I’ve always considered myself to have been extremely fortunate to have never had to live through a World War. My parents lived through World War Two, my Grandparents through the World Wars One and Two. During my lifetime, there have been a few scares along the way, but generally the peace has been kept. However, I fear that the times they are a-changing and wonder if we are somehow sleepwalking towards another World War.
Fascist Russia is currently engaged in an illegal war against Ukraine (can there ever be a legal one?), stealing territory and killing Ukrainians seemingly every day. Much of Europe stands firm against Russian aggression, but the leader of the western world, Donald J Trump, is old, weak, seemingly in steep mental decline and unable to stay awake for long periods, other to lie constantly to a fearful world and showing a curious admiration for ex KGB thug and current Russian president Vladimir Putin. Just last night, Poland closed two of its airports and scrambled attack aircraft as Russia violated its airspace. And even us plucky Brits have seen various Russian incursions in our seas and airwaves. Should we be worried?
I’d be more worried if we had a Reform UK Ltd government led by Trump sympathiser and Russian asset Nigel Farage who has never concealed his admiration for Putin. Same with many other European countries with strong far right leaders who are making serious inroads into their domestic policies. Putin seeks to divide – why do you think he was so supportive of the damaging and divisive Brexit? – and with friends like his it’s easy to see how he achieves it.
The Russian war with Ukraine has a touch of ‘where will this end?’ about it. Putin offers platitudes about seeking peace, but in truth he seeks only victory. In 1938, British prime minister Neville Chamberlain came back to the UK having negotiated what he called ‘peace in our time’ with Adolf Hitler. That didn’t end well and neither did Chamberlain’s tenure as PM. A year later, we were at war with fascist Germany after Hitler’s forces invaded Poland. The same Poland that last night scrambled jets against fascist Russia, seeking to acquire land, perhaps, as Hitler did?
Hearing Farage’s warnings about “not poking the Russian bear” and Trump’s gullible admiration of Putin sound like appeasement to me. And appeasement is weakness, not what the British people are famous for. Yet more and more voices on our political right, like Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, who calls himself Tommy Robinson and newspaper columnists like the Telegraph’s Allison Pearson proclaim that Britons will not fight against fascist Russia. You would like to think that there were some things we could unite on, but the fascist right speaks with one voice.
Hitler, Putin – they’re the same people. And in Trump, you have the most right-wing president in the history of the USA. I’d like to to think we are all singing from the same song sheet and, like our forefathers, we will show the courage to fight for the freedoms we believe in, the freedoms fascists the world over detest and wish to remove.
Will Putin do a Hitler? Well, we have already seen his expansionist tendencies in action, through invasion and occupation as well as testing the waters elsewhere. In any event, Putin should be tried for war crimes. This is not a man we can do business with. The unity that dictators fear is critical and I’d like to think that we have learned the lessons of Brexit.
I don’t know whether one specific incident could set off war between Russia and the rest, but I do wonder if it is closer than we imagine. In order to see off the threat, we need to stay strong and stand up to fascism and don’t fret, as Farage does, about ‘poking the Russian bear’.
