Blast from past
VLADIMIR Putin’s remorseless invasion of Ukraine is a throwback to the last century that few thought likely a fortnight ago.
It also requires an urgent revision of our own military spending, which likewise needs restoring to 20th century levels, having been allowed to shrivel for too long.
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The prevailing wisdom was that land wars in Europe were a thing of the past and that the UK’s needs would be better served with a nimbler — for which read smaller and cheaper — military.
But while it’s true that our Armed Forces do need to evolve to thwart new types of threat, it is now depressingly clear that they cannot afford to blithely discount the old threats either.
Putin’s menace could last for many years yet.
None of which is happy reading for Rishi Sunak, already beset by cash demands on all sides.
Yet it is a challenge the Chancellor must rise to.
A government’s first duty is to protect its people.
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True bravery
THE countless stories of Ukrainian bravery these past 11 days have stirred us all.
One man who knows a thing or two about gutsiness is Craig Monaghan, a wounded veteran of the Afghan war.
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Craig, a winner at The Sun’s 2020 Military Awards, is now among a group who have crossed the “Gates of Hell” into Ukraine with a convoy to deliver medical aid and evacuate refugees.
How that bravery contrasts with the cowardly attacks by Russian forces who, after finding Ukraine’s fighters more than a match, target civilians trying to flee during a so-called ceasefire
Such horrors provide ample justification for the extension to all Ukrainians of the right to apply for sanctuary in the UK, and we applaud Home Secretary Priti Patel for seeking the change.
But such contemptible slaughter should tell French president Emmanuel Macron that his lengthy pleading calls to Putin aren’t worth the price of the phone bill
Putin has no better nature to appeal to. He is evil incarnate.
Frack ’n’ forth
WITH quotes for annual gas bills starting to surge above £4,000, the cost-of-living crisis has never seemed so real.
And yet within a fortnight, two shale gas wells in Lancashire are set to be sealed for good, filled with concrete.
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Asked yesterday whether the Government would look to fracking or a return to coal to expand energy supplies, Dominic Raab shot down the coal option.
On fracking, however, the Deputy Prime Minister was conspicuously silent.
Could that be a sign No10 might finally see sense and heed the dozens of Tory MPs urging a reversal of the ban?
It’s one thing to look a gift horse in the mouth.
But it’s pure folly to pour concrete down its throat.
