The Director General of MI5 has warned Britain must “build defences” against radical Islamic threats in an unprecedented intervention.
Sir Ken McCallum warned the global terror landscape is more complex than it was 25 years ago, when the world witnessed the horror of 9/11.
As well as the threat of Islamic extremism persisting, the MI5 chief said, the West also contends with state-level threats.
Writing in the Independent, he said: “The MI5 I lead in 2026 contends with a threat landscape markedly different to 2001’s.
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“Sadly, mass-casualty terrorist ambition endures… but the terrorist threat now sits alongside strategic national security threats posed by capable States.”
Referencing the US’s former CIA director James Woolsey, who after the Cold War said the West had defeated a “large dragon”, Sir Ken said in today’s world, we now contend with both “dragons” and “snakes”.
“Dragons” being state-actors, such as Russia and China, whose capabilities to spy, disrupt and cause terror are significant.
Also continuing to rear its head are smaller “snakes”, non-state actors, such as radical Islamic extremists, who have less resources than nations, but can be sponsored by them to commit acts of terror.
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