More than a year after NATO military chief Dutch Admiral Rob Bauer called on the West to “prepare for an era of war”, Vladimir Putin’s mouthpiece has threatened Sir Keir Starmer and his “coalition of the willing” with nuclear warfare.

Amid murmurs of a threat of World War 3 for Britain last February, the Mirror spoke with a security and intelligence expert who said the chance of an army conflict between Russia and NATO is “now all too real” – and his comments now ring eerily true.

During his ‘Sunday Evening With Vladimir Solovyov’ broadcast, Solovyov, a well-known conduit for the Russian leader’s rhetoric and an avid commentator on Russia’s involvement in Ukraine, declared the UK and US “are directly waging war against us”. In a direct threat to the West, he warned world leaders they would “feel their consequences” the same as the soldiers on the frontline.

He said: “You don’t understand the main thing. We see right through your coalition of peacemakers, who are not peacemakers but basically interventionists, will be destroyed. You have to realise that not only the frontline units you’re planning to deploy on the territory of Ukraine will be destroyed, but since we can’t perceive it in any other way other than the direct participation of your countries, you will feel the consequences, the likes of which you have never seen. All of your howling will not help you.”

He added in a grim threat to Britain, France, Germany, and the Baltic states: “Your fate will be sad.” But what could this dark reality look like? Modern-day war in the UK would follow a ‘WW2-inspired blueprint’ with secret police, forced labour camps and strict food rations, according to a world affairs expert.

Professor Anthony Glees, from the University of Buckingham, told the Mirror last year: “If the next war is a nuclear war, it will be up and running in hours and over in hours. There will be no winners, only losers.”

The prof believed Putin “will have become suicidal” and would “attack a number of key sites in the UK and continental Europe, almost certainly without warning and without an ultimatum”. He said: “There will be no time for anyone to do very much except prepare for deep impact extinction as best they can.

“However, if it is, as I believe, not going to be a nuclear war, then not only do things look very different – but it is entirely credible to argue it has already started.” Prof Glees eerily predicted World War 3 would progress in three stages, starting with threats from Russia which we have seen in recent days.

“If Putin wins (or has something he can say is a ‘win’) in Ukraine, and especially if Trump becomes the next American President, Putin will begin to put pressure on all the post-1997 NATO members,” Prof Glees explained. He believes the Kremlin leader would first “attempt to soften us up” and try to divide the UK.

He said Putin is already trying to “subvert our democratic system and give political leverage to those who would support him”. “His skill set is of the Soviet intelligence community, and their aim has always been to make threats, to subvert and to hollow out their potential enemies,” Prof Glees continued. If his attempts to divide and conquer do not work, the prof believes Putin would move to stage two.

He outlined the second stage as a “war of attrition”, fought with conventional weapons and UK troops as part of NATO’s Armed Forces. “Slowly, Russian forces would advance to the Pyrenees,” Prof Glees said. He paints a picture of modern-day war in Britain, with fresh food sources quickly running out and petrol unavailable to the everyday Brit.

“We would run out of fresh food in days,” Prof Glees explained. “A massive Russian cyber attack on our critical national infrastructure would mean we can’t get cash out of our bank accounts, we cannot pay bills, we might not get electricity, gas, and – if Putin wanted – he could try to turn out the lights.”

The prof believes rationing of food and goods would “follow a WW2-inspired blueprint”. “Petrol and diesel would be virtually unobtainable for ordinary people. Medicines would quickly be subject to severe rationing and would soon disappear altogether,” he continued.

“Although we would hope the EU would continue to supply us with food, we would have to rely on the USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, especially if much of Western Europe were to fall under Russian control. We would quickly see a black market for home-produced food and clothing.”

Prof Glees believes “all be subject to a curfew to stop looting and nights would be dark to save electricity”, and he predicts there would be conscription. “All adults between the ages of 18 and 40, male and single females would be eligible to be drafted”, he said.

However, the official spokesperson for the Prime Minister at the time, Rishi Sunak, addressed rumours of conscription and said that month that No 10 did not agree, adding: “The British military has a proud position of being a voluntary force. As I say, there’s no plan for conscription.”

Prof Glees predicts that within a month of a conventional war, “a British Quisling government would be established, probably under a well-known domestic politician known to be sympathetic to Putin”. He said: “Within a year, the UK would become a Russian colony and run like Russia, with a secret police and forced labour camps for anyone showing the least opposition to the Russian regime”.

“Russian language would be taught in our schools, Russian or pro-Russian Quislings would run our public institutions. The Royal Family would go to Canada and resistance leaders would try to establish a following from secret bases in Wales and Scotland,” the prof added.

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