Boris Johnson planned to raid the Netherlands to steal Covid vaccines
The former British prime minister claimed in his autobiography that the European Union had taken five million doses from AstraZeneca that "legally" belonged to the United Kingdom.
Boris Johnson, former British prime minister
Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson explains in his autobiography that his cabinet considered launching an "aquatic raid" on a Dutch warehouse to steal Covid vaccines during the pandemic.
Although the book is not yet for sale, local media outlet Daily Mail is publishing chapters in installments. In the most recent, Johnson explains that in 2021 he was in his office when senior military commanders, "bearing with them hundreds of years of collective operational experience," explained the operation to him:
"We would send one team on a commercial flight to Amsterdam, while another team would use the cover of darkness to cross the Channel in ribs (rigid inflatable boats) and navigate up the canals.”
"They would then rendezvous at the target [a warehouse in the city of Leiden]; enter; secure the hostage goods, exfiltrate using an articulated lorry, and make their way to the Channel ports."
Despite acknowledging that "the whole thing was nuts," the former Conservative leader argued that his country was desperate and that the European Union (EU) had taken five million AstraZeneca vaccines that were legally British, because his government had helped fund them and "the company was trying, in vain, to export to the UK."
Johnson goes on to defend his handling of the pandemic. He accuses the EU of envying his results. Worse, he says, the union's leaders ("and above all, I suspect, Macron") would not be able to stand the fact that Brexit had helped expedite the deployment of vaccines on British soil.
"I am, of course, glad that we did not violently seize the Halix supplies, even though they were ours," he acknowledges, noting that in the end the batch never made it to British ports.
One of the main drawbacks was that the operation would be impossible to hide. A lieutenant general explained to the then prime minister that eventually when their plan would come to light, "We will have to explain why we are effectively invading a long-standing NATO ally."
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