It’s amazing! The ABC turned out to be some use after all! Taking a brief respite from its never-ending and biased campaign for the Voice, it found time the other night to run a documentary on the rise of Russia under Putin and its culmination in the invasion of Ukraine. And what a pitiful spectacle it revealed of how Putin has run rings around the West for 20 years, duped every president of the US from George W. Bush onwards, lied to the entire world and been allowed to prepare for and wage hideous war without any real and meaningful retaliation from the democracies. It was, frankly, a macabre relief to have it all set out in increasingly depressing instalments. Well done, ABC!

This dispiriting story started with the fall of the Soviet Union and the wilful blindness of the West to what Putin really believed in and how his clear long-term plan was to weaken the West and re-establish by brute force the glory of the lost Russian empire. The West and  its vast apparatus of espionage had this all set out for them. But no, all it produced was a naive trust and delusion that Russia and Putin would act responsibly, so alien to their character and their declared intentions.

George W. Bush was even foolish enough to say and apparently believe that he had looked into Putin’s soul and had seen not a fetid mass of twisted ambitions, but a decent man he could trust! Ah, the wonders of video that captured so clearly Putin’s sneer and his contempt of Bush for being such a patent fool.

Then we had the darling of the cowardly left, Obama, who must be held accountable for the biggest Western disaster since the second world war. Putin made it clear enough that he would invade Crimea and, again, it was all laid out for us. Obama had the best advice that the US and its allies possessed, namely to respond to force with greater force and arm Ukraine to defend itself or Putin would not take them seriously and would rampage his way to an invasion of the whole of Ukraine. Obama put on his serious face, frowned, and warned Putin that there would be ‘consequences’ if he crossed the red line of Crimea. But the wrathful ‘consequences’ from the US and the West were nothing more than the usual backboneless and limited sanctions and seizing a few oligarchs’ yachts and villas.

But if Putin liked Obama for being such a predictable wimp, and so full of empty rhetoric, he must have loved Donald Trump. Here was an American president who actually believed that Russia could be a partner in peace, despite Putin’s threats and all the evidence to the contrary. No wonder Putin sought to undermine and corrupt the American election process; the prospect of having his very own isolationist in the White House was the ultimate prize.

It therefore was not surprising that Russia should have embarked on the wholesale invasion of Ukraine. After all, he had seen successive presidents and European governments huff and puff and threaten consequences that came to nothing and he was entitled to believe that after token resistance and a lot of finger-wagging, the West would lose its enthusiasm, drop Ukraine and deny it the muscle and grunt it would need to defend itself.

Accordingly, the only conclusion you can reach is that the war in Ukraine has been brought about by the West’s ignoring Putin’s thinly-veiled threats and by showing cowardice in the face of aggression.

Unfortunately, events since the invasion have confirmed the ingrained and defeatist position of the West. True, we have given equipment, economic and diplomatic support and held the occasional garage sale of surplus goods. But not the heavy artillery and missiles, the HIMAR mobile rockets and the F-16 aircraft that Ukraine needs to punch holes in the Russian defences. The rule of thumb has been that if they actually ask for something they really need, don’t give it to them.

Moreover, we have hamstrung ourselves with ridiculous restrictions and bizarre rules of engagement preventing us from winning. First, the golden rule is now that we are not allowed to provoke Russia or even allow the Ukrainians to provoke it, a self-defeating policy of weakness. It is so ridiculous that it means a belligerent may invade a country, but the victims’ allies are not allowed to take the fight into the belligerent’s own territory or a lapdog like Belarus. If they are the rules of war, the West should ignore them, or change them, as the Russians do on a daily basis while they slaughter unarmed civilians. Second, the West must give the Ukrainians the equipment listed above and, indeed, anything else that might actually result in their winning the war. Third, we have not yet imposed the universal sanctions in every respect from trade to sports that will truly isolate the enemy. Fourth, we have not made it clear to democracies like Hungary, India and Israel that if they are not unequivocal and uncompromising in opposing Russia, there really will be a price to pay. But, so long as we keep fighting with those four limitations, it must be very dubious whether we can ever win. Brave Ukraine has not lost, but it is coming perilously close.

There is, of course, a glimmer of hope and we should recognise it. Biden is committed to the struggle and the more credit to him for flying the flag when he has potential opposition in his own country and the baleful presence of Donald Trump looming over the horizon. But if Biden does not lift his game and if the Europeans do not pull up their collective lederhosen, the war may well have an even more dismal outcome and the democracies will suffer a permanent set-back.

And what an irony that the ABC should be at the forefront of promoting this vital policy!