Iran targeting military sites in UK, MI5 chief says

Iran has ramped up attempts to hit military installations in the United Kingdom, with the suspected plot to attack a U.S.-run air base last month part of a broader effort of attacks by Tehran, according to the head of Britain’s MI5 spy agency.

Threats to British military sites, intelligence facilities and high-security targets are a “major shift this year” in “Iranian ambitions to come at harder targets,” MI5 Director General Ken McCallum said in a Tuesday speech.

McCallum pointed to the suspected plot against RAF Fairford in southern England on Sept. 27, saying it was “not unique.” He said there have “been other examples” of such threats to sites “not just in the U.K. but around the world, most particularly in Iran’s own region.”

The threat against RAF Fairford, reported to be a potential drone attack ordered by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, prompted the U.S. military to hastily relocate the 12 Air Force B-1 bombers stationed there, moving them back to home stations in the U.S. The American bombers have been stationed at the base in support of the Trump administration’s war in Iran, now in its eighth month.

British authorities said they had thwarted an alleged terrorist plot, initially arresting five men on explosives and terror charges near the air base. The men, all five of whom are British nationals in their 20s, were released on bail a day later. Two additional men have since been arrested on suspicion of preparing terrorist acts but also were released on bail.

Iran has denied any connection to the suspected plot.

In his Tuesday speech, meant to outline significant threats to the U.K., McCallum said British authorities have made more than 50 arrests in “Iran-linked operations” in the past 12 months.

But the suspected plot against RAF Fairford marks an escalation from lower-level attacks including arson and stabbings, carried out by Iranian proxies and targeting Jewish communities, according to McCallum.

The U.K. faces a “new era of national security,” he said, with Russia and Iran increasing their hybrid warfare campaigns against the country.

He assured the audience, however, that given what British authorities have seen in practice, Iran has not shown “anywhere near the level of capability” to launch a sophisticated attack on U.K. military installations or other such sites.