Putin isn’t afraid of Cameron

Considering the obsession Russia has with Britain as the source of all its woes, it is perhaps surprising how David Cameron’s return to politics is being taken. Or rather, how little Moscow thinks it matters.

After all, there is a flatteringly pervasive sense that while the United States is the main threat to Russia, Britain is more than just its sidekick. Instead, if Washington has the resources, London has the low cunning. Time and again, the Kremlin claims to see MI6 or the Foreign Office or some other arm of Perfidious Albion behind its reversals. Even the recent allegations that a Ukrainian officer masterminded the bombing of its Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which one would have thought was a propaganda gift, was rubbished as Kyiv simply taking the punch for its ‘Anglo-Saxon masters.’

In this context, one would think that the identity of the Foreign Secretary matters, but instead it has been reported in a rather matter of fact way, if at all, in the official media.