Disclaimer: This is not about Putin’s actions towards the Ukraine. I do not, can not, will not make light of one country’s military invasion of another country, whatever the alleged rationale. This is about Great Britain’s, specifically this country’s government’s, reaction to the current situation and its so-called response.
By now the facts have sunk in. Russia did invade Ukraine, Putin’s army is descending on the capital Kyiv. And how do our glorious leaders respond? By making speeches. Which is what politicians normally do, since they rarely know how to do or make anything else. And in this country it would be normal as well, if those speeches weren’t so full of bullshit and hypocrisy that the only normal reaction any sane person can exhibit these days is to vomit on the steps of Westminster.
Ben Wallace, current Defence secretary, displayed the usual Tory tact when he told army personnel:
The Scots Guards kicked the backside of Tsar Nicholas I in 1853 in Crimea – we can always do it again.
(c) Evening Standard
Never mind that Nicholas didn’t have nukes back then. And in typical Tory fashion, it’s not true, either – Charge of the Light Brigade, anyone? More importantly, he made these claims knowing full well it would never happen. The UK doesn’t have a mandate, neither do NATO nor the EU. How do you get your troops legitimately and legally involved in this conflict when Putin has not and will not officially declare war? There is still that thing called the Hague Convention. The answer is simple: You don’t, because you can’t. But then again, I forgot – this government is not above breaking international law as a matter of fact.
Liz Truss, currently Foreign Minister, declared that
We will target anybody who we believe has links to the Putin regime, who is helping support, prop up, the Putin government. […] Nothing is off the tables in terms of who we target.
(c) Huffington Post
Which rings particularly hollow looking at her Instagram post hash-tagged #cabinetandfriends #girlpower showing her standing next to Lubov Chernukhin, single biggest donor to the Tories with roughly £2m in the last ten years and wife of Putin’s former deputy finance minister. That get-together in the Insta picture set Chernukhin back a mere £135,000. So basically chickenfeed for her, yet another constituency for the Tories.
In order to “hobble Russia’s economy,” Boris Johnson announced official sanctions at the beginning of the week that included five Russians banks no-one has ever heard of and three named individuals who are no longer allowed to enter the UK. Wow. I’m sure Putin was shaking in his boots. As usual, Twitter had the best response:
After some wrangling in Parliament, the list got expanded and now consists of
- a complete asset freeze on all major Russian banks, including the second largest bank in Russia,
- prohibiting all major Russian companies to raise finance on UK markets, and prevent the Russian state from being able to raise money on the sovereign debt market (legislation still to be tabled),
- more individuals and businesses, including Rostec, Russia’s biggest defence company supplying £10bn arms each year, and both Putin’s son and ex-son in law,
- Aeroflot can no longer land in the UK,
- suspending all “dual use” export licences, i.e. the export of electrical components used in both military and civilian computers,
- prohibiting the export of hi-tech items, such as semi-conductors and aircraft parts, including Rolls-Royce components used in Russian military aircraft (legislation still to be tabled),
- limiting the amount of deposits Russian nationals can hold in UK banks,
- attempting to shut Russia out of the Swift payments system used to process international money transfers (that needs an EU-wide agreement, which is not forthcoming),
- extending all of this to Belarus, as a result of its decision to integrate with Russia.
They sound almost decisive, these sanctions, don’t they, but when you look at them you realise they are worthless. Utterly worthless. Whoever had money stashed away in UK banks had almost a week between first and second announcement to squirrel it out of the country. With no register of assets and foreign interests, you couldn’t even tell who owns what in terms of money and properties. Which means, no-one can touch the actual real people behind the shell company. What Putin cannot get in hi-tech and dual-use items from the rest of the world, he’ll get from China. Aeroflot not landing in the UK? Boohoo.
The Russian economy is on its knees as I write this. For sure.
And with bombastic sounding announcements, which no thinking person having two braincells left can take seriously, Johnson managed yet again to make this country the laughing stock of the democratic world. British sanctions against Russia? That’ll show them. Because global Britain has such clout, it calls all the shots. Yeah, right. Was there ever a better joke in politics than this. Boris Johnson standing up against Vladimir Putin – sure, you and what army, dude?? Britain took itself out of the equation, took itself out of world politics when it left the EU, the superpower in Europe. Standing at the dispatch box making speeches and announcements like this just proves one thing – the Tories completely lost the plot.
Because the real issue here is not the reaction of one nation towards blatant aggression of another. The real issue is Tory grandstanding in the face of their dependency on Russian donor money. This, and the party’s utter unwillingness & incompetence to really be a democratic party, instead of being the doormat for foreign “investors.” Russian interference in UK politics has been rampant under the Tory government, and nothing was nor is done about it. And now Johnson stands up in Parliament and tells us and the world how Britain on its own is going to cripple Russia? I can barely hold it in.
Russian interference didn’t start with the Conservatives, Labour is just as guilty, but the levels of venality and complacency definitely reached new heights since the Tories came to power over a decade ago. The ties that bind the Tories and this government to Russia, Putin, Russian money & influence are not proverbial ties anymore. They are foot-thick steel cables wrapped around the institution that is this government, and by default this country’s democracy.
No consequences whatsoever. Ever.
In January 2016, the inquiry into the death of Alexander Litvinenko published its findings. The ex-FSB agent and outspoken Putin critic had been poisoned with polonium in 2006 by the Russian FSB while living in London. The UK government had already made a half-arsed extradition request for the two suspects ten years earlier, which was denied, and nothing else happened.
In March 2018, ex-double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia were poisoned with the Russian-produced nerve agent Novichok in Salisbury, but survived. After some posturing, 23 Russian diplomats were told to leave the country. That definitely showed Putin.
Unexplained Wealth Orders (UWOs) came into force in February 2018 in order to combat money-laundering, especially in the property market. Until now, a total of nine UWOs have been issued, and none since the end of 2019 when Johnson became Prime Minister. So far, only one of these UWOs led to property being handed over to the state. None of the nine were issued against Russian citizens, despite the fact that about 150 properties in the UK worth about £1.5bn (yes, billions) are owned by Russians with proven links to the Kremlin. In all other UWOs, the accused could explain away their wealth, at the cost of £1.5m in legal fees to the British taxpayer.
The Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018 contained a watered-down Magnitzky amendment – assets can be frozen, but you still get a visa to enter the country, law enforcement agencies do not have a duty to act, only when advised by the Home Office, NGOs cannot bring cases, and there is no public register of financial interests. In short: The UK is open for business, as long as you don’t get actually caught on CCTV while literally killing someone. (In order to understand why a register of foreign interests is so important, go here.)
In July 2020, the government finally published the “Russia Report,” an investigation into alleged Russian meddling in the Brexit referendum of 2016. Johnson et al had to be sued by MPs and Litvinenko’s widow to do what’s right but still managed to drag it out until after the General Election in December 2019. The government’s response to the allegation of Russian interference was to assert that “there was no successful disruption by Moscow.” As it turns out, there was no evidence of disruption because nobody looked for it. As in, actively did not look for it. As in, “there is a big brown bear tearing at the fences, but we are going to look at the dead cat over there instead.”
Since Johnson became Prime Minister a bit over two years ago, the Tories have accepted £2m from Russian donors, £280k alone since the publication of the Russia Report. A total of 14,516 Golden Visas have been issued to Russian citizens since 2008 – all that is needed for one is the promise to invest at least £2m in the UK. All that is actually needed to get this visa is a UK bank account; nobody will bother you with any background checks. I’m not saying every visa issued that way was for an oligarch with connections to the Kremlin, far from it. But judging by the hoops I had to jump through to get settled status here, a little bit of checking is in order. Regardless of the money involved.
This is the reality of Tory politics in this country. At a time when the world desperately needs to come together to stand against a dictator. But how do you get together with a group of delusional, self-aggrandising idiots who are represented by a lying piece of horse manure that no real person can take seriously? Especially not since said delusional idiots are in the pockets of said dictator?
* With apologies to Peter Sellers et al. The movie has nothing to do with the current situation, but the title is so damn apt, I couldn’t resist.