Our so called leaders speak

We know how the Russian war on Ukraine ends. And increasingly we know that Ukraine will not win it. Our so-called leaders speak fine words that lead us to believe the Russian bear will soon give up the fight and return to its own lands. Boris Johnson walks through the streets of Kyiv with President Zelenskyy and the camera shutters click with a glimpse of a brighter day. But that brighter day isn’t going to come.

The sanctions we have placed on Russia are affecting western economies more than theirs. While we boycott its oil and gas, others, mainly China, are lapping it up. Russia’s economy is taking a big hit but it has reserves. Our economy, with rocketing inflation and massive increases in energy costs, is tanking. Worldwide, the possibility for a worldwide financial crisis grows ever larger. And here’s a truth no one in the west wants to hear: the destruction of Ukraine’s armed forces is becoming catastrophic.

Some 100 Ukrainian soldiers are dying every day, with around 500 getting injured. Multiply those figures by 365 and they are unsustainable. As Putin’s murderous invasion continues, whole cities and towns are being turned into rubble. And Putin himself will never surrender, regardless of casualties and the financial hit. The west will never openly declare war on Russia and so we face the inevitable conclusion: compromise.

How on earth does on compromise with a mass murderer? A regime that has captured 200,000 Ukrainian children and moved them to Russian soil and murders countless hundreds and thousands of people. I’ll bet the likes of Johnson, Presidents Biden and Macron and the rest of the western leaders have thought about how to stop this.

Because this is a war without end, so economic hardship lasts deep into the future. The old saying about what matters most to people is this: it’s the economy, stupid. Politicians making their calculations will bear all this in mind.

And when it all ends, with parts of Ukraine effectively handed over to Russia, the big question is how people react. Not just the good people of Ukraine who may see any agreement with Putin as a sell-out but also people like us who may ask the question: why did we need to suffer when politicians would one day compromise? We weren’t told this might happen. We supported Ukraine and look what you have done. All that sacrifice for nothing.

When we compromise with Russia, effectively admitting defeat, what will happen with future missions, by Putin or any other fascist leader? It won’t be so easy to persuade people to take another financial hit when the last time something happened we just gave up. Putin will be laughing all the way back to the Kremlin.

The only alternative to ‘compromise’ is to declare war on Russia, to engage militarily directly with Putin. That will never happen and what’s more Putin knows it. And what will happen to the people of Ukraine?

They would surely never trust their current hero Zelenskyy again. He led them to the top of the hill then he led them down again and in so doing lost the war.

Putin, I fear, will be the only winner here. He will declare via state media that he has seen off the aggressor and returned parts of Ukraine to Russia, the rightful owner. And by negotiating with him, the west will legitimise his actions. It’s a grim prospect but it needs to be a topic for debate. Compromise means defeat for Ukraine and the west. But few politicians dare speak the words.