Columnists
The day I nearly brought RT down
It is interesting to watch Ofcom finally remove the broadcasting licence from the Russian propaganda channel Russia Today (RT). I…
The moral of P&O: too many strategic assets in foreign hands
P & O once stood for ‘Peninsular and Oriental’, with pleasant connotations of sailings to Cadiz and Constantinople – but…
What I learnt in sex education
The state of Florida recently passed a piece of legislation making it illegal for teachers to hold discussions with pupils…
Sunak’s choice
The Office for Budget Responsibility was designed to protect the Chancellor from accusations that he is cooking the books. If…
The Spectator’s Notes
Zakhar Prilepin is a well-known novelist in Russia and an ultra-nationalist warrior in Donbas. Once a member of the National…
China’s focus is Covid, not a proxy war
It is tempting to believe that we have gone from one crisis to another: Russia invaded Ukraine hours after Covid…
The Spectator’s Notes
I remember my father telling me about Imre Nagy’s final broadcast before the Hungarian leader was taken by the Russians…
Biden is right: crypto world needs regulatory control
President Biden’s executive order ‘Ensuring Responsible Development of Digital Assets’ won praise on all sides, an unfamiliar experience for one…
Would you stay or would you go?
For many of us war voyeurs watching the news with a glass of sherry, admiration of the little-engine-that-could Ukrainian fighters…
There’s no putting Putin in a box
At the heart of the West’s response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine sits an ambiguity that it is convenient, perhaps…
Will the West’s unity against Russia last?
Over recent days I have been reflecting on War and Peace. Or Special Operation and Peace as it must now…
The madness of mutual mayhem — and not exploiting our own fuel reserves
I’ll approach the hot topic of a ban on Russian oil by way of personal anecdote: I’ve never been a…
Russia’s memory war
It seems strange now that any of us ever imagined that Putin might not invade. He thinks of Ukraine as…
Life must go on
Well, at least Covid is over. No sooner had Vladimir Putin’s tanks rolled into Ukraine than the UK’s Covid advisory…
Watching the clock
Having just dusted down my Geiger counter and argued with the family about whether or not there is room for…
The Spectator’s Notes
I wish people would not say Vladimir Putin is mad. One understands him much better if one says he is…
A price worth paying
Nato countries are being careful not to do anything that Russia could claim is an act of war. Just look…
The free world’s new reality
We are about to see brutality in Europe on a scalethat will be almost beyond our comprehension. Russia is turning…
The Spectator’s Notes
Much attention has been paid to how Vladimir Putin has learnt from western weakness over his earlier invasions, including into…
Has Putin saved Boris?
It was with some relief that I heard that Labour’s Diane Abbott was opposed to the Russian invasion of Croatia,…
What the right gets wrong about Putin
A fracture on the international right may seem small fry given everything that is going on right now. But it…
A little Eden
I’m not one of life’s early risers but an exception had to be made on Wednesday last week. In an…
The return of Actual Badness
In the spring of 2020, I advanced an abnormally hopeful proposition: that one blessing that might arise from a pandemic…
At least BP and Shell tried to teach Russia true capitalism
BP will offload the 20 per cent stake in Rosneft, the Kremlin-controlled energy giant, that is the residue of 25…
Women-only train carriages help no one
Sooner or later, somewhere in the UK, we’ll have trains with women-only coaches. It’s an idea which keeps rolling around,…
