Politics: defining the enemy

By Richard North - November 25, 2022

A number of media commentators are waking up to the “home front” aspect of the war in Ukraine that I was writing about yesterday, with an appreciation that much will turn on how civilian morale holds up over the winter months.

An example of the genre is a relatively competent piece in the Guardian by the paper’s world affairs editor, Julian Borger, writing from Kiev under the title: “‘We are Ukrainians. We’re strong’: morale the key in Kyiv as winter sets in”.

The title gives the game away, complemented by the first paragraph of the text which tells us: “The residents of Kyiv taking shelter in their local ‘invincibility station’ were well aware that their own morale has become the central battlefield of the war, and it is not territory they are prepared to concede to Vladimir Putin”.

These “invincibility stations” seem to be tented accommodation provided by the government where residents, caught in the blackouts, can find a haven of light and warmth, where they can recharge their mobile phones, and enjoy tea and sandwiches.

Effectively, these shelters are presented as an example of Ukrainian resilience, although Borger does concede that the local response to Russian attacks “was not entirely one of stubborn resolve”.

Less equivocal is a piece by Fraser Nelson in the Telegraph, venting the opinion from the security of the paper’s London office that, “Vladimir Putin’s plot to freeze Ukraine into submission looks destined to fail”, arguing that this winter, for all its privations, “will mark the beginning of the end” of the war.

The Times has a related piece headed, “Joy turns to fear as battle rages over liberated Kherson”, which has Richard Lloyd Parry reporting that those who can are hurrying to leave the city as it finds itself on the front line of an artillery war. He conveys a strong sense of the roller-coaster emotions of those who were liberated in the city but are now forced to leave it.

He too refers to the government’s “invincibility centres”, but ventures that they will struggle to meet the needs of the whole country. Liberated Kherson’s darkness, cold and isolation, he writes, “are spreading to other, bigger cities, and places of light and warmth are becoming fewer”.

On the general theme of morale, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard also takes to his keyboard with a piece headed, “Putin has another gas shock for us: the deindustrialisation of Europe”, where he extends the remit to the whole of Europe, arguing that, although Putin has lost his energy war this year, he may still win it next year “by exhausting Europe’s will to resist through another gas and power crunch”.

His thesis, therefore, rests on the premise that it is not so much the resilience of the Ukrainian people that will decide the outcome of the war, but how much the peoples of Europe are prepared to take.

Putin’s goal, he writes, citing Helima Croft, an ex-energy analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency now at RBC Capital, “is to set off an uprising of European consumers against their own governments. He wants a Yellow Vest 2.0, this time on steroids”. It is Putin’s bet, AEP continues, “that he can break Europe before it breaks Russia”, adding that he may also break Sushi’s government and Britain’s social stability.

This may not be too far out, especially as we’re getting full frontal propaganda from Hunt, blaming Putin for the energy crunch and demanding that “Britain must cut energy usage by 15 percent to defeat Vladimir Putin”.

This linkage is probably unwise. For those who find themselves forced to make such cuts, not through any voluntary action but simply because they can no longer afford their inflated energy bills, may be less inclined to support the war if they see it as directly responsible for their own personal hardships.

That, of course, presents the government with something of a conundrum as it can hardly parade the inept energy policies of a succession of governments, and the obsession with the green agenda, as the real cause of the problems, so Putin becomes the convenient fall guy.

But, where it comes to Hunt urging households to “play your part” in reducing the UK’s vulnerability to Russia “and other despotic regimes”, he may find a distinct lack of enthusiasm if the more obvious solution might seem to be an attempt to broker an end to the war in Ukraine, with a concomitant reduction in military aid.

Certainly, to judge from the plethora of strikes currently in the news, and those waiting in the wings, there is a rebellious air abroad. And while there is an air of fin de siècle afflicting the Conservative Party, it is unlikely that anything embraced by this government is likely to enthuse the nation.

This is especially as we seem to be getting a re-emergence of Tory sleaze with a vengeance, which doomed the Major government in 1997.

This can only underline the pervasive sense of “us and them”, in a society which is forced to tolerate record immigration, and four-star hotels for tens of thousands of dinghy people while homeless people are left to die on the streets, for want of government support.

The recent publicity about the way the Ukrainian government appears to support its own people also do not help improve sentiment. For, while we see “invincibility centres” set up in war-torn Ukraine, to help those with no access to power, in the UK we see the energy suppliers at war with their own customer base.

Thus we see high-profile reports of energy suppliers sending households vastly inflated bills, we have the energy regulator Ofgem complaining that energy suppliers are “failing struggling customers”, including setting debt repayments so high that customers could not top-up their pre-payment meters. Said one harassed consumer, “It seems to us that they just don’t care as long as they are getting paid”.

Although some energy suppliers complain they have been unfairly treated by Ofgem, the reality is that all the firms take an aggressive approach to debtors, spraying threats at those who are late paying their bills by even a matter of days.

These suppliers continue with a relentless barrage of threats in an attempt to bully consumers into making early payments, heedless of circumstance, while erecting multiple barriers which make communication increasingly difficult, especially for those with restricted power supplies.

While debt charities in the main simply intensify the pressure, warning of the dire penalties for non-payment, it is unsurprising that those on the margins often turn to loan sharks, with dire results.

But then, when ostensibly legal businesses front TV adverts promoting credit cards for people with poor credit records, with an APR of 99.9 percent, and suppliers assail their debtors with endless threats, it is sometimes difficult to see the difference between loan sharks and legitimate businesses.

And there, perhaps is the essential difference between Ukraine and the UK. While one is encouraged to take the view – rightly or wrongly – that the Ukrainian systems and government are defending their people against an external enemy, in the UK the impression is that the systems and government are the enemy.