The world has changed

As I write, I have no idea how the Russian-Ukrainian war will end, except that there will have been an unnecessary loss of life, many wounded and lots of distressed families. We have been given a crash course in Russian history by the media and the perceived threat of Ukraine's 2019 constitutional amendments, which stated a strategic direction towards EU and NATO membership. The current Russian invasion is an escalation of the 2014 occupation of the Crimean Peninsula and its later annexation and the ongoing contest for the Donbas Region of eastern Ukraine. There is a saying that ‘24 hours is a long time in politics’, and it seems that this is also the case in geopolitics, with many of the assumptions about the stability of Europe after the tragedy of World War II thrown into doubt overnight. Unlike in previous conflicts, continuous media coverage allows the UK's population to witness the horrors of warfare and its consequences for the citizens of Ukraine.