Ukip leader Gerard Batten has appealed to potential army recruits to wait until Britain has left the European Union to join the services.
The recently-appointed leader issued a bizarre statement today saying British soldiers are “no longer fighting for Queen and Country but under a foreign military command”.
He said “no one should now join the British Army until we have left the EU”, citing Theresa May’s apparent intentions to tie us into the EU’s military ambitions.
Read the statement in full below:
“Nick Clegg once said that the idea the EU was developing its own military was a ‘dangerous fantasy’. This news has revealed Nick Clegg to be the fantasist.
“No one should now join the British Army until we have left the EU and this has all been reversed. Our soldiers are no longer fighting for Queen and Country but under a foreign military command.
“Our ancestors, the heroes of The Armada, Waterloo, Trafalgar, Passchendaele, El-Alamein, and others too numerous to mention, did not fight so that their descendants could serve under the flag of a foreign power. Mrs May has already stated her intention to tie us into the EU’s military ambitions even if we nominally leave under her plan.
“The sooner we are out of the EU, the sooner we will be able to rebuild our military into a force which serves the interests of our nation first and foremost. Meanwhile British men and women should vote with their feet and not join the armed forces.”
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