Nato forces have taken over a London tube station to use as their underground HQ as they simulate launching “deep strike” operations on Russia in the event of an attack on allied forces.In a ramping up of preparations for war, the UK-led Nato Allied Rapid Reaction Corps (ARRC) moved its military capability to a disused platform at Charing Cross station.As part of Operation Arcade Strike, soldiers are testing Nato’s capacity to use electronic warfare to jam Russia’s communications and down the Kremlin’s drones in case of a fictional Russian invasion of a Baltic country.Speaking from the tube platform, US general Christopher Donahue, head of Nato’s Land Command, gave an unvarnished warning to the alliance, saying Nato has little time to prepare to meet a possible Russian attack.The British Army’s Allied Rapid Reaction Corps (ARRC) has deployed a multi-national command post at Charing Cross underground station (MOD Crown Copyright 2026/WO2 Jon Bevan RLC)“Mission ready by 2030 is not a slogan, it is what we must do,” he said.“Legacy forms of mobilization and movement are no longer a given Nato advantage, and a lack of protection in depth will be used against us.”British ARCC commander Lt Gen Mike Elviss said that the exercise was necessary to rehearse Nato’s “recce-strike” - it’s ability to find and destroy Russian forces heading into the battle.“In this and every scenario we rehearse for, Russia has two critical advantages. First, they can mass combat power at the point of their attack, whereas we have an obligation to defend everywhere, all the time. Second, if an attack is to happen it will be launched by them, so they will have the initial momentum. Our answer to this lies, in part, in our concept of fighting by recce-strike.,” he said.“Today’s deployment is a mission rehearsal....We rehearse this not just to be good at it, but because the adversary is watching and we want him to know that we are ready for the challenge,” he added Soldiers unload equipment on to the disused platform as part of its rapid response training exercise (MOD Crown Copyright 2026/Sgt Sam Terry RLC)The scenes were reminiscent of the Second World War, and reflect similar images from the Blitz when the underground systems was used by civilians to survive Hitler’s bombs.The public messaging of images involving British troops on the London Underground in time of war is deliberate as well as practical. The UK has fallen far behind other European nations, especially the Nordic and Baltic states but also Poland, when it comes to preparing the population for a possible Russian attack. The high profile exercise comes in the same week as Vladimir Putin carries his own war games in Belarus, running nuclear drills on land, sea and air.It also comes days after the Ministry of Defence released footage of two Russian jets flying within 20 feet of an RAF aircraft over the Black Sea and Donald Trump flip-flops about about US troop deployment to Europe.Army Chief of General Staff (CGS) General Sir Roly Walker with past CGS and CDS Commanders (MOD Crown Copyright 2026/WO2 Jon Bevan RLC)Taking over a disused platform on the Jubilee Line, Gurkha engineers set up a command centre for Nato’s ARCC, which in extremis could be in charge of the deployment of 100,000 troops.Equipment for the exercise was carried in on specialist London Underground low loaders in the middle of night and unloaded by waiting troops.Simultaneously, British and other Nato forces were on exercise preparing to defend against a Russian invasion of the Baltic states on Operation Spring Storm in Estonia.Putin’s long range capabilities have been growing and only Ukraine can rival Russia in its use of drones in modern real-life warfare. So moving a military head quarters to a London civilian location tests the command structure's ability to survive and improvise.The British exercise comes as Putin carries out drills with Belarus (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service)“Drones have extended the battlefield horizontally and vertically. Inexpensive unmanned aerial vehicles (UAS) and one-way attack drones now give every combat leader an unprecedented reconnaissance and precision munition capability,” said Gen Donahue.Despite the high profile training exercise, there is no doubt that Nato is behind the curve in the development and use of modern low-cost equipment. Ukraine has shown a capacity to conceive and produce at industrial scales vast amounts of modern drone weaponry - taking months to do what Nato nations have taken decades to achieve.Russia has adapted almost as fast. Its use of fibre optic drones, which cannot be jammed, has recently been reported to have brought the streets of Kharkiv to a standstill as First Person View (FPV) can now reach Ukraine's second largest city.The underground exercise is reminiscent of World War 2 (MOD Crown Copyright 2026/WO2 Jon Bevan RLC)Russian drone pilots have posted gleeful videos of their “hunting safaris” against civilians on the streets of Kherson for over a year.“Failure to learn, adapt, and apply the lessons we observe on the modern battlefield, and failure to do this faster than our adversaries puts both our deterrence posture and our defence plans at risk. So, this exercise comes at a critical time,” said Nato’s Supreme Allied Commander Europe, general General Alexus G. Grynkewich.Britain has committed two divisions to the ARCC and the UK government has claimed that its spends about 2.5 per cent of GDP on defence - £79.8 billion. But this includes non-military expenditure like pensions and intelligence operations.Tory MP and former security minister Tom Tugendhat has argued that the government’s plans to increase military spending to 3 per cent in the next parliament are a sham and that the UK’s military capacities are shrinking.Meanwhile the authors of the UK’s Strategic Defence Review, Lord George Robertson and Dr Fiona Hill, have criticised the government’s response to their recommendations that has left the country “underprepared and underinsured” in the face of Russian threats.The government has also delayed publication of its Defence Investment Plan (DIP) by up to eight months while the MoD is reported to have found a £28 billion shortfall in its ability to meet current plans for upgrades to the kind of equipment being tested on the tube.