From a recent report by the arch-neocon Henry Jackson Society:

As well as assassinations, Russia’s agencies are engaged in all manner of activities associated with active measures – the subversive, political warfare originally employed by the KgB during the cold War. This includes espionage. According to well-placed intelligence sources, Russia has as many as 200 case officers in the uK, handling upwards of 500 agents. in addition, the agencies can call upon informants; these are found within the Russian expatriate community, which is estimated to number up to 150,000 people in London alone, as well as within British society as a whole.

Those Russian informants would presumably be the 52% of Russians in Britain who voted for Puter in 2018. Congratulations to the Dark Lord of the Kremlin, Who Sees and Hears All, on raising this percentage from 28% in 2012.

This was sarcasm, BTW.

You would struggle to find a more oppositionist community of ethnic Russians anywhere in the world relative to British Russians. Though as Paul Robinson points out in his dissection of the report, this may indeed be how the people interviewed for the report think. Bill Browder, for instance, considers anyone who questions or doubts his version of events to be an FSB agent.

That said, the days when I concerned myself with “Russophobia” are long past.

In reality, Russophobia is a very good thing, and I hope it stays high and even increases further in the West. It’s good for Russia, disincentivizing offshorization, potentially reversing brain drain, etc. This goes double for the UK, which is particularly favored as a destination for Russia’s rich, including many who earned it dubiously. In this sense, I agree with commenter Dmitry, who also argues that some moderate level of background anti-Semitism in Europe is good for Israeli demographics.