Ukraine: Why sanctions alone won’t stop Putin’s war as Nato faces prospect of military conflict with Russia – Andrew Vine

Poland shames Priti Patel over Ukrainian refugees claims Tory councillor – Yorkshire Post Letters

For some at least, there may be little left to go back to, whenever and however this ends. There will be those who lose loved ones to Vladimir Putin’s missiles and artillery and many who learn that their homes, workplaces or schools have been obliterated.

Once they are in our midst, this appalling war is going to seem much closer than it already feels. Graphic though the daily coverage in print and on screen is, the personal testimony of those who know the terror of being under fire will bring a whole new dimension to our shock and revulsion at what is happening only a three-hour flight from Britain.

And the refugees’ arrival here and in other European countries might well do something else – prompt a hardening of the public mood in favour of challenging Putin militarily as well as economically.

As the millions of Ukrainians who have already fled their homeland find refuge across the continent, they are going to carry with them the message that Putin must be stopped at all costs.

Their president, Volodymyr Zelensky, has already warned that Ukraine will not be the last target of Putin’s aggression, and that the Baltic states will be next. The stories his people have to tell in their new countries will echo that warning.

Their first-hand experience of the merciless Russian onslaught can only add weight to the growing sense that Putin represents a danger to every country within range of his weapons.

His willingness to escalate the conflict was demonstrated on Sunday, with the missile strike on Yavoriv, in western Ukraine, close to the border with Poland. Warnings from the Kremlin that western supplies of weapons to Ukraine’s forces are legitimate targets are edging ever closer to a direct challenge to Nato.

And if, as both Britain and the United States fear, Putin uses chemical or biological weapons against Ukraine’s civilian population to terrorise the country into capitulation, the West surely cannot stand by and fail to act.

The increasingly desperate diplomatic efforts made by French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholtz to persuade Putin to halt the invasion have come to nothing. Both deserve praise and international support for their attempts to continue a dialogue in the hope of a breakthrough, but the communiques from their offices carry a sense of despair that they are confronted with a dictator who is immune to reason.

President Macron’s staff have even hinted that Putin has descended into some form of madness, saying that he has changed over the past two years, which makes dealing with him even more dangerous and unpredictable.

There is no end in sight to the brutality being inflicted on Ukraine. If anything, it grows worse by the day, as its population and cities are pounded by Russian forces which have failed to achieve the quick victory over the country’s brave defenders they were obviously counting on.

Economic sanctions may eventually cripple Russia, but that will take time and there is no guarantee they will result in Putin being toppled.

Meanwhile, the Ukrainian refugees will tell their host countries that their country does not have the luxury of playing a long game and waiting for sanctions to bite, not with Kyiv surrounded and the International Red Cross saying that conditions in the besieged city of Mariupol are now approaching the inhuman.

The families to whom we give sanctuary are going to ask Britain and the rest of Europe questions to which there are no easy answers. How many war crimes have to be committed by Putin before Nato decides it must intervene directly? Europe’s leaders are going to have a hard time looking the refugees in the eye and responding that they are doing everything possible to end their country’s suffering.

It is inconceivable that Nato’s planners have not already drawn up a strategy of how to deploy forces against Putin, even given his threat to use nuclear weapons in retaliation.

Only a few weeks ago the prospect of a full-scale war in Europe would have been unthinkable, but with Putin taking his aggression to the borders of the EU, the West cannot avoid contemplating what might lie ahead.

The agonies Ukraine is enduring, the derangement of the man who has caused such suffering, and especially the heart-rending stories being told by the people who have escaped it mean that the West has to consider if sanctions are enough to face down this threat to the whole of Europe.

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