Unhelpful as it undoubtedly is, the chief executive of Porton Down was well within his rights to state that his establishment is unable to determine the origin of the nerve agent that was used in the attack on the Skripals.
If it wasn’t so bloody serious, you’d have to laugh at the irony of it. Back in August 2004, the then MP for Henley joined a small group of parliamentarians calling for the prime minister, Tony Blair, to be impeached. The reason, wrote Boris Johnson, was the “dishonest means of persuasion” Mr Blair
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/useful-idiots-are-letting-putin-off-the-hook-fz63rn9g2
https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/3592900
https://www.novayagazeta.ru/articles/2018/04/04/76052-smert-na-vertikali
https://newtimes.ru/articles/detail/156867
https://carnegie.ru/commentary/75951
http://www.ng.ru/politics/2018-04-04/1_7204_roysman.html
Diplomatic expulsions are a standard if extreme way of showing outrage. But tactically speaking, they have mixed results.
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/russia-fsu/2018-04-03/when-diplomats-and-spies-must-go