Downfall

A major armed insurrection on top of a long, grinding defeat in Ukraine are turning Vladimir Putin from a fear-inspiring despot into a figure of ridicule.

How Putin was saved by his poodle

Dictatorships always seem entrenched in power until they aren’t, and though Alexander Lukashenko was credited with saving Vladimir Putin’s regime in the face of the Wagner rebellion, his fall will likely follow Putin’s inevitable and hastening demise.

Send our old jets to help Ukraine

Western countries need to give Ukraine the modern fighters and main battle tanks it needs to drive out the invaders, and Australia should lead by example by handing over our surplus F18s.

Send in the clowns

The one thing a mafia boss can’t afford is to look weak in the eyes of his subordinates, and the ludicrous events in Russia over recent days exposed much about the sordid realities of Putin’s teetering regime.

The world’s weakest strong man

The weekend’s farcical events in Russia suggest that the political end for an increasingly rattled Vladimir Putin is approaching fast.

Both sides lost this game of chicken

Yevgeny Prigozhin’s abortive coup against the Russian military fizzled out over the weekend with both sides chickening out of confrontation, but the fragmentation and in-fighting in Russia will only increase as a result.

On to Moscow

Whether or not the Ukraine counteroffensive that began in early June 2023 succeeds in dislodging Russian troops from all the occupied territory, there are growing signs that the push has Moscow worried.

After the flood

Just as Saddam Hussain ignited Kuwait’s oil wells to frustrate the allied advance and destroy the assets he sought to gain through invasion, so the Russian flooding of Southern Ukraine betrays the ‘scorched Earth’ approach of a defeated and retreating army.

Damning evidence of Russia’s desperation

Russia’s cynical destruction of the Nova Kakhovka dam aims to delay Ukraine’s much-anticipated counter-offensive to liberate Kherson in Southern Ukraine, and reveals both Putin’s brutality and desperation.

Putin’s cannon fodder

Russia’s disastrous invasion of Ukraine has cost its army thousands of men, and Putin’s attempts to persuade more recruits to face death in the trenches are falling on deaf ears around the country.

Ukraine takes the fight to Moscow

Russia has bombarded Ukrainian cities for over a year, but the recent drone strikes on Moscow show that Ukraine has both the capacity and will to strike back at the heart of its enemy invader.

The tide turns for Ukraine

There’s a long way to go, and there’s no guarantee that Putin, having made the terrible decision to invade in the first place, won’t make another terrible decision in escalating the conflict, but Ukraine is winning this war.