Vladimir Putin
Russia will not attack Nato
There is a lot of war fever about. In January, Grant Shapps, Britain’s tiggerish defence secretary, said the UK was…
Why the US will decide Ukraine’s fate
The US will decide Ukraine’s fate
Russia’s long history of smears, sabotage and barefaced lies
Mark Hollingsworth describes how the KGB became the world’s most industrious conspiracy-theory factory, with its agents of influence dedicated to sowing maximum confusion
The Ukrainian war is coming to Moscow
War is coming home to Moscow
Igor Girkin’s arrest was a long time coming
With the reported arrest on Friday of Igor Girkin (aka ‘Strelkov’ or ‘Igor the Terrible’) the career of one of…
How does the Russian public view the invasion of Ukraine?
It’s not just Putin’s war, says Jade McGlynn. The mass of Telegram data shows how much the nation as a whole supports the offensive
Putin is copying the propaganda playbook of Serbian war criminals
A year ago, Ukrainian soldiers discovered evidence of the Bucha massacre in which Russian forces slaughtered hundreds of Ukrainians in…
After his trip to Moscow, Xi Jinping still holds all the cards
After his arrival in Moscow on Monday, President Xi Jinping said that China is ready, along with Russia, ‘to stand…
Xi’s nuclear warnings are a coup for Scholz
Checks and balances on Vladimir Putin don’t come from inside Russia. The people around him supported forced mobilisation, pushed his…
Is Putin preparing a nuclear strike?
Russia is peddling implausible tales of Ukrainian ‘dirty bombs’. Kyiv and the West are embarked on a campaign to counter…
What does Russia really want?
The question of ‘why’ Russia invaded Ukraine has been forgotten amid war’s fog. Greed and malice partially explains it. History, geopolitics…
Tsar Vladimir brings in martial law
Martial law can arrive with a bang: tanks on the streets, Swan Lake on the TV. It can also creep…
Putin at 70: How The Spectator has covered his life
Vladimir Putin turns 70 today. Since he became Prime Minister of Russia in 1999, some of The Spectator’s greatest contributors…
Did Russia sabotage its own pipelines?
It almost seems worthy of the opening scene in a Bond film. Vital Russian gas pipelines running beneath the Baltic Sea close…
Was Nato expansion worth the risk?
This is an important and topical book. Mary Sarotte traces the difficult course of Russia’s relations with Europe and the…
What's behind Putin's no-show?
Has Vladimir Putin carried out a cynical stunt, or ducked out of a seismic decision? That’s the debate among Kremlinologists…
Nothing is certain in Russia, where the past is constantly rewritten
Nothing is certain in a country where the past is constantly rewritten, says Owen Matthews
The next PM must be ready for Putin
Westminster is understandably obsessed with the question of who makes the final two of the Tory leadership race, but today…
How Justin Trudeau caved to Putin
When Russia invaded Ukraine, the West was certain that its sanctions were worth the pain. But there always was a…
Putin’s mistake was to discard the velvet glove
To study international politics since the turn of the century has been, in large part, to study the changing nature…
How Russia wins
It is still too early to predict the outcome of the war in Ukraine. Russia has certainly solidified its position…
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…
Putin’s cult of war
This idolisation of the Soviet military is Russia’s modern tragedy. Not least because it is crucial to Putin’s way of…
