LONDON, July 23. /TASS/. Western states should prepare for a war in three years amid growing international tensions, says General Roly Walker, Chief of the British Army General Staff.

According to The Guardian, he believes that the UK and its allies must be ready "to deter or fight a war in three years." In his assessment, Walker points to the allegedly growing threat to Taiwan, posed by China, and to Iranian nuclear developments. He opined that a conflict with one of these countries or with Russia may cause "a significant detonation" on other theaters of war.

Last year, CIA Director William Burns said that, according to the US intelligence, Chinese leader Xi Jinping ordered the Armed Forces to be ready to carry out an operation on seizure of control over Taiwan by 2027. Commenting on these claims, the Chinese Foreign Ministry underscored that Washington uses the "Chinese threat" myth as a pretext to maintain its military hegemony.

Walker also claimed that the UK must "double our fighting power in three years and triple by the end of the decade." Meanwhile, he underscored that he is not talking about additional funding, but about a more rational distribution of available resources, based on the lessons, learned from the Ukrainian conflict, include the drone use experience.

According to the general, the West is "not on an inexorable path to war," but must "underwrite deterrence" by restoring "credible hard power." He expressed his concerns that Russia, Iran, China and North Korea begin to increasingly actively cooperate in the military area.