The valiant resistance of Ukraine to the invading Russian army means Putin cannot have his way. It looks as if he expected little Ukrainian resistance, a drive into Kiev for his tanks and troops, followed by the rapid departure of Ukraine’s elected President. Putin probably thought he could then have settled terms with the Ukrainians over their future government. He probably wanted them to rule out any future NATO membership and to recognise Russian leadership and trade patterns as some kind of friendly satellite. He may well have assumed he would rapidly consolidate a land bridge from Crimea to the eastern rebel provinces of Donetsk and Luhansk and may have wanted to create a split Ukraine with some under direct Russian rule . Instead six days on he has made far less progress militarily and is being forced into using far more force for far less effect than planned.
Putin is currently exploring a negotiated peace at the same time as pressing his ugly invasion. Maybe the talks are cynical. Maybe they are an attempt to find a less embarrassing and less damaging way out from the violent mess he has created. How should Ukraine respond, given the unprovoked aggression from Russia, the lack of any climb down so far by Putin, but also the wish to avoid more violence if that is possible?
Putin probably expects still to get more control of Ukrainian territory by military means. He has vast firepower compared to the defenders. He should however weigh the shortage of Russian troops to seize and occupy a country and population as large as Ukraine’s, now that most people people there are hostile to him and willing to fight for freedom. He needs to remember that wholesale destruction of cities and mass deaths of civilians will be seen by the West as war crimes, confirming his and Russia’s pariah status. What would be the point of prosecuting the war with widespread death and damage, creating lasting hostility from those Ukrainians who survived and making it impossible for Russia to govern it in any acceptable modern way without the use of permanent large scale intrusive force?
March 3, 2022
Good morning.
I care not what President Putin intends to do. What I do care about is the invasion that is going on nearer to home. How many illegals have arrived this week ? We don’t know because the government now refuses to count them in.
As fo Ukraine, because this is a Ukranian topic, I hear that our esteemed PM has stated that we will take 200k Ukrainian refugees. In truth, it will be more like 2m and they won’t be all refugees just those seeking free healthcare and a nice house and some pocket money, plus child benefit.
But don’t worry everyone, it is all FREE ! Except for the poor British taxpayer.
March 3, 2022
The curious thing is Mark B, over the coming months, we will all become poorer as the cost of everything rising kicks in; the dinghy illegals will still be being paid for, and arriving. How will that work if we add in extra large numbers of Ukrainians? The books wonât balance at all!
March 3, 2022
Sharon:
One wonders where the Ukrainians will be housed, being as many hotels are still full of people from Afghanistan.
Incidentally, there was an item on the web last night either from Unredacted, or Migration Watch (cant remember which) that said over ÂŁ1500 people had come over the Channel, this year already.
Our Government is trying to keep this info from us. It isn’t working.
March 3, 2022
+1
They donât care.
Remember âorder out of chaosâ.
Just depends, from our point of view, what that âorderâ consists of.
March 3, 2022
+1 Sharon, we are bankrupt
March 3, 2022
Sharon
Steady on Sharon that is just too much for government to comprehend.
Their focus is on the world stage and that immortal place in history.
March 3, 2022
How many arrived this week illegally – The H O apparently did issue a Channel figure for Sat 26 Feb of 132 / in 4 boats (BBC) There is a further report of “over 200″ arrivals 2 days ago Tue 01 Mar ” in 7 small vessels” with 105 reportedly stopped by French authorities ( Breitbart) Ships – UK/FRA – also recorded this a.m. in the Channel as usual so nothing is changing. Business as usual.
Noted that for the Ukrainians the government was proposing no suspension of any security or biometric visa requirements, being part of the approval process but seems prepared to be flexible. We must do what we can to help like all other nations but it has to be managed & led by those we have elected, not least in order to best provide what is needed for those suffering but not forgetting our own UK citizens. Sick of the loud voices from the usual suspects. ” We have a collective duty to keep the British people safe and this approach is based on the strongest security advice â – said by Home Secretary.
March 3, 2022
âWhat is a possible end to the Ukraine tragedy?â
I have no idea. I have never been to the country.
I hear various reports in the news, some of which turn out to be untrue. There is also much speculation and supposed insights into the mind of Mr. Putin.
I donât know the cause either – Russian aggression, NATO machinations on its borders, or a return to a Tsarist Empire after Gorbachev gave it all away and then Yeltsin was drunk at the wheel.
March 3, 2022
Not sure about that.
Considering the ever declining fertility rate, we need a lot of immigration if we are to be supported in our old age.
This tends to be politically unpopular, and the Ukrainian crisis provides a rare window where we can both help Ukraine and help ourselves.
March 3, 2022
I agree Johnson and his gang need to show far more actual and material solidarity with the UK, England especially. Finding a spine and kicking EU bureacratic control out Northern Ireland and out of our affairs would be a good start.
But .. it strikes me a reason people like him play big on the world stage is that they get far more support and approbation for those speeches and gifts than they ever do from the home audience.
What encouragement is there if the loud voices in this country are continually negative rather than supportive?
You don’t have to much further than the many bilious and repetitive posts from many on this blog not only agin Johnson but also our host. It all seems so counter-productive.
March 3, 2022
The Ukrainian refugees comprise mostly of women and their children, whilst the men stay and fight. They will not want to stay in the UK any longer than it takes for the victory to be won by Ukrainians for their country.
Those coming across the Channel by dinghy are on the other hand largely young men looking for a better life than the regimes they are a product of can offer. They want to come here and stay for good.
March 3, 2022
I say Mark B, have you worked out that people who come here by-and-large get jobs, pay taxes and expand the economy? In my experience they work hard and well doing things that others will not do. It may take time to for them settle in, but we are close to finding out what our declining demographics does to your precious taxes as we become overwhelmed by old age care.
By the way, the population of Russia is now declining and there are not enough people to occupy vast it’s tracts. Maybe Ukraine is not a land grab but a people grab, nearly one 30% population expansion in one go!
March 5, 2022
âWhat is a possible end to the Ukraine tragedy?â What about turning ‘No Fly Zone’ into ‘No NATO Zone’?
March 5, 2022
‘In my experience they work hard and well doing things that others will not do’ That’s because there are so many immigrants that’ll do the work. If no immigration then UK people would be more likely to do the work. That happened before there was much or any immigration. No?
March 3, 2022
What a blind, cynical, deluded post.
March 3, 2022
It’s the old problem with this site. You don’t know who’s replying to whom half the time. Needs a re-jig.
March 4, 2022
John C,
If you just include the name of the addressee things become clearer.
March 4, 2022
John C- I always add the name of whom I reply to but it definitely needs a rethink. It was probably upgraded to provide a better service but as always upgrades are to the detriment of the service.
March 3, 2022
Well said. Totally agree.
March 3, 2022
The illegal immigrants at Calais only have to say that theyâre from Ukraine and they get the golden ticket
March 3, 2022
Glen
“Golden Ticket”
Not if they are men aged between 16 – 60 years of age as they are not being allowed out.
Reason : They are supposed to be fighting for their own Country.
March 3, 2022
I was referring to the bogus illegal immigrants jumping on the bandwagon âpretendingâ to be Ukrainian
March 5, 2022
Glen
Agreed, but if they pretend to be Ukrainian then the same logic applies, at your age you are not allowed out of Ukraine, so we do not believe you.;
March 3, 2022
+1
This relentless tide across the channel has to stop. Itâs unsustainable. No one voted for this, no one asked for it, and no one was asked about it. Whatâs being done please Sir John? And please donât cite Patelâs Bill.
March 3, 2022
+1
March 3, 2022
Similar to the invasion and the suspension of the southern border in the US. Each week I see new faces in my town (in England), it is government organised.
March 3, 2022
I don’t begrudge us taking in a single Ukrainian refugee – for these are real refugees – escaping from an evil that we have not seen in Europe for over 70 years and thought we would never see again. They are not middle class young men, who can raise thousands, to buy an illegal passage across the English Channel -destroying their identities and in many cases pretending to be children – then complaining about not instantly being given a house.
March 3, 2022
+1
March 4, 2022
‘FREE!’
– Most of the refugees I see on the telly are mothers and children. Most of the men seem to be staying home fighting any way they can to protect their homeland.
You’re right about the ‘FREE!’ argument for sure. But I don’t think this the time and place for that right now.
March 3, 2022
Putin wishes to rebuild the Soviet Union and feed his psychopathic urge for total power, and as long as he has an active support group ready to bolster their own egos as well as his, Ukraine and Moldova (and probably the other smaller states on Russia’s boundaries) stand little chance against him.
Just another repeat chapter in human history across the world, sadly.
March 3, 2022
SM,
No, I disagree. He wants a buffer from the west for security of his nation. He repeatedly asked and was ignored. He was told Ukraine would remain neutral. EU and NATO have expanded east for 30 years against what they said. Cameron publicly stated, holding the shirt tails of the US and EU he wanted to expand to the Urals!
Did the US get pissy about Cuba?
History should have shown the west to accommodate through diplomacy. This is a West failure in foreign policy. Gerbotrov and Putin asked to join NATO.
March 3, 2022
So long as they stay out of Nato and the EU they’ll be OK.
From footage of pre war Ukraine I see lots of cars made by global manufacturers. Orderly, clean, cosmopolitan and safe cities. People wearing what they like with hair styles they like. Visitors from the West able to come. A good standard of living in general.
What was it about the EU that they were ready to risk invasion for ? And many notable people including Henry Kissinger said this would be the result of the EU and Nato courting Urkaine.
Too late for a neutral Ukraine now. Putin seems to want a piece of it.
The Whitehouse and the Kremlin should strike a deal that Ukraine remains out of Nato and out of the EU in exchange for Russian withdrawal. Anything else is warmongering. Alas there is no-one in the Whitehouse of that stature.
Russia is the second largest oil and gas producer btw.
March 3, 2022
It’s not your business why the Ukrainians might want to join the European Union. If you like the idea of sovereignty then you should respect theirs.
And hasn’t Putin just demonstrated exactly why they would also want the full protection of NATO for goodness’ sake?
Those free, democratic people did not want to adjoin a huge power subject to deranged thug rule and be at its mercy any more than you would.
March 3, 2022
I don’t watch, listen or read what the MSM has to say however if they’re not very careful Biden, Johnson and Ursula von der Leyen shall push Putin and Russia in the direction of China.
March 3, 2022
In which case, my money would be firmly on China – not out of a feeling of benevolence for their current regime, but because I suspect the Chinese authority is far more capable than the Russian one.
March 3, 2022
SM, it’s a new Sino-Russian alliance our Western leaders should be worrying about.
Radar
March 3, 2022
He is already there! Are you unaware of the political, financial and economic agreements they have already entered into?
March 3, 2022
+1
Putin and Jin Ping clearly share confidences and discussed the invasion before it happened. What else are they discussing ?
Publicly China condemns the invasion but imposes no sanctions and abstains from the UN vote.
Alas too late. Putin could have been our ‘bastard’ pissing out of our tent in the war on terror.
March 3, 2022
Look up Shanghai Cooperation Organization-a grouping of China Russia India Pakistan Iran,the stans,etc.
Pakistan has just announced they are buying 2m tons of Russian wheat and confirming a new gas pipeline to Karachi.
This grouping is going to cut the west out and remove the dollar from their trading.
March 4, 2022
Imran, me ol’ china.
What your mate Vlad’s doing ain’t exactly cricket, is it?
March 9, 2022
And our idoits will still be giving them Aid
March 3, 2022
Radar, they have already done so.
March 3, 2022
I thought that, but in the last week China have been noticeable in their absence to laud Putin and support his invasion. I think they have see the strength of feeling worldwide and are holding back. After all, surely world purchases of their goods are more important than Russia and if the world turned against buying their stuff things could be difficult certainly for us, but also for them.
March 3, 2022
Agreed, China has certainly moved from notionally supporting Russia to “sitting on the fence”.
And for some reason India is also fence sitting?
March 3, 2022
China has not imposed sanctions. China knew about the invasion and set the limits on the date for it.
March 3, 2022
Unsurprisingly, China is doing whatever suits China best. Right and wrong never enters the equation.
March 3, 2022
You are behind the times.China and Russia already have something which,in President Xi’s words last year ,is better than a formal alliance.
March 4, 2022
How do you spell your name in Cyrillic?
March 3, 2022
It’s already happened, Radar. Russia now has lots of big contracts with China, and won’t be supplying so much energy to the West. Petrol price soaring, better get an electric car. Subsidies to renewables now looking more affordable, as fossil fuel costs skyrocket. Yes, everything is working out nicely (!)
Against our interests.
March 3, 2022
It could well become another Afghanistan in the making. The Ukraine has mountains to be able to use as bases and a nation so proud and full of hate for Russia that would become an open wound for Putin for many years even decades. Just as the Taliban discovered weapons can be and are readily available to keep them in the fight. Ukrainians will not forgive or forget the war crimes committed against their civilian population.
March 3, 2022
I agree, TT.
I note that the Russian delegation in scheduled talks has said that a ceasefire is on the agenda, and that the convoy towards Kyiv is reportedly bogged down by breakdown and by attack..
How much weight we should assign to that is a very open question, however.
March 3, 2022
It’s certainly another Afghanistan as far as the Military Industrial Complex is concerned.Who do you think is going to end up paying for all those weapons being shipped in?
As one door closes,another opens….as someone said just before the outbreak of this conflict:”the Anglo-Saxons need another war.”
March 4, 2022
TT, Isnât comparing the Ukrainian mountains (hardly over 2000 m) to the Afghan Pamir or Hindu Kush mountain ranges (height above 7000 m) a bit farfetched as potential resistance bases?
March 3, 2022
Putin will possibly find that smaller countries on his borders will now in light of this incursion into Ukraine, lean them towards membership of the EU and Nato as the proof is there for the world to see Russia cannot be trusted in any shape or form. The question after Ukraine can only be “who will be next”?
March 3, 2022
Membership of the European Union is not a precondition for that of NATO at all.
March 3, 2022
Poorer countries like Ukraine only want to join the EU for one reason – and it isn’t collective defense. They are after the billions of Euros that will be showered upon them to modernise their economies and spend buying EU, mainly German-made goods.
If they want security, they can only look towards NATO and even then, with Obama Biden or Harris in office – or any other Democrat President for that matter – even that has to be in doubt.
March 3, 2022
Putin’s Ceasar Decree war has one intention, to make Ukraine uninhabitable. Ukraine will become buffer against the West. The man’s an intelligent psychopathic that many Western leaders underestimated. Cold, calculating, unemotional and utterly immune to human suffering.
The new Sino-Russian alliance is now a threat to world peace. Taiwan will be next. A new cold war and the West demands real leaders and yet we have the current crop of progressive halfwits and Davos lackeys. No wonder Putin and Xi see the West as weak when Western leaders despise their own citizens.
Divisive, racist progressive Neo-Marxism embraced by many western politicians, including the self-indulgent Tory party and scum Labour, and leaders has destroyed the West. This politics must be criminalised.
We must now protect women and children at all costs. Putin must be starved into submission and targeted. It’s gonna get costly. It’s a shame our leaders have just pissed down the sink $4 trillion on the Covid scam.
The west needs a real leader. We don’t have one
March 3, 2022
It’s the likes of Putin who criminalise politics that they don’t happen to like.
You give great succour to his kind.
March 3, 2022
+1
Letâs hope that people donât start looking beyond the chaos creating âYoung Global Leaderâ premiers to a more umâŠ.universal form of leadership.
What is happening at the moment is whipped up hysteria.
March 3, 2022
+1 Agree….we need less UN and world leadership
March 3, 2022
+1
Exactly!
See they are now desperate to sign us up to some global pandemic agreement!!
March 3, 2022
DOM
Real leader?
We haven’t had one of those for years
March 3, 2022
For once I disagree with you.
We are in no position to punish Putin.
March 3, 2022
A case against Putin and his army commanders need to be put together with the object of issuing arrest warrants to be implemented if they and him leave Russian territory.
March 3, 2022
Bob Dixon
+1
March 3, 2022
That is under way as we write.
March 3, 2022
OK, Bob but let him join the queue after Blair and Bush.
March 3, 2022
The one aspect lacking from Commentators is an understanding of his reasoning and thoughts on an end game.
He cannot withdraw empty handed yet will be stuck with a divided broken country whose citizens will continue to resist even if âpuppetsâ are installed whilst his own economy goes south.
Certainly Ukraines military response and the Westâs political stance would seem to have caught him by surprise and in that respect the Westâs politicians should bear some of the blame.
Re negotiations, we must not let up on strangling him economically at the first hint of âconciliatoryâ words.
He has proved to be bellicose, unhinged and not to be trusted. The cage door must be shut firmly on the Bear until a new regime emerges.
March 3, 2022
He is actually very rational-and has been very patient-but the last time a Russian leader allowed a build-up of hostile military infrastructure on his borders,27m of his citizens died.Ukraine is being used as an expendable pawn in a proxy war against Russia.It’s a great tragedy for the people of Ukraine but the west has created this crisis.
One of the few knowledgeable journalists providing incisive commentary,amidst the torrent of lugenpresse, on the situation in Ukraine is Peter Hitchens of the Mail on Sunday(twitter @ClarkeMicah).
March 3, 2022
Mitchel +1000
Also (and I am no pro Putin bot) there is no thanks to Russia for such an orderly dismantling of empire nor the fact that Putin held together the Russian Federation by force of personality rather than allowing it to splinter into nuclear armed countries of differing stability.
Instead Nato and the EU shat upon him repeatedly.
WE caused this.
March 3, 2022
What did the European Union do?
Putin commended the Euroclubs that it set up in Russia.
March 3, 2022
There is no reasonable comparison between the free association of the democratic members of NATO and Hitler’s enthralled automaton army from a totalitarian state.
Putin and his shills make that false equivalence, whereas it is he who most closely resembles his example.
He has also, with crystal clarity, exploded his own excuse for his actions, ironically, by giving NATO the opportunity to demonstrate that it is not – even in these circumstances – going to wage a war of destruction and annihilation against any people or country, which was the very purpose of Hitler’s terrible adventure, and yet which he himself seems prepared to wage against any who do not surrender utterly to his tyranny.
March 3, 2022
I think that your analysis agrees with that of good sense, based on such information as we have, Sir John.
Putin has confirmed the worst suspicions that the world had about him, and that will change perceptions of his country for many years, unless there were a popular revolution to reshape it as a free, open, democratic modern country with an end to thug rule, and all that goes with that.
There is no hope at all for normal relations with any country, least of all with Ukraine until that happens.
March 3, 2022
Agreed.
Now, how to put a wedge between him and the Russian military who seem to be “close as thieves” at the moment?
March 3, 2022
I took a gander at who might be able to steer Putin away from this confrontation. The Defence Minister? No. The Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church? No. (What an interesting Wiki profile he has!) The PM? Yes – he’s a technocrat and understands finance too. And perhaps the Chief of the General Staff. The West should, I think, look to leave Putin a way out of this mess of his own creation. Given his army’s casualties, he’ll be looking for one.
And. as an aside, may I suggest that our MPs look into the training of our diplomats. I’m also thinking that we have too many PPE grads in government and too few who have attended something like a Foreign Affairs Institute.
March 4, 2022
The patriarch’s CV is indeed interesting. It shows that the Russian establishment is pretty consistent from one end to the other too.
March 4, 2022
S_W, The FCDO Diplomatic Academy (part of the University of Westminster?) looks a bit like the US FAI. Chatham House holds a lot of seminars that, I guess, are open to âall types of peopleâ. CH also has very informative weekly newsletters.
March 3, 2022
And in other news the government is still insisting on people returning from abroad to fill in a passenger locator form. With the relaxation of quarantining rules etc there is zero reason for this apart from surveillance and control.
I can spend a few days in the North of England on a holiday break and return home but if I visit Calais a far shorter journey for me I have the stress of the locator form to complete.
More uncaring rubbish from the Minister for Transport.
March 3, 2022
“the stress of the locator form to complete” ?
How is this any different from entry forms and processes always needed elsewhere in this past, eg when entering USA from the UK.
I wouldn’t categorise such things as “stressful”, rather a minor irritation like any other part of travel admin.
March 3, 2022
Never forget the first three letters of assume. Maybe if you had been stuck unable to get the forms to work and no help to get back into the U.K. you wouldnât have been so condescending.
March 3, 2022
How was I condescending, merely questioning why it was any more stressful than other transit forms.
Of course, I forgot how paranoid continuity remainers are and always ready to take offence there, does that make you happy?
March 3, 2022
The PLF is âstressfulâ inasmuch as it asks one to provide the proof of oneâs vaccinations but is unable to accept the pdf. file containing the QR codes that the NHS app produces, at least it was like that last week for me returning to the UK.
But thatâs the UK for you, the Home Office and the DHSC unable to have compatibility of their own documents.
March 3, 2022
we weren’t able to get on the NHS app this morning to order a prescription, you might class that as “stressful” or instead wait a bit and try later like we did.
But that’s the UK public sector for you …
March 4, 2022
d, Well, inhale and exhale sloooooowly âŠ
My French/EU TousAntiCovid app accepted my NHS app-produced QR codes âwithout batting an eyelidâ, my British Passenger Location Form did not, even after trying several times either using the original NHS digital file or a mobile picture of them.
Fortunately I had a paper copy of the QR codes that I could show at boarding time.
The problem with your prescription might simply have been related to ânetwork trafficâ that particular morning. And you were in your house âhaving nothing better to doâ than to wait for the NHS app to respond.
Within 24 hours of travelling back to the UK, I was wondering whether I would be able to return or not, maybe a tiny bit more âstressfulâ, wasnât it? đ
March 4, 2022
h, was your jaunt to France “elective”, our prescriptions certainly weren’t.
And don’t you have a house there, I seem to recall you describing the rural idyll with convivial neighbours at some point, so would a delay really be that onerous or costly?
March 5, 2022
d, indeed youâre right, but sometimes people have things to do that require them to be present in person in the UK at a particular time on a particular day, things like NHS appointments (that are rather difficult to get these days).
And I hope you would agree that after having finally been able in November to get an appointment with a real doctor in a real hospital some time in March one would not want to waste it. As the next one might not be before June, July or possibly even later.
March 6, 2022
@hefner – similarly you are quite wrong with the “And you were in your house âhaving nothing better to doâ than to wait for the NHS app to respond.” crack.
But I allow a good time margin when I order prescriptions to avoid stressful panic.
March 3, 2022
Wait til poor Nig realises how many forms his Brexit will require him to fill in.
March 3, 2022
Such forms applied to foreigners. Indeed, many countries require foreigners to register their passports at their hotels etc. You get finger printed on entering or leaving the US. But that doesn’t apply to US citizens.
March 3, 2022
It does apply to US citizens …
“Starting on December 6, air travelers aged two and older, regardless of nationality or vaccination status, are required to show documentation of a negative viral test result taken within one day of the flightâs departure to the United States before boarding. You must show your negative result to the airline before you board your flight. That includes all travelers â U.S. citizens, lawful permanent residents (LPRs), and foreign nationals.”
March 3, 2022
I guess because Nig L lives here in Britain, not in the US, is the obvious answer.
March 3, 2022
Good point. The government has just sent me a COVID vaccination certificate, so it knows that I am vaccinated. That should be sufficient to get me back into my country. After all, it’s sufficient to get me into lots of others.
March 3, 2022
JR: “He probably wanted them to rule out any future NATO membership and to recognise Russian leadership and trade patterns as some kind of friendly satellite. ”
You mean just like the UK ruled by the USA? How many troops do the USA have on UK territory, right this instant?
To what extent does the CIA interfere in the internal affairs of the UK?
And here we are, pawns of the New World Order, and Clause Schwab.
Parliament sat on its hands for a year, and you claim we live in a democracy.
March 3, 2022
+1
No such thing as a democracy ( or at least not as we have been taught to view it).
Parliament has been playing with us in a most despicable way since at least 2016âŠand probably ever since the first âleaderâ declared himself/herself.
March 3, 2022
APL. You have made some valid points there.
I’ve been thinking, well hang on, what does Eastern Europe have to do with a NORTH ATLANTIC treaty nowadays?
U.S.A.’s ‘help’ during 2 ‘World’ Wars and the ‘Cold’ War, made some sort of sense.
But bearing in mind that the United Nations and all it’s ever increasing functions are based in the U.S.A. and bearing in mind that Global Pharma and Global Finance, Technology etcetera are all based in the U.S.A.:-
Well it does make me wonder.
The United Kingdom has not been a World Power, in the same league as U.S.A., at least since the end of WW2. It feels as though we are ‘hanging on to Biden’s shirt tails’!
Still, Russia is clearly moving towards China. An especially huge power block, which I would not imagine intends to be part of the New World Order.
Personally I do not want to be part of any of it. I want MY country, to be INDEPENDENT in every way of all these power blocks, including the E.U..
Also I want it independent of the N.W.O. – New World Order. So it beats me what ‘we’ should be doing.
March 3, 2022
The Ukrainians also want their country to be as independent as reasonably possible too.
March 3, 2022
”I want MY country, to be INDEPENDENT in every way of all these power blocks, including the E.U..”
Couldn’t agree more Pauline Baxter
March 3, 2022
Indeed, Pauline, this is not our fight. Those trying to get us into a fight in which we can only lose economically are not fit to govern this country. Their Big Bad Putin narrative is simply grotesque. Perhaps it could only work on a population softened up by the Big Bad Covid narrative? There’s one thing so far missing – fear. How the media influencers get the fear factor into play will be thing to watch for next.
March 3, 2022
…And to forget that Stalin, Putin’s hero, starved four million or more Ukrainians to death.
March 3, 2022
Putin is a mad man same as Hitler, I don’t think he believes any of the scenarios you write.
He wants total capitulation and nothing else will do.
God bless the Ukrainians for giving him a bloody nose.
March 3, 2022
It’s a great, great pity that they could not do it to him personally.
March 3, 2022
You can usually manage something better than this sort of playground abuse, lad. Give us a high-level analysis of the position, the kind of thing we were used to with your fascinating thoughts on Brexit and suchlike. Especially needed, now that young Andy seems to have gone AWOL from this site. (Perhaps he’s enlisted with Blackwater to go to Ukraine?)
March 4, 2022
What a strange post – what is your view on the US Republican, who urged Putin’s assassination, but which Johnson has decried’
March 3, 2022
+1
You know he is a Global Young Leader ( like Johnson, Trudeau and all the gang)âŠas mentioned on video by Mr Schwab?
March 3, 2022
The Young Global Leaders are an invention of the World Economic Forum (Davos) which is the undocumented executive arm of the United NationsâŠ.time they where all disbanded
March 3, 2022
+10
Yes and they arenât likely to fall out of step.really are they?
They must surely all agree on a plan of action?
Which makes our present situation all the more puzzling!
March 3, 2022
Sometimes you have to man-up and use the big stick against a bully and not the letter from your mother
March 3, 2022
Agree
And they arenât likely to fall out of step.really are they?
Putin, Johnson, Trudeau and others âŠall from the same stable.
As Schwab said on camera.
They must surely all agree on the plan of action?
Which makes our present situation all the more puzzling!
March 4, 2022
I think that you really have lost it completely.
March 3, 2022
If he manages to seize Ukraine completely it will result in a protracted civil war/guerrilla-style war of independence (depending on your point of view). Ukraine will not quietly submit to Russian rule and long-term Russia will not be able to subdue it providing the draconian sanctions remain in place. It couldn’t hold Afghanistan and longer-term it won’t be able to hold Ukraine.
We must retain sanctions and do out utmost to ensure that our less-than-reliable allies don’t start lifting them. For a start that means using our own oil, gas, shale and coal reserves which are under our feet and in the north sea. The twaddle coming from Johnson that it means we need more renewable energy is at best naĂŻve and at worst negligent of our security.
March 3, 2022
Johnson needs to be forced out.
March 3, 2022
So who will you force in in his place? Gove?
March 4, 2022
d, if they are not too busy doing marvellous things for the country, the Conservative parliamentary party will possibly provide the CUP members a choice between two candidates. With a bit of luck, these members might even think before choosing another Ronald McDonald.
Would you not be happy with such a towering figure as Sir Gav of Inglenook?
March 4, 2022
Love the last line đ
March 3, 2022
Keeping the sanctions in place will be a struggle. Although Putin displays zero humanity (was that surgically removed as a rite of passage in the KGB?), there are plenty of national leaders who also are very lacking in humanity, and for them the suffering of Ukrainians is a tolerable price if it advances their political objectives.
I know we keep bashing Boris, but I saw he was very moved by that Ukrainian reporter who cried for more western military aid. If it had been Putin instead, he would have looked at her with cold indifference.
March 3, 2022
Johnson is a performer, Dave, but Putin isn’t. I’m sure the Russian military will ignore what Western ‘public opinion’ thinks and get on with the job, doing what they need to do to return Ukraine to neutrality and humane treatment of all its citizens. Perhaps then the world, having emoted and huffed and puffed utterly ineffectually, will come back to its senses – as it is gradually doing over Covid. Sanctions on Russia will result in massive collateral damage to international trade in essentials (food and fuel). They risk producing ruin and starvation in the Third World and accelerating fuel poverty at home, which won’t be tolerated, especially in the run-up to the next election.
March 3, 2022
Donna
Very well said.
Maybe the answers lie with us the electorate? Come May, if the country rose up and ignored the big useless three Con/Lab/Libdem same old parties, and all voted for one of the newer parties not agreeing with Net Zero, Dingy Invaders and secure energy supplies then the shock waves just might be the first domino to fall over putting this country first, not the world in the direction of plain common sense.
Time for real radical change through the ballot box.
March 3, 2022
Today there is a very interesting article under the banner Common Sense on the Not a Lot of People Know That website.
The Westâs Green Delusions Empowered Putin.
Very informative and well worth a look-see
March 3, 2022
Iâve just read that articleâŠits on the money
March 3, 2022
Well said Turbo.
March 3, 2022
The woke world that our political elite live in isnât as cosy in practise as the theory would suggestâŠmost of the world is under dictatorship and corruption by religious, cultural or just power mad peopleâŠ..and what is the Boris plan âban frackingâ âban gas explorationâ âban the carâ â ban the gas boilerâ âban the wood burnerâ âcreate clean air tax zonesâ âŠwe all crazy but some are even more crazy
March 3, 2022
Donna. I agree we certainly need to use all our own energy supplies.
We also need to stop ‘importing’ all those foreigners needing houses etcetera, thus taking up scarce land that we need, to produce more of our own food.
We need to trade – we always have done. That means we need to produce goods that others need or want.
Not ALL of this government’s declared intentions are completely wrong but somehow the sensible ones seem to have been put aside for all the MAD ideas!
March 3, 2022
I’ve no idea what the end will look like. I can only hope there will be no escalation. Putin could be replaced but not by someone the Western leaders would approve of. It could be someone who will think that Russia should take over as police man of the world instead of US.
The invasion of Ukraine is wrong on so many levels.
Putin’s points on the treatment of Russians, the Azov Battalion’s etc have now been blasted to smithereens by his stupidity.
If many in the West didn’t want to talk to him about it in the past, they sure won’t now, now he’s given them the moral high ground.
It is that assumption of the moral high ground from people who have themselves invaded other lands with flimsy pretexts, not even the excuse of protecting their own nationals, that is making me feel sick with rage.
The appalling loss of life to our own as well as countless civilians in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya.
The skinning of the British tax payer to pay for it all, who then end up giving homes to half the world and his Uncle because of the ‘humanitarian’ invasions, while those responsible just shrug their shoulders.
I doubt that point will be lost on Putin, unless of course he has completely lost his marbles. He may think that if he’s going down he’ll take a few of those whose actions haven’t been dissimilar with him.
Biden will be airlifting aid to the people of Iran!!
I can only hope that particular clip has been doctored as a piece of anti-Biden propaganda. If not then we should all be afraid. If you don’t know what I mean there is a clip on You Tube showing him talking of the support for the Iranian people as Russia invades.
March 3, 2022
I take your point Michelle, but I feel that, as Big Tech got Biden elected, they would not be party to any manipulation of video or audio that would show him in a bad light. So I’m afraid that the “Leader of the Free World” is a poor, senile old man. I agree that this is terrifying, as from what I read, the actions of Putin and Xi appear to me to be coordinated.
If faked, the YouTube clip is quite sophisticated, as you can see Harris cringing in the background, mouthing the word “Ukranian”.
March 3, 2022
It appears to have been yet another slip of Biden’s tongue – he apparently meant ‘Ukrainian’.
March 3, 2022
Melanie Phillips has just written on this, Michelle. See her blog.
March 3, 2022
Like the Muslim extremists he doesn’t think like you do. He is not mad, there are lots of his peers who think along his lines. Sure they are bad, on our terms, but things make sense in his mental model of the world which he has been quite happy to lay out on his TV announcements. We have been stupid ignoring what they said. Biden was stupid pre announcing he would not fight, he should have stayed unpredictable.
More important is what are the western democracies going to do now? Are we really going to let China invade Taiwan because “it’s not in NATO”
We need to listen to the people who predicted this correctly.
March 3, 2022
Correct – Poland wasn’t in NATO in 1939 when we went to their help
March 4, 2022
Except we didn’t go to Poland’s help. ‘We’ (Britain and France) let Germany overrun Poland, with Soviet assistance. Then ‘we’ acted all surprised when France was overrun too, and next we nearly were.
It was Polish pilots who came to *our* help in the Battle of Britain.
Maybe you can still find your school history textbook in the loft, Glen?
March 4, 2022
I was almost agreeing with you until I read your last sarcastic sentence
March 3, 2022
I like to hear both sides of an argument and was appalled last night when trying to tune into RT that it has been removed from my TV channel list. So much for living in a supposedly âfreeâ country, as people used to say but tend not to anymore. Also appalling yesterday in parliament was MPsâ blanket lambasting and proposed indiscriminate asset freezing targeted against so called Russian oligarchs. This seems to be being justified by âlinksâ, however tenuous, with the Putin regime. UK criminal law can be used to prosecute such people if they have broken our laws. What would we have thought during the Iraq war if wealthy UK citizens who owned property in France had had assets seized because the French government disapproved of Tony Blairâs invasion of Iraq?
March 3, 2022
I very rarely watched RT in the past but hearing that it was to be banned I recorded some programmes before that happened, and I can see why “our” side does not want us to be able to watch it. Ukrainian forces shelling innocent Russian speaking civilians in the eastern regions, mass graves after nationalist volunteer units went on rampages? None of that ever happened, and any shelling has always been in the opposite direction … all the talk about freedom of expression, but we are not allowed to hear both sides of what is really somebody else’s argument, and should have stayed that way. The BBC did show Putin speaking, and had to immediately point out that what he had said did not match their view of what was happening, “on the ground”, but if it’s Saint Volodymyr then everything he says can be taken at face value as the absolute truth. Increasingly I am asking “cui bono?”, who benefits from fomenting and fuelling this war?
March 3, 2022
Some or all of those pictures could have been genuine too.
But who knows?
March 3, 2022
I tend to agree on principle, MPC, though when I have watched RT, I wasn’t always impressed by its coverage. The international business section is where I found the most interesting stories, not much covered elsewhere. Anyway, RT is now on Bitchute. Still, there is a serious worry that the values that distinguish our country from an autocracy (the way Russia seems to be going) are being seriously eroded. Perhaps, as many commentators have suggested, this is what happens when Western governments got a taste for cancelling freedom ‘because of Covid’.
March 3, 2022
Agree â freedom of speech (and therefore news) is indivisible with democracy
March 3, 2022
The real question is; ‘What would satisfy Putin’?
The West is too weak, both morally and in military terms to enforce or impose anything on Russia.
So this will be over when Putin decides it will be. There have been enough talks for Russia to spell out what it wants — Let’s see some real diplomacy from the West in reaching a point where the fighting can be stopped.
All we have seen from Western diplomacy is them stonewalling everything Russia has brought to the conference table.
March 3, 2022
It is an existential fight for Ukraine. It means an extended guerrilla war is likely provided there are enough Ukrainians ready to fight it (which looks certain) and enough outside support with the means to supply the necessary tools (which also looks certain). Putin has probably underestimated the response by Ukraine and the rest of the world, especially the scope of the sanctions (which have frozen part of his reserves) and now the inability to sell Russian oil (not yet sanctioned) to traders. As he has declared and believes Russia faces an existential threat from an independent Ukraine, he will press on with his invasion. The severity of economic sanctions may cause a pause as might pressure from China if Putin becomes to be seen as an embarrassing ally. But this will be a never ending conflict while Putin rules Russia.
March 3, 2022
Now whatever could put an end to this hysterical situation?
Oh I knowâŠ
A World Government!!
Theyâll have the sheeple begging for it!
March 3, 2022
@everhopeful +99
I fear that may be closer to the truth than most people can possibly imagine
March 3, 2022
+1
Unfortunately, yes.
All paths seem to lead that way.
I hope notâŠ.butâŠ
March 3, 2022
How about this scenario? The west continues to back the utterly Ukrainian government and makes it a running sore in Europe. Russia implements it’s own sanctions by cutting off oil and gas to Europe causing massive shortages, inflation and the closure of most industry. 30% of the worlds wheat currently produced by Russia and Ukraine is redirected away from the west. Russia, China, the rest of Asia and most of Africa start using the already developing CIFS and SPFS payment systems making the dollar hegemony obsolete. This causes the trillions of dollars floating around the world to return to America destroying the currency and economy making it impossible for America to continue it’s militaristic aggression and making it into a Third World hellhole much as Europe could well be. Meanwhile our cretinous ruling class continue to believe in their own importance and ignoring their own massive criminality.
March 5, 2022
Plus 1
March 3, 2022
I am quite sure the Russian leadership have thought of all this already, Sir John.
The solution is a negotiated settlement, and going forward a neutral Ukraine which has withdrawn its objective of joining NATO. Geography dictates it needs to get on with its large and powerful neighbour, not provide bases for an alliance hostile to it.
March 3, 2022
It’s not a given that a NATO member will provide bases for the alliance. Norway, for instance, is very sensitive about ‘bases’. But I’m with you, partially, on the idea that a neutral Ukraine might be a good idea. President Zelensky’s video application for EU membership wasn’t helpful. I wonder if his ruling out NATO and EU membership would be a ‘get out’ for a Putin seeing Russia’s economy collapse.
March 3, 2022
Agreed, Sea W. Nor was Z’s announcement helpful a little while before the attack that he was thinking about nuclear weapons for Ukraine. Talk about a red rag!
March 3, 2022
Maybe we could ask Putin to swap Kaliningrad for Ukraine……but its not our decision, its for the Ukraine people to decide
March 3, 2022
It’s probably time that the West came together and agreed a common position on when our sanctions would be reduced. (There’s a strong case for the continuance of some, such as the dual-use technology ban, beyond the Ukraine crisis.) I would suggest that sanctions remain in place until:
(1) Russian forces have left ALL Ukrainian territory, other than Crimea.
(2) Russia ceases all attempts to destabilise democratic government in Ukraine.
(3) Reparations have been made by Russia.
(4) Putin has left office.
There has been some talk about Russian ‘war crimes’ in Ukraine. I’m in favour of the ICC investigating those. Western governments should, of course, make informing the Russian people of the progress of investigations an objective in their Information Campaign.
March 3, 2022
They’re all perfectly reasonable conditions.
Unfortunately Putin preposterously claims that Ukraine is not a nation or a state but some historic part of a Greater Russia. He has no respect for the principle of self-determination whatsoever.
March 3, 2022
But Putin couldâve achieved those goals by invading the Donbas region and not Kyiv (a further 825km)
Also there are three other NATO member nations that border Russia, so Ukraineâs membership of NATO is a distraction
March 3, 2022
What is the end game, well at the moment it looks like it will be a Country in the main part destroyed, with millions of displaced people, and gorilla warfare for years to come.
Putin cares not about human sacrifice or other peoples lives but his own, he is now fighting a stand off war of destruction, because the only people who can really topple him are those at home, where he has almost total control of the so called police and media, thus he does not want a large body bag count of returning troop bodies, with families spreading such information.
I would guess a so called puppet government will eventually be installed with heads of that Government rotated at Putins will, who to take all of the future blame and flak.
The West needs to realise that both China and Russia are still a threat to the World, but in different ways, so we need leaders and Governments who recognise and act as such. Thus time to reduce our dependance on either of those countries for manufactured products, the supply of raw materials, and the use of our universities.
The developing World needs help, but trade not aid, and so we should be supporting them, so they do not sell out the family silver (raw materials) to China.
March 3, 2022
Oops “Guerrilla”, auto correct strikes again.
March 3, 2022
John
Pray tell me of what use has the UNITED NATIONS been in all of this, surely it has now been exposed (as it has previously) as just a talking shop, with no power to do anything ?
March 3, 2022
+10
March 3, 2022
Good point. The Security Council is rather hobbled by Russia’s being one of the P5. But the Secretary General really should get over to Moscow.
March 3, 2022
Even in this crisis, Johnson has reiterated his determination to plunge the UK further down the renewables rabbit hole, increasing our dependence on energy importation and bolstering the Russian economy by inflating gas prices, all while increasing global CO2 emissions.
It’s high time that his refusal to allow fracking was politically highlighted, and the excess CO2 emissions due to imports tallied.
It would be interesting to know whether these unnecessary excess emissions are in breach of the requirements of the UK climate control legislation.
March 3, 2022
The one thing you will never hear a member of the government (any government) say is âWe cannot afford itâ.
Because, of course, as soon as they say those words the shouts go up ⊠you can afford HS2 and duck houses on MPs lakes and a new royal boat and wallpaper at 2 grand a roll etc.
March 3, 2022
How can you be sure what Putin was told about Ukraine and what he is being told now? He will be enveloped by plotting courtiers feeding him their own agenda, the Harold Wilson “mushroom” syndrome. It happens even in a democracy, as evidenced by Boris, but how much worse for a totalitarian leader with power of life and death. Who dares speak truth unto power?
We have to hope that he will not be so misinformed as to press the nuclear button.
March 3, 2022
The economic sanctions, particularly those on the Russian central bank, are very effective, we just need to wait for them to really hurt. What does not help are countries like Pakistan announcing they will continue purchasing gas from Russia thus handing them foreign currency. We need to stop our ÂŁ320m a year foreign aid to Pakistan immediately. My view is that China will be involved in any post-conflict resolution hence their appearance of neutrality currently. I think the government are handling this quite well, for example clearly ruling out a no-fly zone which would simply favour the Russian troops and so be counter-prodcutive.
March 3, 2022
Who knows the mind of a despot. Should he invade and take control of the whole of Ukraine he might find that governing an unwilling people difficult in the extreme.
He should have targeted the UK. Alexander Johnson and his cronies just open the borders to young men of fighting age. Even put them up in hotels with pocket money!
March 3, 2022
Before we can identify a possible end to the Ukraine war we must first identify the Russian war mission objectives, what are Putins actual goals
March 3, 2022
He has announced what they are. Perhaps the news outlets you watch/read didn’t broadcast them? That would not be a surprise.
March 3, 2022
I watched Putin on RT news channel declare that the Ukraine must disarm and stop being NaziâŠ..theyâre not mission objectives, theyâre not measurable, theyâre not realistic, theyâre not achievable, theyâre not sensibleâŠ..theyâre idiotic
Putin went to war with Ukraine to âdemilitarization and denazificationâ is insane by any military measureâŠ.so again I ask whatâs his real goal
March 3, 2022
I disagree, Glen. Denazification means getting rid of the Nazis (= ultra-right nationalists in the Nazi-supporting Bandera tradition) in key positions and in charge of military units. Much the same as in 1945 Germany. Not achieved 100%, but easily enough to root out the influence of the Nazi ideology for good.
Destruction of the Kiev military machine, the other Russian objective, is being accomplished. A neutral status for Ukraine in future would mean no foreign weapons or bases on Ukrainian soil, which is measurable by international observers if required. That would actually entail that Russia would have to give up its newly-acquired right to bases in the Donbas republics, but international human rights guarantees to their populations would be far preferable anyway.
March 3, 2022
Weâll ask all the Nazi to identify themselves and take everybodyâs weapons, rifles and pistols and destroy themâŠ.doesnât sound to practical
March 4, 2022
Russia has its own extreme right wing nationalists, probably proportionately more than Ukraine does.
March 3, 2022
I agree completely, Glen.
March 3, 2022
I would suggest that they are probably to:
(1) Have Ukraine renounce the ambitions for NATO and EU membership.
(2) Carving out the Russian-speaking areas for incorporation into Russia.
(3) The removal from office of President Zelensky.
He has lost so many troops that Putin won’t want all of the Ukraine.
March 3, 2022
Chimpanzees display hurling heavy tree branches about not to make log piles.
March 3, 2022
But he couldâve achieved those goals by just invading the Donbas region and not Kyiv (a further 825km away)
Also there are three other NATO member nations that border Russia, so Ukraineâs membership of NATO is a distraction
March 3, 2022
Putinâs war will end with Putin dead or in prison. Heâll either die from natural causes, someone brave from inside The Kremlin will put a bullet in his head or heâll be arrested by the generals and turned over to The Hague to face war crimes charges. This may take some time but this is how it will end.
The Russian people would overwhelmingly not support Putinâs war if they were able to learn the truth of it. But as we saw from Brexit and Trump, Putin is a master of disinformation. This is what he does.
The reality on the ground is that Putin has already lost. Sure he may destroy some cities, kill lots of people and occupy swathes of Ukraine for years to come. But far from quashing Ukrainian nationalism he has stoked it. He has also united Europe in a way it has not been united for decades. He has made the European Union significantly more powerful, has permanently ended any chance of Poland or Hungary leaving and has actually sparked a rush by countries to join.
Meanwhile, as the EU has proven mighty – again – NATO has failed, again. The so called military alliance – which was beaten by a bunch of radicalised goat herders in Afghanistan – faces a conflict on its borders and what amounts to a genocide on a doorstep and it is too impotent to do anything. NATO is a genuinely pathetic organisation which has never succeeded at anything.
March 3, 2022
Or maybe he is going tell all the people to leave.
March 3, 2022
Putin has opened a can of worms for himself. A combination of bodies returning to Russia in large numbers and the attack on the russian economy from just about the entire free World will register with the average russian. Those in Russia who have attained a way of life they enjoy will start asking themselves how do we best protect it. This will be the demise of Putin. I do not expect it overnight because to date Putin has been quite popular among russians and suffering has been a way of life in Russia.
We should be 100% supportive of refugees fleeing Ukraine. Note the difference. The rib migrants are largely male, the Ukrainians fleeing Ukraine are largely women and children. Realise the significance of this.
The BBC should bombard both Russia and those left fighting Russia in Ukraine with accurate information that can be verified on the ground. First to erode Putins power base and second to avoid confusion among Ukrainians in Ukraine.
Anticipating a long term conflict we should train suitable Ukrainians along SOE lines for ths express purpose of making life for occupying russians intolerable.
We should encourage all European NATO members to up their defensive spend and capability. Seeing satellite imagery of that 40 mile russian vehicle park suggests to me that they are very vulnerable to unconventional warfare. Ironically Putin has awoken a sleepy NATO to become the threat it is not at present, but will become even in purely defensive mode. As with Israelis all having their uzi or galil at home, we should encourage large armouries of hand held anti tank and ground to air missiles readily available to those trained to use them. An expanded territorial service is the answer to their use. We talk of poking the Russian bear, anyone contemplating invading Europe should quickly realise that they are stiring a hornets nest.
March 3, 2022
Your moderation policy is beyond understanding. You publish the crass and ignore the considered. Aay beyo nd me.
March 6, 2022
a, my full support to your comment.
March 3, 2022
I decided to stop commenting here because your party no longer wants to listen to its supporters, I’m glad I’m not a member having to justify the decisions that are made and campaign for that this May.
What is the point of us, the general people, speculating on what the possible end of the Ukraine/Russia war is going to be, most of us can’t believe this is happening in 2022. It’s like watching The 300 but in modern-day with women and children being blown out of their homes and politicians scheming behind the scenes. Civilian homes bombed, children killed, it is telling that the Ukrainian men in the main are staying to defend their homeland, it is Ukranian women and children fleeing for genuine safety. The rest of the world who disagree what Russian is doing can only light up buildings and Britain claps an ambassador (it is literally a cringe moment – thanks for the applause but for goodness sakes come and help us to repel the tanks that are killing actual people, people just like us and our familes.)
March 3, 2022
There will be no end as there is no specific Russian/Chinese plan other than to cause economic pain and disruption to the West through the implementation of sanctions and the influx of refugees.
There will be a temporary ceasefire of the Ukrainian hostilities when Russia/China believe sufficient damage has been caused for now and before it affects them politically.
Ukraine will be in a mess and thatâs just how they want it, the precise position is immaterial as they will just have another âgoâ later.
It should also not be forgotten that Russia/China are making successful progress against the West on two other major fronts â the destruction of their economies through the false idea that anthropological CO2 (plant food) will cause the Earth to burn up and the funding of massive flows of migrants into the West from the ME and Africa to destroy the Westâs social cohesion.
These attacks on the West will continue until the West weeds out the communist fifth column in its midst and the Russian people realise that China is eating them for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
March 3, 2022
The real danger is that he has that nuclear button near by and the West has to be very very careful not to push him closer to it.
He won’t give up even though he has made a massive miscalculation on the Ukrainian resistance and the reaction of the rest of the world. China will watch every move from the side lines and select economic advantages as they arise while the West will continue to strangle the Russian economy.
The only route out will be if the military commanders withdraw their support and there are a few very small signs of this. The best example is the 40 mile convoy that hasn’t moved in 3 days. It has all the hallmarks of Putin saying ‘drive there and take the capital’ and the Generals saying ‘OK’ and ignoring logistical support, knowing that it would run out of fuel and food.
We just have to hope that this is a sign of non-cooperation to come and to grow.
March 3, 2022
Peter Oborne
1 March 2022 14:09 UTC | Last update: 1 day 13 hours ago
âTwo standards have been applied by the West: Rush to help Ukraine against the foreign invader, but no mercy missions to Yemen, Gaza, Syria or Myanmar for that matterâ
March 3, 2022
It’s not two standards. In Ukraine’s case it was a country wanting to live peaceably attacked by Russia. In other places in the world it is two or more sides that want to fight and not live in peace.
If it was two factions within Ukraine determined to fight each other, the world would have just sat back and let them get on with it.
March 3, 2022
Dave, I think you need to update your knowledge of the Ukraine situation. There have indeed been two parties to the conflict, fighting each other inside Ukraine in the Donbas region in the East of the country. The Kiev government troops and especially its far-right militia brigades have been shelling civilians there for years, causing hundredsd of deaths and thousands of refugees, without too many in the Western media getting upset. Peter Oborne rightly pointed out that some civilian victims of war are just the wrong kind of victim, as far as certain people in the West are concerned.
March 3, 2022
Quite right Dave. Ukraine posed no threat to anyone.
March 3, 2022
Two things strike about Ukraine.
1. We would intervene were it not for Russia’s nuclear weapons. Therefore we need to urgently develop what used to be described as “star wars” technology to render ICBMs a thing of the past. We would also need anti-submarine capabilities.
2. The rush to net zero may have exacerbated/accelerated this war, since Putin can see his main product becoming obsolete within 8 years. However, that’s now factored in – but fossil fuels will be necessary for a long time (just not Russian ones, so we need fracking, new North Sea fields etc while we develop nuclear power and perhaps fusion later). Rolls Royce SMRs may be a solution and new tech such as thorium reactors offer hope for more safe and smaller technology.
For now, the best we can hope for is to keep supplying weapons to Ukraine and fund/arm any insurgency if Putin does win, hosting a real Ukraine govt in London.
If Ukraine does hold out then giving them immediate NATO membership should be a given – it will be difficult for Putin to do anything about it if he’s just lost that war.
The recent veilied threat of nuclear weapons use from Russia is an interesting one – it seems to be just sabre rattling with Putin playing his “as unpredictable as Trump” nutter role in the background, stoking fears of a madman with his finger on the nuclear trigger. I don’t see this as a real threat. It looks as if, were the Werst to be more flagrant in their support for Ukraine, that Putin would back down.
If tactical nukes are used on the battlefield then we have a heck of a decision to make. Probably, we need to use that as the “humnanitarian” reeason to go in – war crimes committed etc etc, as a “peacekeeping force”.
March 3, 2022
Sir John,
Your last paragraph could just as easily have applied to Iraq.
I’m still waiting for war crimes trials to commence after what happened in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria.
While Julian Assange remains locked up in Belmarsh prison.
March 3, 2022
Indeed, Mark. And when have sanctions been applied to NATO countries for invading other people’s territory?
March 3, 2022
Assange has done more to reveal the disgusting nature and conduct of the proponents of the so-called rules-based international order than anyone else.
March 3, 2022
There’s not just one “international order” though, is there?
There’s the US’s effective empire for one, which sometimes displays the faults that you identify, but then there are other associations of many nations and which are sincere and effective at sticking to their agreements, such as on reducing CFCs etc.
Whatever, it is an outrage that Assange is imprisoned here at the behest of the US and far beyond the appropriate penalty for his bail terms breach.
March 3, 2022
One would think with all the explosions, excessive vehicle movements, combat aircraft sorties, buildings and trees on fire that all the disciples of saving the world new order religion would be out protesting in every major city and towns across the world to stop all the CO2 and smoke damage immediately. Pollution in whatever form it takes is still pollution.
Our leaders want Net Zero? For God sake get a grip and live in the real world.
To add to the mix Old Faithful in Yellowstone National Park it would seem to appear to be building up for a massive eruption. OMG how will the world survive?
March 3, 2022
I’m sure Miss Thunberg is cycling like mad to Moscow as we speak, in order to berate Mr Putin …. or perhaps not.
March 3, 2022
Too true Turbo. All this net zero is pathetic. Apparently Khan is destroying London with all the crap. Cab drivers have had enough and TFL is broke. We’ll done that man…..idiot.
March 3, 2022
Well, JR, it turns out that it’s not just Russia that has blood on its hands, so does NATO.
20 minutes in here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0014x1p
“Ukraineâs Deputy PM: NATO âinhumaneâ to refuse no-fly zone”
I would say otherwise, that the EU and NATO should have made it clear long ago that there was no prospect of Ukraine being admitted to either organisation over Russian objections, and would once again refer to this article from exactly eight years ago:
https://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2014/03/03/the-eu-does-not-prevent-war-in-europe-lets-make-sure-it-does-not-lead-to-an-eu-army/
“The EU does not prevent war in Europe â letâs make sure it does not lead to an EU army”
March 3, 2022
For which Sir John stands all the evidence of the past couple of millennia staring us in the face on its head.
March 3, 2022
Russia is well aware that the regime that came to power in Ukraine in 2014 as a result of a coup orchestrated by the US State Dept involving the hiring of Georgian mercenaries to engage in indiscriminate shooting in Kyiv, such that both police and protesters believed they were under attack by the other side, was deeply Russophobic and exemplified by the Right Sektor militia whose objective was to drive every Russian speaker out of Ukraine by main force.
Gorbachov spoke of a Common European Home; he saw Russia as a European country
which had been temporarily removed from the European family of nations by the coup in 1917. Putin believed similarly that as most of the Russian people lived in European Russia, Russia could and should be accepted as a western country, a partner, not a foreign adversary. However, the US State Dept does not want partnership or equality with anyone; it seeks total dominance with its universal military bases and loathsome culture to which we in Europe have become habituated.
It was inevitable therefore that attempts by the US State Dept to undermine Russian national security by firstly occupying Sevastopol to control the Black Sea and then when that failed as a result of Russia occupying Crimea, initiating a civil war which has cost the lives of 14,000 and created many more refugees, would lead to an open conflict with Russia. It is noteworthy that one of the first targets of Russian military operations was the destruction of the US naval base in Ochakiv at the mouth of the Dnipro. Russia does not want ‘Pax Americana’. It does not want to live in a unipolar world and neither should we.
March 3, 2022
Some of your claims are quite reasonable and probably correct, but since the popular revolution of 2014 – there is no evidence of a coup as such – there have been several democratic elections and Zelenskiy was returned with 73%.
Whatever, they certainly do not justify the appalling actions by Putin over the last few days.
March 3, 2022
The EU needed to interpose on behalf of Viktor Medvedchuk, leader of the largest Ukrainian opposition party who Zelensky had locked up for alleged ‘treason’. Victoria Nuland publicly boasted that the US State Department had spent $50m on its colour revolution in Ukraine; how much evidence do you need?
March 4, 2022
How much non-UK money was spent on brexit, do you think?
The point is, that whatever happened in 2014 in Ukraine, the elections since have been free and fair by internationally-observed standards.
March 3, 2022
Agreed, Turboterrier. But those new parties need to co-ordinate their actions, not compete.
March 3, 2022
Let’s face it, the Russians led by Putin want to go further than Ukraine. It’s naive to imagine and hope that his difficulties will put him off taking over Ukraine and then moving on later.
We must build up our stocks of munitions urgently as a starter. Bring back mothballed ships and aircraft into use. Build new shore defence boats urgently.
Question is though who makes our bullets and shells for example? Did our Tory party subcontract the job out to another country?
Could you answer this one Sir John please.
March 3, 2022
I think you’ll find Mr Putin is far more interested in developing the enormous potential of his existing vast territory and resources.
And that is seen as an existential problem for certain vested interests in the west.
March 3, 2022
Wikipedia âList on modern armament manufacturersâ will provide you with the 16 UK companies involved in military âproductsâ, plus a couple of hundred other companies on the international market.
If one wants more details, one can have a look at the site xxxsystems.com of a well known British company xxx and choose from âSmall Arms Ammunitionâ, âArtillery Ammunitionâ, âMortar Bombsâ and six even more enticing products.
March 3, 2022
Macron has a ‘resilience plan’ to protect the French economy against blowback from the anti-Russian sanctions.
What has Johnson announced he’s doing to protect the British economy, do we know?
March 3, 2022
I don’t believe anyone in the Cabinet has a plan….they all look to see which way the wind is blowing
March 3, 2022
We should seize the properties of Russian oligarchs and use them to house Ukrainian refugees. In due course we should then sell these properties and donate the proceeds to rebuild Ukraine.
This dark money – effectively stolen from the Russian people – is used to buy power and political influence in the US and UK. You think these rich Russians donated large sums to the Tories, Trump and Brexit out of the goodness of their hearts? No. They wanted something in return.
I wonder what it was they wanted in return for this Russian blood money?
March 3, 2022
Six months ago Ukrainian Nationalists were being described by the Guardian as Neo-Nazis. Now, these people have suddenly morphed into freedom fighters and patriots. Welcome to the poisonous, extremist world of the Neo-Marxist progressive , constantly shape-shifting through life without concern for life, truth and decency.
China’s sabre rattling in Taiwan has become hysterical. At times like these we need a strong-man. We don’t have a strongman. We have Biden, Harris and Trudeau. God help us
As an aside. Can someone please inform Dorries that shedding tears for Ukrainian journalists in detailing the truth on the ground conflicts with Labour’s, her and her government’s attack on freedom of expression using Marxist victim culture politics. Hypocrisy’s out of control and they don’t care
March 3, 2022
The right wing extremists, Svoboda, got 1.8% in the last Ukrainian elections.
Zelenskiy got 73%
But yes, the fascists are still there, as they are here and in the US too, and rather more so in the latter case.
March 3, 2022
Dear John Redwood
I think it is tragic that the West is now so impotent that they only have financial sanctions to bring a despot to heel: Russia also has a large Army with over 10,000 nuclear weapons, Vladimir Putin is also a big bully who knows the West are terrified of even a single nuke – that’s how bullies operate! And standing behind Russia is the Chinese Communist Party with a two-million strong Army and more nukes. The Chinese Government knows the West is afraid of their nukes, and what’s more the Russian Government knows that the West is (colectively) terrified of the Chinese nukes too!
And so, the British Government only sends weapons, fuel and other supplies to the Ukrainian Army- and hopes that will be enough (it won’t!). And, in getting supplies to the Ukraine Army they hope that they don’t come across any invading Russians because “We cannot provoke their ire by resisting them, in making sure the supplies get through”! Vladimir Putin knows that too. He knows that, if push comes to shove and Ukraine is showered with thermoblastic bombs killing 100,000 inhabitants, that the West is too terrified of Russia (and China also getting involved)! We just pray this all goes away whilst tut-tutting the Russian Government.
Our Prime Minister, Boris Johnson is no Winston Churchill: If he was in charge in 1939-40 he would perhaps have said “We must Sanction Adolf Hitler and the German Government More! The German Government must know how much we disapprove of their actions! Let us now Condemn Unequivocally the German Invasion of Poland! But we cannot fight Germany, Adolf Hitler has a Big Army and They Could Hurt Us!”.
What’s the matter with us in Britain? What’s the purpose of NATO, of the UN Security Council if not to act to prevent a large country invading a weaker neighbour- by military means if need be, particularly if the attacked country is in Europe? Britain has a nuclear deterrent, as does the USA, as does India. We also have technology enabling us to intercept nukes directed from Russia. How is it courageous and right to allow fear to stop us standing up for a European country under seige?
With that proviso, we need to get the British Armed Forces to Ukraine (alone if need be, sure in the knowledge that all NATO would be involved if Britain is sttacked), impose that no-fly zone and then help Ukraine to drive the Russian Army out of their country. Yes, Britain or another NATO country might get nuked (standing up to bullies is scary, but it is the right thing to do).
As a Conservative MP you should get our lily-livered Government to get some Courage. It’s time Global Britain came out of the shadows and roared at Russia!
Ian Pennell
March 3, 2022
What 1.8% ?
You are obsessed NHL
Do you also worry about the Monster Raving Looney Party in UK elections?
It’s your version of the old reds under the beds.
Keep twitching those curtains.
March 4, 2022
Read the OP, you very silly person.
March 4, 2022
Just cut out your abusive rudeness and I might just obey you NHL
March 3, 2022
Seems that our pathetic leadership have never played or followed baseball.
Two strikes and your out.
Their rules:
Two strikes and you get a knighthood.
Who says failure and incompetence doesn’t pay.
.
March 4, 2022
Turbo, are you perhaps forgetting what Williamson really got the knighthood for? A few years ago, as Foreign Secretary, he told the Russians to ‘shut up and go away’. What a superb international statesman we had there!
Sadly, he forgot to think about what they might do after they’d gone away.
March 4, 2022
Williamson: This is a sickening abuse of Crown powers. If the Queen was consulted, it was disgraceful to put her in this position at her age especially, either to condone such an outrage or to create a constitutional crisis by saying no. This is utterly shameful, and those responsible should be flushed out, sacked, and stripped of any honours they themselves might have received. If she wasn’t consulted, they have brought our monarchy into disrepute, and belong behind bars.