Vladimir putin

As dark clouds of burning oil billow like thunderheads on the skyline of Moscow and black rain falls across the capital, why does Vladimir Putin fail to see that something fundamental is changing in the dynamic of his war? Why, when Donald Trump effectively agreed to hand over every inch of the Ukrainian territory Russia has captured and offered the Kremlin an easy off-ramp studded with juicy business deals, did Putin refuse? And why, for that matter, did the Russian President choose to launch his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in the first place? One answer is that Tsar Vladimir is mad, so blinded by his imperialist ambitions that he deliberately chooses to ignore the reality of a crashing economy, half a million dead fellow countrymen and a war that is obviously unwinnable.

Volodymyr Zelensky stood proudly on the steps of 10 Downing Street this week, flanked by Sir Keir Starmer and the leaders of France and Germany, ready to discuss Europe’s latest package of support for Ukraine’s ongoing war effort. Though the conflict has, as of this week, lasted longer that the first world war, Zelensky is in some ways in the most heroic period of his presidency. Ukraine not only continues to stand firm against intense Russian assaults but also seems to be regaining a strategic advantage with its long-range drone strikes. Europe has stepped up to replace US funding and diplomacy and the fall of Hungary’s Viktor Orban has unlocked a €90 billion loan package. Yet it is also the most sordid period of Zelensky’s presidency.

On 19 November 1941, King George and Queen Elizabeth paid a visit to Woburn Abbey, home of Britain’s covert propaganda war against the Nazis. Surrounded by a park full of rare monkeys, and among corridors bearing Old Masters, the King and Queen were presented with ‘Britain’s Secret Army’, a fleet of radio stations that broadcast subversive content deep into enemy territory. Sefton Delmer, who before the war had been a foreign correspondent for the Daily Express, presented his new German station. While the officious BBC German Service was lecturing Germans about the virtues of democracy and the evils of fascism, Delmer was trying something different.

A year ago, Russia marked the 9 May Victory Day celebration with a spectacular display of fireworks that lit up the Moscow sky. This year the fireworks have again been spectacular – but this time they have been caused by long-range Ukrainian attack drones slamming into refineries, pumping stations and factories deep inside Russia. In the Black Sea port of Tuapse, fireballs of burning gasoline 15 storeys high erupted over the local oil refinery, while rivers of burning fuel ran down the city’s streets. Firefighters took three days to extinguish the inferno, which created a plume of smoke so high it was filmed by skiers from the slopes of the Caucasus mountains more than 60 miles away.

The Russians are on the warpath – and Europe is Vladimir Putin’s next target. That was Sir Keir Starmer’s alarming claim at the Munich Security Conference earlier this month. Britons ‘must be ready to fight, to do whatever it takes to protect our people, our values, and our way of life’, Starmer warned. Britain and Germany’s top military commanders delivered the same message in a recent article. Russia’s military posture ‘has shifted decisively westward’, wrote Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton and General Carsten Breuer. Soon the Kremlin ‘may be emboldened to extend its aggression beyond Ukraine’. Really? According to much western coverage in mainstream and social media, the Russian army is crumbling, corrupt and inept.