Notes

The lessons military planners are learning from the Ukraine invasion and what it means if the UK went to war with Russia
Now, the threat of an encounter with Russia - regarded as a military peer - is very present and it is arguable the British and other allied forces are not yet equipped for that. Mr Murayev called the claims "stupid" in an interview with Reuters news agency. Russia considers the alliance as a threat, and is demanding legal guarantees that it will not expand further east, including into Ukraine. But the US has said the issue at stake is Russian aggression, not Nato expansion.


Russia's ambitions, he said, were not just about seizing territory but "about defeating our system and way of life politically, psychologically and symbolically". He highlighted numerous threats, but there is one common thread amid all these warnings - Russia. Some autocratic leaders are looking to see how robustly the West resists attempts to undermine the territorial integrity of a sovereign nation. Many analysts fear war in Ukraine could potentially spill over into other European countries. "We will not reopen that divide by agreeing to overturn the European security order because Russia has placed a gun to Ukraine's head." But both of these demands would break key Nato principles, namely that the alliance should be open to any European country that wants to join and that all Nato members should be sovereign nations.

UK citizen army: Preparing the 'pre-war generation' for conflict
The Covid lockdown, which saw fights breaking out in queues at supermarkets and garages, was a glimpse of how trouble can spark during times of nationwide panic. There would also be concerns about looting, especially if food shortages started to bite. “We have become so comfortable here in Britain that it’s hard to imagine young people fighting, and when I went to Afghanistan a decade ago, I didn’t think the youngsters of would be up to much,” he said.


The UK and our allies condemn the Russian government’s unprovoked and premeditated war against Ukraine. But without political support, the mindset of a country that does not feel like it is about to go to war is unlikely to change. One Whitehall source told the Times that the training of Ukrainian civilians on UK soil could act as a rehearsal for rapid Army expansion. The size of its active armed forces is only 19,000 personnel, but it can call on another 238,000 reserves.

How will Russia invading Ukraine affect gas prices?
The former Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain has long been criticised for describing Germany's attempted annexation of Czechoslovakia in 1938 as "a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know nothing". Around 900 British troops are stationed in Estonia under Operation Cabrit, the UK’s contribution to Nato’s Enhanced Forward Presence in the Baltic states, which some fear could also be targeted by Mr Putin. Although the UK has no troops stationed in Ukraine, it has contributed resources to Nato’s presence in the wider region. https://euronewstop.co.uk/why-is-russia-invading-ukraine-newsround.html have also risen since the invasion, given Russia’s role as an oil producer and as a form of security for investors as the stock market slumps. War in Ukraine is almost certain to exacerbate cost-of-living problems in the UK. Wholesale gas prices soared on Thursday following the invasion, and, while the UK does not import much gas directly from Russia, British consumers will still be affected by rising worldwide gas prices.

Peter Szijjarto has arrived in Ukraine for talks with senior officials today. In terms of military aid, the UK has trained 22,000 Ukrainian troops under Operation Orbital since 2015, supporting both Ukraine’s army and navy. Ukraine’s military has released a statement in which it accused the Russian army of using military transport aircraft to deliver missiles to the Belgorod region in order to perform cross-border attacks in recent weeks. Speaking as the Foreign Office pulled some embassy staff out of Ukraine, the PM said the situation was "pretty gloomy" but war was not inevitable. Ukraine wants the opposite – it aspires to be part of the EU and Nato (the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation) rather than under Russia’s control and so is firmly resisting Putin’s threats.
There are reports of attacks on Ukrainian military infrastructure across the country, and Russian convoys entering from all directions. Nato’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, has said Hungary clearly supports Sweden’s application to join the alliance. “The aircraft was flying away from Belgorod- it was supposedly carrying 65 Ukrainian prisoners of war with just three guards. Russia mounted an impressively fast disinformation campaign off the back of the incident. “The direction of the crash indicates that the plane left Belgorod and was moving away from it,” My Belgorod reported. Seconds before impact, several objects fell from the Ilyushin, he said, citing video evidence.


While the Channel has long been the country’s greatest defence, it makes it hard to import in times of war. As well as curbs on foreign consumer goods, there’d be runs on more basic products like medical kits, fuel canisters and masking tape to stop windows shattering during bombing raids. Last month, the European Union paid the final instalment of a multibillion-euro support package to Ukraine to help keep its economy afloat. The European Commission has proposed to provide Ukraine with €50bn ($55bn), with 26 of the 27 nation bloc’s leaders endorsing this plan at a summit before that last payout. Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán, is considered to be Putin’s closest ally in the EU.


Consequently, Air Vice Marshal Bell says planners need to take political and ethical landscape in which the Kremlin operates into consideration if it ever gets into a fight. Russia has seen more success in eastern Ukraine, by pounding their opposing forces and holding them back with an onslaught. Unfortunately for the Russians, it was clear they hadn't planned sufficiently well to undertake an effective invasion, and the forces operating their equipment were not well enough trained to adapt when things went wrong. The Ukraine war is providing a golden opportunity for British and NATO military planners to observe Russia fighting on the battlefield and to plan accordingly. Here, according to former Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) head Professor Michael Clarke and retired Air Vice Marshal Sean Bell, are a few of the lessons the MoD will be taking on board.

But the US has said the issue at stake is Russian aggression, not Nato expansion. In Rostov, governor Vasily Golubev said a drone was downed over a campsite in the Neklinovsky district, which borders eastern Ukraine. About 10 civilians are believed to have been killed, including six in an air strike in Brovary near the capital Kyiv. The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has called for an international investigation into the crash. One ex senior minister suggested to me that there was a generational divide between those who had lived with the threat of the Cold War era, and those who had not.
A large diversion of citizens to military duty would leave gaps in the workforce to be filled, be it guarding food warehouses or building trenches and bomb shelters. Retired members of essential professions – doctors, nurses, morticians, police – would be urged back into service. As in Ukraine, office techies could be in demand to operate drones on the front lines and to fend off cyberattacks. The conflict in Ukraine offers a glimpse of how Britain might prepare for self-defence. Checkpoints and pillboxes would be built at motorway junctions and city entrances. Public buildings and metro stations would be used as air raid shelters, while anti-aircraft guns might be hidden in parks.

But if Ukraine’s experience is anything to go by, the threat posed by a common enemy could have a unifying effect. The success of anti-tank systems the UK and the West has given Ukraine shows that planners' decisions to commission some weapons to counter a Soviet invasion of Europe was right. Wholesale gas prices soared on Thursday following the invasion, and, while the UK does not import much gas directly from Russia, British consumers will still be affected by rising worldwide gas prices. A little earlier, we told you about a report in the Financial Times that the EU was proposing to sabotage Hungary's economy if Budapest blocks further aid for Ukraine this week. The Russian offensive was preceded by artillery fire and there were injuries to border guards, the DPSU said. In extremis, a wartime government could inter anyone deemed a threat to public order or the war effort.
But far-fetched as they might sound, General Sir Patrick Sanders, the head of Britain’s army, believes it is time we dwelt on them more. As fighting intensifies, cross-Channel shipping is attacked by Russian submarines, and long-range conventional missiles strike Dover and Southampton. After an uneasy peace with Ukraine, Moscow has sent forces into the Baltics, clashing with British troops based there to protect Nato’s eastern flank. A Russian team shot and killed a brother and sister from the Khotin community of the Sumy oblast this morning, the regional military administration said.


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