fi-enabled blood banks (allegedly). Cheese toasties ruined throughout all Nato members? Disgruntled cats hungry for Felix fish-style chunks all across the UK? Blame Reform UK (plc)’s defence spokesperson, Wing Commander Angus MacIntyre.
The best person for understanding this may not be a Wing Commander happy to throw in his lot with the racists and fascists and crypto-grifters and Russia-friendly bagmen at Reform UK (plc), whose power depends on undermining the UK’s social cohesion
Because these days, as Sir Ken McCallum, the director general of MI5, inconveniently explained at length on 13 October while being ignored by most major news outlets, war is more subtle than simply shooting things out of the sky. “The impacts of the threats we face at scale in 2026 – arson, sabotage, cyberattacks, coercion, violence – are deeply human,” cautioned Sir Ken. “Much of the time, those who mean the UK harm aren’t attacking things government owns or controls. They’re aiming at people, businesses, communities. At the cohesion of our society.” And the best person for understanding that may not necessarily be a Wing Commander happy to throw in his lot with the racists and fascists and crypto-grifters and Russia-friendly bagmen at Reform UK (plc), whose political power depends on undermining the UK’s social cohesion, no matter how many wings he has commanded.
We now know – even though it was obvious at the time to anyone paying even the slightest bit of attention or reading the clearly troll-farm-generated below-the-line comments on any Guardian or Observer article criticising Farage or Brexit – that the anti-EU side of the 2016 referendum was bot-boosted and media-muddled by Nigel Farage’s cheerleaders in the Kremlin. And when the UK committed its unprecedented act of economic, social and cultural self-harm and voted to leave the EU, the then Russian ambassador to the UK, Alexander Yakovenko, delightedly declared: “We have crushed the British to the ground. They are on their knees, and they will not rise for a very long time.” Well done everyone! Take back control!! Trebles all round at the golf club bar!!!
Does the new Reform UK (plc) defence spokesperson Wing Commander Angus MacIntyre’s desire to resist Russia go beyond blasting their planes out of the sky and aiding Ukraine, or will it address the more subtle forms of propaganda-driven and politically influential hybrid warfare the Kremlin has spent decades perfecting? Because if it does, that line of defence strategy is going to bring the current Reform UK (plc) defence spokesperson, Wing Commander Angus MacIntyre, straight to the dirty back doorstep of the former Reform UK (plc) defence spokesperson, and architect of Russia’s beloved Brexit, Nigel Farage.
Reform UK (plc) has a Russia problem. And what’s more, it is finally, if ever so gradually, being perceived as having a Russia problem, even though less than 30% of surveyed Britons know Reform’s leader in Wales is currently doing time for having been literally in the pay of the Kremlin. You can bet, like my Brexit-voting relative, that they all know that Keir Starmer’s flat was set on fire by Ukrainian rent boys he owed money to, another propaganda victory for Moscow’s social-media shitposters.
Wing Commander Angus MacIntyre, with his 40 years of military service, has been hired as Reform UK (plc)’s new defence spokesperson to whitewash that problem with his headline-grabbing 40-year commanding of wings. But getting far-right parties, like the one Wing Commander Angus MacIntyre has just joined and boosted, into power across Europe remains a priority for Russia and it employs all its dark arts of online propaganda and covert political influence to do so. And Wing Commander Angus MacIntyre, in his own small way, simply by lending Reform UK (plc) even an iota of credibility, is helping Russia achieve its aims. Wing Commander Angus MacIntyre is nothing more than what old hands in the intelligence trade call “a useful idiot”. The sooner he is gone the safer we will be.
Stewart Lee vs The Man-Wulf has a final two-week run at the Leicester Square theatre in London in December.
Stewart’s new book, Pea Green Boat, is available now, and so is a DVD of his last live show, Basic Lee.
And he is supporting the singer-songwriter John Smith, performing Pea Green Boat with him, at St Pancras Old Church, London, on 25 and 26 November