GENERAL SIR PATRICK SANDERS is literally on the warpath. The chief of the general staff is urging the country to brace itself for armed conflict with Russia.

He told an armoured vehicles conference in London — he was speaking to people, the tanks were there to be bought — that Britain would need to enlist a citizens army if it were to give it a go against the menace from the east.

Both major parties have hurried to reassure voters that they are not going to bring back conscription. But neither have started to unpack Sanders’ twisted logic.