Russia

Putin, at least 12-foot-high, glowers from the wall of a gym where men are training to wrestle. He is at the centre of an unnerving triptych. On his left is the image of Akhmad Kadyrov, the former President of the Chechen Republic who was assassinated by Islamists in 2004. To his right is Akhmad’s son, Ramzan Kadyrov, now Chechnya’s president, and instigator of a personality cult that manifests itself in everything from Instagram posts of chasing ostriches to dancing with Gérard Depardieu. [caption id="attachment_8902652" align="aligncenter" width="520"] Republic of Chechnya, 2013. Wrestling training in the central gym.

In the latest Spectator, Liam Halligan takes a sobering look at European markets bearing the brunt of sanctions against Russia. 'The western economy that’s suffered most, by far, is the largest one in the eurozone. Germany’s manufacturing thoroughbreds have sunk tens of billions of euros into Russian production facilities in recent years. . . . 'This helps explain why, having grown 0.8 per cent during the first three months of 2014, German GDP shrank 0.2 per cent in the second quarter. The eurozone’s powerhouse is now on the brink of recession. Industrial production dropped 4 per cent in August, the biggest monthly fall since early 2009. Exports were down 5.8 per cent — again, the steepest drop since the Lehman collapse in 2008.

Walking around London this lunchtime with my family, my stomach tightened as it struck me that we may conceivably now be sliding towards a war with Russia. A war with consequences that could end up destroying everything we value. Not physical assets – they can be replaced – but those we love and hold dear. The poverty of the West’s response to Putin’s aggression in Ukraine is breathtaking. Sanctions are announced, then re-announced, in the hope that perhaps the crisis on our borders may just resolve itself, with Putin deciding he has tweaked our tail enough. Such an outcome, however desirable, is pie in the sky. Let’s be clear that Putin holds the West, its leaders and its values in contempt. We are weak; he is strong.

Ukrainian military have destroyed a 'significant' part of a Russian military column that crossed into the country on Thursday night, the country's president has claimed. A Ukrainian military spokesman told journalists that 'appropriate actions were taken and a part of it no longer exists'. In a statement on his website, President Poroshenko said he had discussed the 'entry of Russian military machines to the territory of Ukraine'. Commenting on reports of this, the President 'informed that the given information was trustworthy and confirmed because the majority of that machines had been eliminated by the Ukrainian artillery at night', the statement said. More to follow...

The old cliché that ‘nothing happens in August’ has again been brutally disproved. From the centenary of the outbreak of the first world war to the Russian invasion of Georgia six years ago, August is a month often packed with violence — but rarely more so than this year. In Syria, Christians are being crucified for refusing to convert to Islam. In northern Iraq, there are reports of mothers throwing their children from mountains rather than leaving them to the jihadis who are parading the severed heads of their victims. Russian convoys are rolling towards the Ukrainian border as Vladimir Putin tests the resolve of the West. Barack Obama has watched this unfold from his holiday spot in Martha’s Vineyard; David Cameron from the Portuguese coast.

I've just been in France, where the shadow of the First World War always seems to be darker and longer than that cast over Britain; it is partly that, aesthetically, their war memorials are far more haunting than ours, but also that in sheer numbers our allies lost more men than we did, up to 1.4 million French soldiers died in the conflict. It still seems to haunt the country, and anyone travelling through empty countryside into a small town with its thick list of casualties engraved under the legend 'mort pour la patrie' can see why Frenchmen would ask 'why die for Danzig?' 20 years later; and can't quite manage even a faint smile to the weak jokes about France's supposed military failures.