AS I write, the Ukranian President is warning of a “full-scale war” with Russia.
Petro Poroshenko says that troops and tanks are massing on his border and has placed his country under martial law in anticipation of an attack.
This worrying escalation follows the seizure by Russia of three Ukranian naval vessels in the Kerch Strait.
The Kremlin is ignoring international condemnation, as it did when annexing Crimea, downing flight MH17, and supporting Syria’s genocidal President Bashar.
Meanwhile, in the UK, protests against Russia’s increasingly frequent military incursions into our airspace and waters fall on deaf ears, while online, her well documented cyber-attacks on our infrastructure persist.
The new Chief of the General Staff, General Mark Carleton-Smith, told reporters this week that Russia is now more of a threat to our security than ISIL.
As former head of our special forces, which battled ISIL over the past few years, he is well qualified to raise the alarm.
In response to his comments, Russia has unleashed a ferocious assault on the General’s reputation on social media, just as they ridiculed the revelation that two Russian intelligence officers had poisoned the Skripals.
It’s standard Russian practice to lie.
But they cannot deny the menacing evidence of film footage shown this week of one of our Type 45 destroyers being swarmed on by 17 Russian fighters.
Cat and mouse this may be, but such confrontations can have unpredictable consequences.
General Carleton-Smith says we cannot leave the Russian threat “uncontested”.
But what to do?
Ukraine is not a member of NATO, but we do need to show resolve.
Sanctions and threats of cancelling presidential meetings are one thing, but I would suggest that beefing-up NATO’s military presence in the area is another.