Blaise Metreweli, Britain’s new MI6 director and the first woman in the agency’s 116-year history to hold the public-facing “C” role, will deliver her debut speech on Monday from London headquarters.
She declares the “front line is everywhere” amid surging dangers like cyberattacks, disinformation, and terrorism – spearheaded by an “aggressive, expansionist, and revisionist” Russia.
“The export of chaos is a feature not a bug in the Russian approach to international engagement; and we should be ready for this to continue until (Russian President Vladimir) Putin is forced to change his calculus,” she will state.
Since Russia’s 2022 Ukraine invasion, Moscow’s “grey zone” tactics have hit allies: UK police uncovered Russian-linked arson on Ukrainian aid sites; drones halted Danish flights; NATO scrambled jets over Poland and Romania; and Baltic undersea cables snapped, raising sabotage fears. The Kremlin denies involvement.
A former tech lead evoking Bond’s “Q”, Metreweli urges digital prowess. “We must be as comfortable with lines of code as we are with human sources, as fluent in (computer programming language) Python as we are in multiple languages.”
“The defining challenge of the 21st century is not simply who wields the most powerful technologies, but who guides them with the greatest wisdom. Our security, our prosperity and our humanity depend on it.”
Calling for “rediscovery of our shared humanity,” she adds, “It is not what we can do that defines us, but what we choose to do. That choice – the exercise of human agency – has shaped our world before, and it will shape it again.”
This follows Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper’s sanctions on Russia’s information warfare and Chinese cyber firms. MI6’s “Silent Courier” dark web portal targets Russian spies, building on ex-chief Richard Moore’s 2023 Prague appeal.