The war in Ukraine is never going to be resolved

There are only three things I can say for certain about Putin's war in Ukraine. Russia is never going to win to Putin's satisfaction, Ukraine is never going to win to Zelensky's and his western backers'satisfaction and Europe will continue to suffer the wider consequences. It could be a forever war, the thing that both Donald Trump and Joe Biden vowed never again to get involved in. I think it is inconceivable that Putin will suddenly decide to call the whole thing off. His future depends on achieving something out of his invasion of Russia's neighbour. So far he has lost more than 60,000 or 70,000 troops, countless tanks, armoured vehicles, helicopters, aircraft and several ships, and used up a huge percentage of Russia's ballistic and cruise missiles. Any other country might have decided, enough is enough, and go hard for a deal. But Putin doesn't want a deal because he didn't invade Ukraine in order to reach some sort of compromise. And Ukraine doesn't want a deal because it would inevitably mean giving up some sovereign territory and after more than seven months of courageous fighting and appalling sacrifices, Zelensky won't want to give an inch to the Kremlin autocrat. So the conclusion is, the war will go on for ever and ever, and when Ukraine achieves some success, like the drone and unmanned ship attacks on Sevastopol naval base (it's pretty clear it was after all the Ukrainians who did this and not Russian saboteurs) then Putin takes revenge by hammering Ukraine's cities with missile attacks - and suspending all grain shipments. Who suffered the most: Russia with a few burning buildings and a damaged ship or two, or Ukraine with the destruction of more homes and power stations and the loss of electricity and gas across the country, and the axing of the one and only deal Zelensky and Putin have agreed to which was of huge benefit not just to Ukraine but to the starving millions in Africa. One has to ask whether the drone attacks on the naval base at Sevastopol in Crimea were really worth it?

The misinformation war from Moscow

Propaganda, black or otherwise, misinformation, disinformation and downright lies have all played a role in every war since wars began. Moscow has been particularly adept at playing with the truth. In the war in Ukraine, the Kremlin propaganda machine has been heavily engaged in numerous claims and allegations and accusations. The allegation that Ukraine with western backing is building a dirty (radioactive) bomb, today's claim that the Black Sea Fleet HQ in Crimea has been bombed by Ukrainian drones (could be true but we don't yet know) and all the stuff about how the West is to blame for the war in Ukraine feed into Moscow's playbook that Vladimir Putin and not the poor people of Ukraine, is the victim of the war. After more than seven months it has got to the point where the Kremlin's allegations are getting more and more ludicrous. No one in the West believes a word but of course the Russian people, especially those who live out of Moscow, listen to their leader and trust him. If only they would see through the Putin lies and start protesting on a national scale, perhaps the Putin regime could come to a premature end. But that reamins a wholly unlikely scenario. So we have to put up with the nonsense which seems to get more outrageous as each day goes by. Meanwhile Putin has stopped Ukraine's grain exports because of the attacks on the Black Sea Fleet HQ which makes me wonder whether it was actually the Russians who carried out the sabotage in order to justify stopping the grain sales which are so vital to the Ukrainian economy and feeding millions of people in Africa. I know it seems far-fetched but there is a long history of Russia's security and intelligence services carrying out bombing attacks and killings and blaming whoever it wants to blame at the time. *I have a spy thriller with a strong Russian theme called Shadow Lives coming out as a paperback on November 30. The ebook version is now available for pre-orders at £1.99 from https://amzn.to/3TVLN7e. Pre-orders help me hugely to obtain a good Amazon presence!!

Russia's Black Sea fleet back in business against Ukraine

The Russian Black Sea fleet is back in business in the war in Ukraine with 12 warships and submarines now lined up firing cruise missiles at power stations and other critical infrastructure targets. Ever since the sinking in April of the flagship cruiser Moskva which was caught patrolling offshore within range of Ukraine’s Neptune anti-ship missiles, the Black Sea fleet has been under-used by Moscow’s commanders in Ukraine because of fears of further spectacular strikes against Russian warships. However, under the newly appointed Russian supreme commander, General Sergei Surovikin, there appears to have been a decision to involve the Black Sea fleet on a much grander scale than in recent months. Surovikin, a 56-year-old air force general, demonstrated his enthusiasm for targeting civilian infrastructure during Russian strikes against rebel anti-regime forces in Syria in 2019. Now he appears to have brought every aspect of Russia’s military assets in Ukraine and offshore in the Black Sea to focus on the destruction of Ukraine’s power facilities. The Black Sea fleet which withdrew to safer waters or returned to home ports after the loss of the Moskva now has two Grigorovich-class frigates and four Buyan-M-class corvettes, all armed with long-range Kalibr cruise missiles, operating off Ukraine. One of the frigates is believed to be the Admiral Grigorovich, the first of the class which is fitted with a vertical launch system for firing Kalibr cruise missiles. There are also six Kilo-class diesel-electric submarines firing upgraded Kalibr cruise missiles which have a range of up to 1,500 miles. The re-emergence of the Black Sea fleet in the war in Ukraine is a sign of new efforts to try and terrorise the population as winter approaches. In the early stages of the war the fleet’s warships and submarines were used almost daily. On March 24 for example, Kalibr ship-launched cruise missiles destroyed a military fuel storage site near Kyiv. The following month a Kilo-class submarine was deployed for the first time, firing Kalibr missiles from the Black Sea at Ukrainian military targets. During its operation in Syria, the Russian navy fired nearly 100 Kalibr missiles at anti-regime targets. However, after the sinking of the Moskva whose coordinates had been confirmed to the Kyiv government by US intelligence reconnaissance aircraft, the whole of the Black Sea fleet took a back seat in the war. Ukraine followed up the attack on the flagship cruiser with a number of missile and drone strikes against smaller Russian navy ships. Several vessels were sunk. It had been assumed by western intelligence that the Crimea-based Black Sea fleet would play a vital role in providing back-up for an eventual amphibious assault on Odessa. But the expected assault never took place. The success of Ukraine’s own Neptune anti-ship weapons and Harpoon missiles donated by Denmark which sank a Russian supply ship, Spasatel Vasily Bekh, in June, were seen as humiliating blows for the Russian navy. The setbacks led to the sacking of the Black Sea fleet’s commander, Admiral Igor Osipov. He was replaced by Vice Admiral Viktor Sokolov.

Oops another bad decision by Sunak

Of course the economy is crucial and Rishi Sunak wants to devote his time to getting it right. But sometimes a leader of a country has to drop everything and be in the right place at the right time. The next climate-change summit for world leaders is on November 8 at Sharm el-Sheikh in Egypt. But Sunak says he won't go because he will be too busy working on the economy. Perhaps he has forgotten that he is no longer the chancellor but is the prime minister. The prime minister should be at the climate-change summit even if it falls at a bad time for him, schedule-wise. It's just too important. Joe Biden will be there, Emmanuel Macron will be there, all the world's leaders will be there. But the UK will be represented by someone who isn't even in Sunak's cabinet. What will Biden think when he has to deal with some underling? It should be a time for all leaders to get together and discuss how to save the planet but the UK will not be suitably represented. It's another case of poor judgment oh dear. Something makes me think he will have to change his mind. Perhaps his first u-turn. Unless a u-turn over his choice of Suella Braverman as Home Secretary is to be his first one.

Oh dear, two bad judgments by Rishi Sunak

Trying to remain positive in this country is hard. Rishi Sunak's arrival in Number 10 Downing Street has provided most people - clearly not the Labour opposition or the few Liberal Democrats still in post - with a degree of satisfaction and relief. Yesterday was his big moment and he sounded fine, saying all the right things to please the markets and the Bank of England and his former employer, JP Morgan. But then he announced his hastily drawn-up Cabinet and he revealed two misjudgments which will cause him grief for sometime, perhaps throughout his time as prime minister. First, he sent Suella Braverman back to be Home Secretary after she had resigned following the briefest of sojourns at the Home Office under the Liz Truss government for sending official documents to unofficial end-readers. An extraordinary decision. Can you imagine what the civil servants at the Home Office thought when back she came, all forgiven. Sunak could have given her any other job except the Home Office and the Justice Department if he was determined to include her in his Cabinet. He said he wanted her there because she was experienced in that department. But she had only been Home Secretary for less than six weeks and in that time she warned that a trade deal with India would increase immigration and that was a bad thing. That was a massive PR error which must have angered Truss. No wonder she sacked her as soon as she had an excuse - the emails. But Sunak has still sent her back to one of the highest-profile departments. Not only was it inexplicably poor judgment but he will live to regret it when she says something else off-message in due course. Then there's Penny Mordaunt. Ok, she tried to defeat Sunak for the premiership but he shouldn't have taken his revenge by refusing to give her a better job. He merely sent her packing to do the same job as before, Leader of the Commons. No wonder she looked so pissed off. Again, why did he do it when he could easily have given her something more fancy. Perhaps he doesn't rate her in which case why give her a job at all? Apart from these two misjudgments he brought back all the old Boris Johnson ministers, Dominic Raab as deputy prime minister, Michael Gove as Levelling-up Secretary, etc etc. Where were the fresh, new young, exciting ministers? Perhaps there just aren't any!

A little bit of quieter, calmer politics please Rishi Sunak

I don't suppose there's a hope in hell of everyone in Parliament just calming down and getting on with making decisions that will benefit everyone. Labour will be in a tizz because after weeks of crying for a general election they are not going to get it which means they have at least two years of whingeing and bellyaching ahead of them while the one man they hoped wouldn't make it to Number 10 - Rishi Sunak - is now firmly esconsed on Day One of his premiership and looks like surviving until the next election. But let's hope Labour and leader Keir Starmer don't just bash the Tories non-stop for no good reason and allow Sunak to get the economy of this country back to a favourable state. After Boris and then Liz Truss it's a wonder we're not all begging for food in the streets. So please we want sensible decisions, nothing wild, a period of quiet, meaningful politics and no dramas. I realise of course that whatever Sunak does he can't act independently of the rest of the world, and the consequences of the Putin war in Ukraine will continue to undermine almost everything the new prime minister decides. But with Boris's instinctive glamour politics and Truss's unreconstructed back-of-the-envelope econmics gone out of the window, Sunak has the chance to govern this country in a more adult fashion. Here's hoping.

Second time lucky Rishi Sunak

What a whirlwind success story for Rishi Sunak. He thought he would beat Liz Truss for the premiership but lost. Then Truss resigned and he started to fear that Boris Johnson, hurrying back from his Caribbean hols, would pip him to the post and return as prime minister. But Boris did one of those things which no one had anticipated. He realised after hours of talks with Rishi and others that while he might have a sporting chance of getting the necessary 100 Tory MPs to support his candidature, he would face nothing but problems if he returned to Number 10, including being accused of lying over the wretched Partygate (Christmas drinks during lockdown) scandal. So sensibly he decided to back out and leave the job to Rishi. So second time round the Asian Brit wins the top job at the age of just 42. It was surely the right decision. He has the treasury knowledge to get our economy back into shipshape condition. The global markets will be pleased. At last things are looking up. How Rishi is going to sort out the mess we don't yet know but Jerermy Hunt, chancellor (still), has laid the foundations and, of course, Truss has gone. She won't be given a Cabinet post I predict and can now spend more time with her husband who never had enough chance to find out where he was allowed to go in Number 10 before he and his wife were booted out. Such is the life of politicians and their spouses. King Charles III will be relieved. I am sure he was dreading having to welcome Boris back as prime minister and will be delighted that someone of Rishi's origins from his beloved Commonwealth is now in charge.