I am sure he has. Twenty years ago, I worked for the Sukhoi Design Bureau for a year, and Russians made it apparent to me that there is a strong sense of Russian nationalism and they did not want their country to be raped. Putin is clearly playing to that. He is a man who has photographs of himself stripped to the waist, bearing a gun, standing over a shot bear, and so on—a man who plants a Russian flag on the floor of the Arctic ocean. One has to ask oneself, “What sort of a guy is this?”
Let us ask what is next. It is perfectly clear from what my friend in eastern Ukraine is saying that Russia is on a roll. The Russians will move fast, and eastern Ukraine is at risk, because 34% of Ukraine’s economy is in the east. Crimea has no direct land link to Russia; it runs only through Ukraine. So where will the Russians go next? They will annex that land to give them direct access into Crimea. Where might Putin then go? To Odessa. That is why I said to the Defence Secretary yesterday that we need to take more robust action. If he manages to get to Odessa, Ukraine will become landlocked because it will have no access to the Black sea and no port.
These are very serious stakes. I do not know, Mr Speaker, whether you saw the BBC television series, “37 Days”, but it is chilling how the kinds of conversations heard there are being reflected in what we are discussing today. I have no wish to provoke military intervention and no wish to harm the Russian people, but I do believe that the security of Europe is at risk if we do not
take action. We need to understand the risks of inaction. Turkey has talked about closing the Bosphorus to Russia because of its treatment of the Muslim Tatars in Crimea. The Russians have been exercising repeatedly on Ukraine’s borders, and it is time for NATO to act and put together some exercises. In my view—I say this to the Foreign Secretary—NATO should have a maritime exercise in the Black sea to serve notice on the Russians, “You do not go near Odessa.”
2.39 pm