Politics

I think Putin will have been surprised. I mean: I was surprised. Weren’t you? Not, necessarily, that Ukraine should have been resisting as valiantly as it is; nor even that Russia’s supposedly unstoppable war machine should have found itself out of petrol on a chilly highway from which the road signs have been removed. But surprised by the sheer force and volume and unanimity of the international cry of: no, this will not stand. That is one thing, even amid the unspeakable human cost of the war in Ukraine, to feel encouraged by. If this invasion does, as many have said, mark the beginning of a new order in European security and great power politics, isn’t it a sign that it could be a stronger, better, less complacent one?

As Vladimir Putin ordered Russian troops onto Ukrainian soil, the initial Western response was swift, if not underwhelming. Trade in Russian debt was curbed and a handful of oligarchs have had their assets frozen. Snarky tweets from an American embassy safely withdrawn to Poland, were also sent. While Russia rolled its tanks across the border, European cities lit up buildings in Ukrainian colours. Perhaps predictably, the threat of these measures and the diplomatic disapproval accompanying them did not dissuade Putin from further action. Hard power, and the ability and will to deploy it, count. Putin has all three; the West does not.

For weeks, discussion about partygate dominated Britain’s newspapers. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has put paid to that. But Boris Johnson is mistaken if he thinks he has been saved. Instead Keir Starmer is likely to be the biggest beneficiary of the Ukrainian crisis. This might come as a surprise to some. After all, history suggests that a Conservative government should be able to benefit from this conflict by relying on its traditional reputation for being strong on defence and foreign policy in general. Yet the Ukrainian war is different, at least for now, to skirmishes that have arisen in the past.