Things fall apart. Moscow friends call to say that I have to urgently send my 19-year-old son out of Russia. He is travelling on his Russian passport and a new law says that he is obliged to register for the military draft. Nikita is on a gap year working at a Moscow theatre and he begs not to be sent away. I dismiss the warnings. A day later, a friend’s nanny shows up at our door and hands me an inch-thick packet of high-denomination euros to take out of the country for her employer. The money’s owner is already en route to Israel on a private jet. I overrule my son and open up Skyscanner. Europe, the US and Canada have closed their airspace to Russian planes and the Kremlin has reciprocated. Istanbul is the only European destination still accepting flights from Moscow. One-way tickets are 1,700 euros. But miraculously I discover air miles I had forgotten. Even more miraculously, Turkish Airlines is still issuing reward tickets. We’re booked.
I appear on a debate with Radek Sikorski, former Polish foreign minister. Radek has always maintained that Putin was a classic Russian imperialist. I, in common with all the Russian watchers I most respect, was convinced that Putin was a master of divide and rule, diplomatic bluff and strategic calculation. As it turned out, we were wrong – the diplomacy was the bluff, and war was the strategy. Radek had the good grace not to say ‘I told you so.’ How does this war end for Putin? Whoever in the Russian government has been leaking the Kremlin’s detailed operational plans to the CIA and MI6 has been very clear. The strategy was to quickly surround Kiev, decapitate the Ukrainian government and install a pro-Moscow puppet regime. But Putin’s blitzkrieg has failed. Advance will be bloody.
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