The Nord Stream blasts are Putin's warning shot to the West
While the Ukrainians are fighting a conventional war on their own territory, Russia and the West are engaged in an…
Even Putin knows he is losing
Vladimir Putin’s latest escalation over Ukraine not only demonstrates that even he doesn’t think he’s winning the war but what…
The Queen’s funeral and Russia’s post-modern propaganda state
Modern Russia is a propaganda state, but not in the same way as the Soviet Union. The Kremlin has squeezed…
How will Putin respond to his latest defeat?
Russia is retreating at speed along the Kharkiv front, leaving behind burnt-out tanks and, even more tellingly, undamaged ones, too.…
Why even Vladimir Putin has paid tribute to the Queen
It is a mark of the Queen’s standing that even Vladimir Putin, in the midst of an undeclared economic and…
Russia's Ben Stiller ban is a sign of Putin's desperation
What do Ben Stiller, Sean Penn, the chairman of the BBC, Piers Morgan, and, er, me, have in common? The…
What the defenestration of Ravil Maganov says about Russia
In my travels when I was still persona grata in Russia, I never got the sense that their windows were…
Gorbachev was no saint. But he was a kind of hero
Mikhail Gorbachev is dead at the age of 91, and in a way I feel orphaned. I became fascinated by…
The stalemate in Ukraine won't last forever
Addressing the vexed question of who is winning the war in Ukraine, six months on, is a task to challenge…
What the Dugin assassination tells us about Russia
Car bombs used to be a fixture of gangland feuds in 1990s Russia but have since fallen out of fashion. This…
Ukraine has found Russia’s Achilles’ heel in Crimea
Another day, another Russian arms depot up in smoke. The latest attack, this time on an ammunition storage site near…
Ukraine’s Crimean strike marks a new stage of the war
For most Russians, the brutal realities of Vladimir Putin’s ‘special military operation’ have not really struck home. Ukraine’s attack on…
Why Zelensky is purging the security services of Ukraine
Could a general of the SBU, the security service of Ukraine, really have helped Russia take the city of Kherson?…
Russia is militarising its economy
The ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine isn’t a war – there’s a law and a possible maximum sentence (though no…
Does Putin’s ‘toxic masculinity’ really matter?
Apparently, if Vladimir Putin had been a woman, everything would be just tickety-boo. Speaking to German TV, Boris Johnson has said…
What Russia's military shake-up reveals about Putin's war in Ukraine
When General Alexander Dvornikov was made overall commander of Russia’s forces in April, it looked as if the amateurishness and…
How Russia’s cartoon heroine turned on Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Putin’s regime has a track record in building up public heroes whom it hopes to use, only to find…
Putin is no Peter the Great
Putin has a penchant for history, but only insofar it flatters him and his views. Last year, he gifted the…
How the West is helping Putin's propagandists
One might not think that J. R. R. Tolkien has much to do with the bitter war in Ukraine, but…
Does Putin have blood cancer?
Suddenly, we are all diagnosticians. Clips of a puffy Putin slurring his words, his hands twitching or clutching a table…
The real reason for Putin’s intelligence shake-up
It has been reported this week that Vladimir Putin is shifting responsibility for covert operations in Ukraine to a different…
How Ukraine rained on Putin’s parade
The Russians know how to put on a parade, and Victory Day is the showiest of the shows. It may…
Why Putin’s ‘Satanic’ missile launch matters
In some ways, it’s a headline-writer’s dream: Putin puts his faith in Satan. In reality, it’s actually Putin’s new RS-28…
Putin is devouring his children
Like the Greek titan Cronos devouring his own children, Vladimir Putin seems determined to turn against those he was once…
The terrifying neo-Nazi mercenaries being deployed in Ukraine
Given how the Kremlin is so determined to portray Ukraine as a hotbed of Nazis, it is tragically ironic not…
