Finian Cunningham
Britain is being run by a puppet regime whose purpose is to sell war.
One week after becoming prime minister, Andy Burnham delivered on his assigned role to ramp up Britain's militarism and support for Ukraine in the NATO proxy war against Russia.
Burnham hosted Ukrainian so-called president, Vladimir Zelensky, at Britain's top naval base in Portsmouth on board the aircraft carrier, HMS Queen Elizabeth.
"It's no accident that we meet here," Burnham told Zelensky with British and Ukrainian troops in the background. He went on to say that Britain has Ukraine's back "one hundred per cent" and that the meeting was a signal to Russia that London was "not backing down" in its support for the Kiev regime.
In those words, "it's no accident", Burnham let it slip. This was indeed a calculated show of deeper British military involvement in the four-year proxy NATO war against Russia. Note that Zelensky was not received at Downing Street, which would have been strange enough. No, he was welcomed on board Britain's flagship aircraft carrier.
Zelensky is the first foreign leader to be hosted by Burnham since he took over at 10 Downing Street on July 20. That speaks volumes about Burnham's assigned priorities. Forget about domestic issues and dealing with the cost-of-living crisis for Britons that Burnham has appeared to be concerned about. The top priority is militarizing the British economy and sticking it to Russia.
In their meeting in Portsmouth, Burnham said he discussed increasing supplies of anti-ballistic missiles to Ukraine and scaling up Ukraine's manufacturing capability of drones. In a provocative step, Burnham said that London was providing Ukraine with greater access to Britain's electronic warfare system, Stone Cloak, which is aimed at intensifying drone strikes deep in Russia. British and NATO-supplied drone technology and targeting logistics have already enabled Ukraine to increase deadly strikes on Russia in recent months, with hundreds of civilians killed. Burnham is giving notice that Britain is aiming to increase the lethality of these weapons by enabling them to evade Russian air defenses.
Also on the agenda in Portsmouth was British navy training for Ukrainian troops to step up attacks in the Black Sea against Russian ships, including civilian cargo vessels carrying grain exports. Of course, this is couched in the language of "defense" and "counter-measures".
For his part, Zelensky said that he was looking forward to setting up a "big, big factory" in Britain for manufacturing drones for Ukraine. If that goes ahead, Burnham is putting a target on Britain for Russian retaliation.
Burnham took over from the hapless Keir Starmer as prime minister with the task of driving up massive spending on British military and commitments to NATO's support for Ukraine. He is the fifth prime minister to have had dealings with Zelensky since 2022, when Boris Johnson played a decisive role in escalating the war in Ukraine by sabotaging an early potential peace deal between Kiev and Moscow in April 2022.
Starmer was an ardent supporter of the Kiev regime. On his first day as prime minister in July 2024, he visited the Ukrainian capital and vowed unwavering support. In his last days as premier, on July 16, 2026, just before Burnham took over, Starmer also traveled to Kiev where he pledged an additional £255 million ($345 m) in military aid. This close coordination between London and Kiev indicates how involved Britain is in pushing the war.
The problem with Starmer was that he was not gung-ho enough for the British establishment. He balked at the pressure to vastly increase the military budget to 3.5 per cent of GDP. This triggered the shock resignation of John Healey as Defense [sic] Secretary on June 11, which precipitated Starmer's downfall. One week after Healey quit, Andy Burnham won a by-election to become a Member of Parliament. He then put himself forward to take over from Starmer and, a month later, was made PM. The British media talked about it as a coronation. It was more accurately a coup orchestrated by the British establishment to install a more popular figure in Downing Street who would drive through the militarist agenda, as discussed in a previous column.
On the day Burnham took over the premiership, he appointed John Healey as Chancellor of the Exchequer, Britain's finance minister. It was an unexpected appointment for many observers. But Healey will ensure that the necessary cuts in public services and social welfare are made to ramp up military spending and Britain's support for Ukraine.
Burnham has no experience in international politics. He was a health minister in previous Labour governments more than a decade ago. What he is presumed to have is more public appeal than the aloof and ridiculed Starmer.
Former British national security advisor Lord Peter Ricketts (an establishment voice) candidly told CNN on the day of Burnham's entry to 10 Downing Street that his "task" will be to use his "excellent communication skills" to "sell" the agenda to the British public of increasing Britain's militarism and the support for Ukraine.
Burnham has paid lip service to tackling the severe cost-of-living crisis in Britain. He announced populist measures like capping bus fares and reducing the price of beer in pubs. All this is just populist fodder to boost his image as a working-class hero. Meanwhile, the real agenda is for Burnham to deliver the militarism that Starmer failed to do.
Since 2o22, Britain has sent £25 billion ($33 bn) of taxpayer money to Ukraine. Under a bilateral defense pact signed in 2025 by Starmer, Britain is committed to supplying £3 bn every year to the corrupt Kiev regime "for as long as it takes."
This level of funding for a futile war is part of the reason why British society is falling into abysmal conditions of deprivation and disrepair. If Burnham really had British public interests at heart, he would be prioritizing diplomacy to find a way to bring the proxy war in Ukraine to a peaceful end.
But no. Burnham is a puppet prime minister who did not even have to face a public contest for the role. He was installed to deliver the militarist agenda, and his first overseas visit from Zelensky on board a warship shows that Burnham is dancing right on cue as he was assigned to do.
Britain is piling up the war agenda against Russia. While some Britons might coo over the prospect of cheaper bus fares and pints of beer, the new figure in Downing Street is driving the British bus over the cliff to all-out war.
Notably, too, that, on taking office, Burnham immediately gave the U.S. permission to use RAF bases in England to fly long-range B-1 bombers to attack Iran. And also this week, the new British military minister, Wes Streeting, told the BBC that he would be holding discussions with the U.S. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth on Britain playing a naval role in opening up the Strait of Hormuz.
Britain is being run by a puppet regime whose purpose is to sell war.