We are into the third decade of the 21st Century, and Russia has just invaded Ukraine. Under the pretence of the “denazification of Ukraine”.
I woke up on Thursday morning and watched in horror as Russian missiles landed in mainland Ukraine, including near Kiev.
Last month in a column, I said regarding a full-scale invasion: “I think it’s more likely that Russia will recognise eastern Ukraine’s rebel-held areas… a highly provocative move. Worryingly it has recently handed out countless thousands of Russian passports to folk who live there. This could be used as a pretext to troops moving in there, under the guise of ‘defending Russian citizens’, if Moscow doesn’t get what it wants. A dangerous, yet very clever move from the Kremlin.”
And this is what has happened.
Moscow didn’t get what it wanted, which was for Ukraine to be ruled out of ever joining NATO. That, of course, was never going to happen.
Russia would also dearly love for NATO to return to its pre-1997 borders. Basically, that means removing the member countries that were once in the old Warsaw Pact out of the organisation.
Rightly or wrongly, that’s not going to happen either. Go and ask, say, Poland or Estonia, if it would like to leave NATO?
However, let’s see it from a Russian point of view.
Whether we like it or not, Russia still sees – and probably always will regard – many of the states that surround it as “under its sphere of influence”.
And of course, we did what we said we wouldn’t do, which was to allow former members of the Soviet-run Warsaw Pact to join NATO in the first place. We broke our promise. This, I know from going to Russia for 27 years, is a serious bone of contention.
None of this, however, can justify showering missiles down on a European country in the year 2022.
As I watched Putin’s war speech early on Thursday, I thought “He’s lost the plot”.
The aggression shown was unlike anything I have ever seen from him before. Gone the cool, unemotional, reserved KGB Putin. In, an angry, very angry man, banging on about Nazis and of course the Second World War.
In another clip, I watched Putin dress down his spy master. Putin looked agitated and annoyed. That would never have happened live on TV before.
He even threatened the entire world, to not get involved – or else.
Something has fundamentally changed with Putin. It is deeply worrying. He has appeared less frequently in public, preferring to be in a bubble. He is totally surrounded by yes men. There is no one to tell him to wise up. He is out of touch with the reality of the modern world.
I contacted open-minded Russian friends on Skype. Reaction? Total shock at what was going on. Many are also deeply worried for relatives living in and around Ukraine border areas.
I stayed away from contacting pro-Putin friends. I could not stomach hearing the same old garbage about Russia defeating Nazis. I’ve heard this nonsense since 2014.
I stood in Kiev’s Maidan during that revolution. I saw women and priests holding candles. I didn’t see Nazis running around, despite what many Russians were led to believe.
I spent the morning flicking back and forth watching numerous news channels. The worst is RT, Russia Today. Known as Putin’s propaganda channel, it is spouting some tripe indeed.
On the subject of RT, and even Nicola Sturgeon agrees with me here, is it not time that Alex Salmond stopped working for them? Is it not time he stopped with his weekly political show on that channel? Yes. It is.
While my thoughts are of course with the Ukrainians in mainland Ukraine and ethnic Russians in and around border areas, let’s not forget ordinary Russians at home, far away in cities such as Moscow and Saint Petersburg. For they will also suffer – in their pockets. Inflation is rampant and everyday costs are soaring.
For a decade I used to get around 52 Roubles to my £1. As of writing, I can get 119 Roubles to the pound. Russia’s currency is crashing and burning.
As I write, 30% has been wiped off the value of Russian banks, and bigger sanctions are coming. But it doesn’t seem to concern Putin, as he’s reportedly built up a reserve fund of hundreds of billions of dollars.
As to the general hardship for the average Russian? He doesn’t care.
Problem is, he can’t be voted out by his own people. The Russian voting system is totally corrupt and rigged. He is, unfortunately, going nowhere.
Could there be a coup against him, from within his own ranks? Who knows? Not remotely possible until recently, but now, with him seemingly making decisions on his own and publicly berating his yes men, who knows what will unfold.
I’ve been in eastern Ukraine; I crossed the border on foot near Belgorod. I spent time in Kharkov. It’s being bombed as I write.
What’s next? No one knows. How far will he go? I genuinely don’t know anymore.
The idea that he may strike a NATO country like Estonia, for example, terrifies me. It should us all.
Last month I would have laughed off such a suggestion. Not any more.
Cool heads are needed here. Real cool heads.
