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30th September 2025
03:00pm BST
A number of US air tankers have crossed the Atlantic heading heading towards the UK.
This news comes after Donald Trump met with his military command.
The journey was made on Sunday night with around a dozen KC-135R/T Stratotankers being spotted on Flight Radar with some heading towards RAF Mildenhall.
It's been theorised and reported that the jets were stopping in the UK to refuel for an 'urgent military requirement', reports Metro.
The last time that the US moved so many tankers was five days before the US Air Force attacked Iran's alleged nuclear facilities.
It could, however, be linked to Exercise Cobra Warrior 25-2, which is a large-scale Nato training event running from September 12 to October 2 over the North Sea.
And another theory, perpetuated by John Sitilies, former State Department diplomacy expert, is that the jets could be responding to Russian drones over the Baltic Sea.
He told the Daily Mail: "Denmark’s inability to defend its own airspace underscores White House concerns that it is unable to protect and defend its far larger and distant Greenland territory from increasing Chinese and Russian joint air and naval patrols in the emerging Arctic theater of strategic competition."
This news comes just days after, German chancellor Freidrich Merz has claimed that Europe and Russia are 'no longer at peace'.
Merz has accused Russia of executing a 'war against our democracy and our freedom'.
He made the claims while speaking at an event in Dusseldorf on Monday.
Coincidentally, this statement came as Vladimir Putin announced his biggest conscription plans in almost a decade mandating that 135,000 Russians between 18 and 30 join the army.
Back in 2016, 152,000 citizens were called up to join the military.
Just yesterday, news emerged that the former head of MI5 had said that cyber attacks and sabotage directed at the UK by Moscow could mean we're already be at war with Vladimir Putin's Russia, as revealed in a podcast interview.
Tensions between Western nations like the UK, Germany and the USA and Russia had been steadily increasing over the past decade before they reached a head following Russia's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
In the three years since, Putin's nation have been isolated from their counterparts on the international stage, and heavy economic sanctions have been imposed.
Despite the UK providing billions in economic and military support for Ukraine, there has not been an official declaration of war between Russia and Britain yet.
However, as revealed in a new interview with Lord Speaker John McFall, the former head of British spy agency MI5 Eliza Manningham-Buller has suggested that Russia and the west may be at war with other unofficially.
Lady Manningham-Buller led MI5 over 20 years ago, and made the suggestions in a podcast on Monday (29 September).
Manningham-Buller said: “I think she may be right in saying we’re already at war with Russia. It’s a different sort of war, but the hostility, the cyber-attacks, the physical attacks, the intelligence work is extensive.”
The comments come after reports back in May that six Bulgarians were jailed for their involvement in a Russian spy ring.
Manningham-Buller says she first met Putin in 2005, during a period in which many in Europe were hoping to build peaceful cooperation between the West and Russia after decades of cold war tension.
She added: "I didn’t anticipate that within a year he’d be ordering the murder on London streets of [Alexander] Litvinenko, but I thought he was quite an unpleasant man.”
Litvinenko was a former Russian spy who lived in London and was poisoned radioactive polonium.
An inquiry found that two Russian agents killed him and that they were "probably acting" on Putin’s orders.
The UK continues to support Ukraine's resistance to Russian attacks, and has provided £21.8 billion worth of aid to date.
Despite prolonged talks between Putin, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Donald Trump, no agreement to end the war has been reached yet.
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