Mystery drones over UK airbases and threat of Russian ‘sleeper agents’: Putin’s covert agents are ‘probing the West’s defences for future attack’, warns colonel as UFO hysteria grips US

Russian ‘sleeper agents’ could be behind the mystery drone swarms buzzing over US and UK military bases that have triggered global alarm, a defence chief has warned.

Colonel Hamish de Bretton-Gordon claimed the incursions worldwide may be part of a Kremlin ploy to use covert agents to ‘test the waters’ and expose weaknesses in the defences of British and American bases.

The veteran commander claimed Putin could have activated sleeper agents – spies on the Russian payroll – to run the brazen series of ‘coordinated’ operations, which have left government agencies scrambling to respond on both sides of the Atlantic.

Panicked American officials have called for a state of emergency to be declared amid the soaring number of drones invading skies across the east coast, with hundreds spotted in recent weeks.

New Jersey’s own senator, Jon Bramnick, even sensationally claimed the US Government was too scared to reveal the answer behind the mystery incursions – as he urged Pentagon defence chiefs to ‘come clean’ with the American public.

Meanwhile across the Atlantic, drones have been seen brazenly circling US military bases in England – including RAF Lakenheath, Suffolk, which is set to become the home for some of America’s nuclear weapons. It followed a slew of recent activity by Russian spy ships and reconnaissance aircraft off the British coast last month.

Col de Bretton-Gordon, the former head of the UK’s Joint Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Regiment, feared sleeper agents were now at work, using drones to siphon intelligence on response times, troop numbers and kit to lay the groundwork for future attacks on Western bases abroad.

‘It’s no secret that there are sleepers and stuff around,’ he warned. ‘It’s espionage 2.0. It’s the next stage. So, this is absolutely the case.

‘You can approach people who could do a service for you, and I expect you can pay some young kid or young person money to do it. I would have thought the Russian and Chinese were paying quite a lot.

‘If you’re a young person and somebody is giving you several thousand dollars to do something that seems dead straightforward, you will do it.’

Col de Bretton-Gordon, who investigated Syrian tyrant Bashar al-Assad’s use of chemical weapons in 2013, said a similar tactic of ‘toe-dipping’ was potentially being used by Russia as the Kremlin seeks to expose weaknesses in Western defences.

‘The Assad regime was really testing the water,’ he said. ‘He did two sarin nerve agent attacks and nothing happened, despite the fact I went to the area and investigated and bought samples back to the UK and warned ministers of it.

‘Assad and his henchmen were testing the water and suddenly realised the West was interested and they then went full on. I’m sure that’s exactly what it is that’s happening now in the US and UK… They are testing to see where the weaknesses and vulnerabilities are.’

UK defence sources have insisted there is ‘no evidence’ that the recent spate of drones buzzing US air bases in the UK was linked to Russia or any other hostile state, like China or Iran.

However, former British UFO hunter Nick Pope said he could not ‘rule out’ recent drone incursions over RAF bases in England being connected to Russia and China.

And he has questioned the stance of US officials over drone swarms in the skies above New Jersey and other states, including Pennsylvania, Texas and California.

Federal agencies put out a joint statement last week declaring the spotted drones in New Jersey did not represent a foreign threat or any danger to public safety, but did not provide an explanation for worried locals were seeing from their homes.

‘Despite US government statements that there’s no evidence any of this activity is attributable to foreign adversaries, this has to be one of the leading theories, and it seems perfectly possible,’ Mr Pope, a former UK Ministry of Defence official who headed the UFO desk at Whitehall from 1991 to 1994, told MailOnline.

‘Some defence commentators have said China is level with – or even ahead of – the US in drone technology. There’s lots of talk about the military racing to perfect AI-controlled drone swarms, and as always with military technologies, progress is likely to be some years ahead of what’s publicly declared.

‘So the idea that China or Russia are conducting espionage over key US military sites and critical national infrastructure isn’t that farfetched.

‘The fact that similar drone incursions over military bases in the UK started at almost exactly the time the UK government authorised the use of long-range Storm Shadow weapons against Russian territory supports this theory.

‘Drones could easily be launched from the sea, from a commercial vessel being operated by a foreign government, or even from a submarine.’

Last month a suspected Russian spy ship was caught loitering off the Irish Sea directly above vital undersea energy cables linking Britain and Ireland, forcing a naval warship to intercept it.

The Yantar, billed by Moscow as an ‘oceanographic research vessel’, was lurking near the Isle of Man – just days before drones were seen hovering above US airbases in England.

The position of the spy ship, equipped with mini submarines, was assessed to be directly above undersea energy cables linking Britain and Ireland. Undersea cables elsewhere in Europe have recently been sabotaged.

Days earlier, the ship had been observed by Norwegian, US, French and British navy and air defence services accompanying a Russian warship, the Admiral Golovko, through the English Channel.

Iain Ballantyne, the editor of Warships International Fleet Review magazine, told the Express the West should be monitoring the Yantar’s movements ‘very closely’.

‘And if Russia is to take revenge one day for the UK and other NATO nations assisting Ukraine in its fight for survival, then it will possibly be via unseen activities like seabed sabotage,’ he said.

‘Russia is already suspected of doing such things since the 2022 invasion of Ukraine.’

Days earlier, on November 14, two RAF Typhoon fighter jets were scrambled from RAF Lossiemouth in Scotland to intercept a Russian Tupolev-142, a maritime reconnaissance aircraft, as it flew over the North Sea.

Then, less than a week later on November 20, swarms of drones were seen flying above RAF Lakenheath and RAF Mildenhall, in Suffolk, as well as RAF Feltwell in Norfolk and RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire. A similar set of sightings were reported on November 22, with reports of up to four drones brazenly circling RAF Feltwell, RAF Lakenheath and RAF.

Previous incidents have seen unmanned ‘spy boats’ being washed up close to a key nuclear submarine base.

The solar-powered Wave Glider drone washed up near Faslane. It was equipped with kit that could monitor the comings and goings of warships – in a potential effort to track the Royal Navy’s Trident missile-armed fleet of nuclear submarines.

Mystery still remains over who deployed the vessel – with similar variants used by the UK and US military. However, neither country claimed the boat was one of theirs.

Col de Bretton-Gordon said ‘nothing was off the table’ when it came to drone or spy ships being used to prowl the seas of the UK.

‘We’ve had a spy whale – if they’re prepared to fit an electronic surveillance kit to a whale to go and spy for them, then almost nothing is off the cards,’ he told MailOnline. ‘But a Russian ship sitting off the Channel is very easy to pick up with all the modern surveillance technology we have, so it’s unlikely.’

The surge in alleged spy drones in both the US and UK has prompted concern from defence experts and military bosses.

Over the weekend, a former commander in British military intelligence claimed US security agencies had been caught off-guard by the sudden influx of drone sightings.

Spymaster Colonel Philip Ingram told MailOnline security chiefs at the Pentagon were seemingly perplexed by the sightings.

‘The Pentagon isn’t this massive organisation that knows everything,’ he said. ‘They probably don’t want people to know that they don’t know because they like the myth that is out there.’

The US Government’s silence on the issue has led many people to offer numerous suggestions and conspiracy theories online – which has been spearheaded by a close adviser to Donald Trump.

Some believe they are Government nuclear weapon detector drones or the result of foreign powers spying on the country.

Responding to these claims, Colonel Ingram said there was a ‘possibility it could be nefarious activity’, but also believed the drone hysteria could be a case of people putting ‘two and two together and making seven’.

Other conspiracy theorists have speculated the drones could be of extraterrestrial origin. However, UFO expert Mr Pope poured cold water on this theory.

‘While there’s been extensive speculation about the extraterrestrial hypothesis, this must be regarded as unlikely – though it can’t, in strictness, be ruled out,’ he said.

‘But as with some earlier drone incursions at Langley Air Force Base, it’s telling that the Pentagon’s All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), the US government’s lead office on UAP, doesn’t appear to be leading the official response.

‘In a media roundtable on November 14, AARO’s Director stated that for them to lead, sightings have to be both unidentified and anomalous. The clear implication from AARO’s apparent non-involvement is that – as with Langley – the current incursions are regarded as unmanned aerial vehicles.’

The situation has lead to New Jersey’s Senator, Jon Bramnick, calling for a state of emergency as he derided what he said was a lack of government transparency over the unexplained drone sightings.

‘Whatever these drones are doing, the government really doesn’t want us to know,’ he told NewsNation on Saturday, urging the DoD to ‘come clean with the American public’ following a string of appearances since November.

‘There must be something going on that they can’t tell us because they’re so fearful of what the public’s gonna do when they hear what the drones are doing,’ the Republican senator sensationally declared.

The White House’s national security communications advisor John Kirby has urged that the sightings pose no ‘national security or public safety threat’, and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said he knows of ‘no foreign involvement’.

But the lack of explanation has sparked fierce criticism from some lawmakers as drones continue to appear around sensitive sites, and panic spread as a New Jersey mayor revealed his fire department had been told to wear hazmat suits in case the flying objects crashed.

Drones are now being reported all along the northern East Coast, with suspicious sightings in Connecticut, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and Virginia, according to news reports.

They were even spotted as far west as Los Angeles this past weekend, according to FOX11.

Their presence has raised both alarm and confusion, with the Pentagon being criticised for their ‘lack of transparency’ on the issue.

A bill before the US Senate would enhance some federal agencies’ authority and give new abilities to local and state agencies to track drones.

It would also start a pilot program allowing states and local authorities to disrupt, disable or seize a drone without prior consent of the operator.

‘What the drone issue points out are gaps in our agencies, gaps in our authorities between the Department of Homeland Security, local law enforcement, the Defense Department.,’ said Rep. Mike Waltz, R-Fla., Trump´s pick to be his national security adviser, speaking on CBS’ ‘Face the Nation’ on Sunday.

‘Americans are finding it hard to believe we can´t figure out where these are coming from.’

Col de Bretton-Gordon said: ‘It’s a bit of a wake up call that we are in this pre-war age or this “third nuclear age”. We are back into this Cold War, which is turning hot. Those 20 years of peace dividend we have spent it so much we have left ourselves vulnerable and this is another wake-up call to spend on defence.’

In a statement a spokesman from the UK Ministry of Defence told MailOnline: ‘We take threats seriously and maintain robust measures at defence sites. We are supporting the US Air Force response.’