Ukraine

Friday

Svitlana Morenets

Can Zelensky afford to freeze Ukraine’s gas prices?

This morning, Volodymyr Zelensky signed a moratorium on energy prices – so while gas bills are rising all over Europe, Ukraine will remain unaffected. This honours a pledge he made on his election. Freezing energy bills is a standard populist policy in Ukrainian politics (in a country where temperatures can reach -25ºC and the elderly can’t afford to buy medicine, it’s hard to win without making such promises). But there are now serious worries about whether it could bankrupt a government that needs all the money it can get to fight a war. Energy prices will be frozen until six months after martial law ends in Ukraine: the pledge is good for as long as the war lasts.

Thursday

Daniel DePetris

Ukraine is convinced that time is on its side. So is Russia

From our US edition

As the war in Ukraine approaches its six-month anniversary this coming Wednesday, the fighting shows no sign of stopping. Peace talks are a figment of the imagination, as Russian president Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky remain just as committed to achieving their objectives today as they were when the war first broke out. The Russians continue to pound residential areas with artillery in the Donbas, hoping to slowly capture more territory after months of slow, high-cost maneuvering in the Donetsk region. The Ukrainians, meanwhile, are settling on a new strategy in the south, harassing Russian supply lines deep into Russian-occupied territory.

ukraine
Owen Matthews

Nothing is certain in Russia, where the past is constantly rewritten

Enforced brevity focuses the mind wonderfully. And when the minds in question are two of the West’s most interesting historians of Russia, the result is a distillation of insight that’s vitally timely. Sir Rodric Braithwaite was Britain’s ambassador to Moscow from 1988-92 during the collapse of the USSR (where he was the boss of Christopher Steele, of Trump dossier fame), then chaired the UK’s Joint Intelligence Committee. He went on to write the brilliant Afgantsy, a history of the USSR’s disastrous Afghan war and its impact on the Soviet Union’s collapse, and Moscow 1941, a people’s history of the heroic Soviet fight against Nazism.

Tuesday

Peter Van Buren

The five stages of Mar-a-Lago grief

From our US edition

Another week, another silver bullet misses Donald Trump. Once more we suffered through the same endless roll of waves of crimes, accusations, near-indictments and just bad words to which we'd become accustomed during the Trump presidency. We went from "Trump has classified material under lock and key at Mar-a-Lago" to a group of people paying $1,800 to fly a banner reading "ha ha ha ha" over the resort to mock a Trump staying 3,000 miles away in New York. On cue, the regulars on MSNBC and CNN brought out their running-dog former CIA and FBI officers to tell us tick-tock, the walls are closing in, this time it will stick, Trump is going down, he'll be in jail before he runs again for office. If we can't stop him with the electoral system, we'll use the judicial system. This. Is. The.

Tuesday

Stephen L. Miller

Celebrities embark on a Ukraine safari

From our US edition

The saying goes that there is nothing that celebrities can’t make about themselves. As it turns out, that includes a war in Ukraine caused by an invasion of Russia that's already seen thousands of casualties. It's almost as though there are two wars happening at once: one on social media, where guerrilla clips from the front lines show bodies, shelling, and damage to homes, and one playing out in the pages of Vogue magazine. This week, it was revealed that Oscar-winning actress Jessica Chastain had visited with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky. The photo was posted to his official Telegram account and was taken from his presidential palace. There were also several shots of Chastain seated at a table with Zelensky having a discussion of some sort.

Monday

Svitlana Morenets

Ukrainians aren’t surprised by Amnesty’s victim-blaming

Is Amnesty International victim-blaming? The Ukrainian military has been endangering civilians, it said, by establishing military bases and putting weapons systems in residential areas. Agnès Callamard, the organisation's secretary-general, remarked that ‘being in a defensive position does not exempt the Ukrainian military from respecting international humanitarian law’. It was a bizarre statement. Russian forces are attacking villages and large cities with dense populations. The Ukrainian armed forces can’t sit in a field, or put their weapons on a boat and sail away from coastal cities. As well as the morality of shifting the blame on to the aggressor, Amnesty’s statement doesn’t recognise the realities of the war situation.

Friday

Peter Van Buren

The myth that Hiroshima was necessary

From our US edition

If you think the falsehoods spilling out of Ukraine about casualties and atrocities are shocking, meet the greatest lie of modern history. August 6 marks the seventy-seventh anniversary of the nuclear destruction of Hiroshima and death of some 140,000 non-combatants. Yet the only nation in history to employ a weapon of mass destruction on an epic scale, against an undefended civilian population, shrugs off the significance of an act of immorality. Beyond the destruction lies the myth of the atomic bombings, the post-war creation of a mass memory of things that did not happen. This myth has become the underpinning of American policy ever since, and carries forward the horrors of Hiroshima as generations pass.

Thursday

Katy Balls

What foreign policy would look like under a PM Truss

When Tom Tugendhat announced he was backing Liz Truss for prime minister, his former supporters were dismayed. He was the candidate for the ‘One Nation’ caucus of moderate MPs, who defined themselves against the Tory right. ‘Anyone but Truss’ was their mantra – and they lined up behind Rishi Sunak. Yet here was their former poster boy supporting their nemesis. What could Truss and Tugendhat possibly have in common? The answer can be summed up in a word: China. For better or worse, Truss is an instinctive politician. On foreign affairs, she was held back by Boris Johnson, who was more cautious on China. If she becomes prime minister, which looks likely, she would spend more on defence and take a more muscular stance against aggressors.

Owen Matthews

Sanctions are working – whatever Putin says

Don’t believe Vladimir Putin’s hype. The Russian economy is not OK. With western sanctions jeopardising up to 40 per cent of the country’s GDP, Putin’s assurances of an economic pivot to the East are a sham. And his weaponising of gas supplies to Europe is the financial equivalent of strapping on a suicide vest. That, roughly, is the message of a major new study published last week by the Yale School of Management about the impact of sanctions on Russia. Yale, working with a team of international economists, has looked past a wall of Russian obfuscation and used real-world data from retailers, energy traders and investors to reveal a picture very different from the rosy image presented by Putin at the St Petersburg Economic Forum in June.

The Spectator

Portrait of the week: Hosepipe bans, England’s women win the Euros and a strike over dragons

Home BP reported quarterly profits of £6.9 billion, its biggest for 14 years, after oil and gas prices rose steeply. Typical domestic energy bills were forecast by the consultancy Cornwall Insight to go above £3,600 a year in the coming winter. Under the family scheme for visas, 31,300 Ukrainians had arrived in the United Kingdom, and 72,700 under the sponsorship scheme. British Airways suspended new ticket sales for short-haul flights from Heathrow until at least 15 August, to meet the airport’s limit on the number of passengers departing each day of 100,000. On 1 August, 696 migrants crossed the Channel in small boats; in July the total was 3,683, and more than 17,000 so far in 2022.

Tuesday

Jacob Heilbrunn

Pelosi is right to put China on notice

From our US edition

House speaker Nancy Pelosi has always had a flair for the dramatic. During the Trump presidency, for example, she ostentatiously tore up his State of the Union speech. But for sheer spectacle, it will be hard for Pelosi to top her “will she, won’t she” visit to Taiwan this week. In spite of the suspense, there was never really any doubt about it. For weeks China has issued dire warnings about the perils of her visit. So, as it happens, have several commentators, including The Spectator’s Freddy Gray, whom I debated on the Americano podcast, and who seems to have a bad case of the collywobbles about the Pelosi trip.

Monday

Timothy Jacobson

Ukraine in black and white

From our US edition

Displays of wanton brutality and heroic resistance in the Russo-Ukrainian War of 2022 have prompted some in the West to proclaim a moment of “moral clarity.” Some caution might be wise here, since moral clarity in world affairs is not always as clear or as moral as its claimants think. It was Soviet ideology, succeeding czarist imperialism, that for so long smothered Ukraine, along with the other captive nations consigned to Stalin at Yalta. As Ukraine may now be slipping captivity at last, the West rejoices. But how clear is the clarity? History’s players sometimes switch roles even from one act to the next. It has not, for example, always been brutal Russians that heroic Ukrainians went up against. Eighty-one years ago, it was brutal Germans.

North Star

Saturday

John Allen Gay

Iran and Russia: the new Axis of Evil?

From our US edition

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to Tehran last week brought attention to a growing partnership between Russia and Iran. The Russian shook hands with Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, a rare gesture since both men are notorious coronaphobes. The old cleric expressed support for the Russian invasion of Ukraine, while the old KGB man offered Iran supplies of grain. US intelligence even claims Iran will open its drone arsenals to Russia. This strange friendship has its limits, but its growth could spell trouble. History does not suggest this is a natural partnership. The list of grievances between Iran and Russia is long. Great powers are often rough with middle-power neighbors.

Friday

Grace Curley

The Zelenskys’ Vogue publicity misfire

From our US edition

The legendary nineteenth-century showman P.T. Barnum is credited with first uttering the words, “all publicity is good publicity.” Barnum had the good sense to die a century before he had the chance to see the Zelenskys’ Vogue photo shoot. https://twitter.com/MayraFlores2022/status/1552267933501489152 Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky and his wife posed for renowned photographer Annie Leibovitz. In one shot Olena stands near Ukrainian female soldiers at the Antanov airport. In another she holds hands with her husband in the presidential office compound in Kyiv as the pair stare pensively at the camera.

zelensky vogue

Monday

Daniel DePetris

The Ukraine war enters its sixth month

From our US edition

On February 24, Volodymyr Zelensky, the comedic actor-turned-president of Ukraine, addressed his countrymen at the same hour Russian missiles were landing in multiple Ukrainian cities simultaneously. Clad in olive garb and sporting a light stubble on his face, Zelensky promised his citizens victory for Ukraine and defeat for the Russians — and he implored the Russian people to protest the actions of their government in Moscow and St. Petersburg. As the war entered its sixth month this Sunday, Zelensky — this time dressed in a camouflage army uniform with a full beard — is just as defiant and sure of victory today as he was on that depressing February night. "Even the occupiers admit that we will win,” Zelensky boasted during his daily speech to the nation.

Friday

Svitlana Morenets

Ukraine and Russia sign grain deal – what next?

This afternoon Kyiv and Moscow signed a UN-backed agreement to free up at least 20 million tons of grain from blocked ports. Ukraine said it would not sign a deal with Russia directly, only with Turkey and the UN. As Wolfgang Münchau noted this morning, it marks the first successful mediation between the two sides since the start of the war. This deal will complicate Vladimir Putin’s efforts to strangle the Ukrainian economy. But the Russian leader needs to show countries that are neutral – or more inclined towards Russia (in Africa and Asia) – that he saved them from hunger and rising food prices. Otherwise, Algeria could increase gas supplies to Europe and Egypt could supply Ukraine with hundreds of units of Soviet weapons and military equipment.

Thursday

The Spectator

Portrait of the week: Record-breaking heat, a summer of strikes and a warning for snake-owners

Home In the contest for the leadership of the Conservative party, Jeremy Hunt and Nadhim Zahawi were the first of the eight contenders to be eliminated, followed by Suella Braverman, Tom Tugendhat and Kemi Badenoch. After two televised debates, Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss, the frontrunners, refused to take part in a third, which was cancelled. The debates were bitter and accompanied by negative briefings. Lord Frost said he had ‘grave reservations’ about Penny Mordaunt, and had ‘had to ask the PM to move her on’ when she was his junior during Brexit negotiations. After parliament rose for the summer two names were to be put before party members in a postal ballot.

Monday

Daniel DePetris

Why Putin still might shut off Europe’s gas

From our US edition

There was a time in the not-so-distant past when Europe and Russia had a mutually beneficial relationship with each other — at least in the energy field. Europe, a major oil consumer, received reliable supplies of crude and natural gas from Moscow, while the Russians received tens of billions of dollars in return. The European Union imported 155 billion cubic meters of natural gas from Russia last year, equivalent to about 45 percent of its total gas imports. There was an ingrained assumption in European capitals that, even if relations with the Russians were thorny, fossil fuels would continue to head west. War, however, can change things in a flash. European and Russian officials now talk past each other, and sometimes they leave the room when the other is speaking.

sanctions putin russia davos oligarch

Thursday

The Spectator

Portrait of the week: Mo Farah’s secret, hot weather warnings and hot competition for the Tory leadership

Home The Conservatives began the process of finding a new leader, which involves balloting MPs and then sending two names for party members to choose between. Eight candidates initially qualified for the process set out by the 1922 Committee, by gaining nominations from 20 MPs: Kemi Badenoch, Suella Braverman, Jeremy Hunt, Penny Mordaunt, Rishi Sunak, Liz Truss, Tom Tugendhat and Nadhim Zahawi. Grant Shapps, Rehman Chishti and Sajid Javid withdrew before the off. Ben Wallace, the Defence Secretary, a fancied contender, had decided not to stand, as had Steve Baker, who was not widely fancied. Michael Gove (whom Downing Street had denounced a week earlier as a ‘snake’ when the Prime Minister, attempting to hold on to power, sacked him) did not stand, and nor did Priti Patel.

Tuesday

Svitlana Morenets

How Justin Trudeau caved to Putin

When Russia invaded Ukraine, the West was certain that its sanctions were worth the pain. But there always was a question as to whether this resolve would last once the domestic difficulties actually started. This week, western countries moved closer to admitting it might be too much to bear. At the time of the invasion in February, a massive Russian turbine was being repaired in Montreal. It was one of many turbines used to send gas through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline from Russia to Germany. When the Russians moved into Ukraine, it was kept in Canada as punishment. Over the next few weeks and months Russia replied, cutting off gas supplies to the continent.