EXCLUSIVEBORIS JOHNSON: After a week of tactical brilliance, Ukraine could finally end this war
It was the look on Putin's face that said it all – the sudden lip-twitching indignation of the autocrat hearing the truth.
He was on live TV, and the governor of the Kursk region was explaining what was actually happening to Russian towns and villages. They were being overwhelmed, said Alexei Smirnov. The Ukrainians had already taken a chunk of land that was 12km deep and 40km wide.
At this point Putin's features went into small but visible spasm, like a stroke victim, and he cut the man off. It was up to the military to explain these details, said the Russian president, and moved the conversation on.
But Smirnoff had made his point. Putin's embarrassment was plain for the world to see, and since that moment on Monday his humiliation has only intensified.
Russian president Vladimir Putin has a face like thunder during the meeting with his officials on Monday
Alexey Smirnoff, governor of the Kursk region, gives his report at the meeting on live television before Putin cuts him off
When he launched his evil and unjustified invasion, over two years ago, he believed the Ukrainians would fold like napkins.
He thought his armoured columns would topple Kyiv in days. Never in his worst nightmares did he imagine that one day Ukrainian tanks would be crossing into Russia; or that they would capture more territory in about a week – more than 1,000 square kilometres – than the Russians have captured in a year. He never dreamed that he would have to evacuate hundreds of thousands of Russians from their homes, and pay £90 each to those affected.
When Putin attacked Ukraine, he thought he would soon be installing a puppet regime in Kyiv. Now he finds that the Ukrainians have actually captured 80 villages inside Russia itself, and set up a military administration in the Russian town of Sudzha.
As I write, the Ukrainian counterpunch continues. For those of us who love Ukraine, and who passionately want the Ukrainians to be free, the past few days have been exhilarating: the best news in a long time.
This lightning dash into the Kursk region reminds us of the key truth about the whole war: that from the beginning we have always underestimated the Ukrainians. We have underestimated their gift of surprise, the way they ruthlessly kept their latest plan a secret.
We have underestimated their boldness – their willingness to do what people have thought impossible. And we have chronically underestimated their sheer fury at the Russian invader – the deep yearning in Ukrainian breasts to expel Putin's troops from every inch of Ukrainian land. So for pity's sake, can we finally cut the cackle, drop the ludicrous Putin-phobia and give the Ukrainians the tools they really need to finish the job; and by that I mean the proper permission to use the tools we have already given.
We all want this war to be over; we all want to stop the bloodletting, on every side. So let's end the delay and the half-measures.
When it comes to UK support for the Ukrainians, it is time for the Labour Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, to stop pussyfooting around.
We can all see why the Kursk operation is tactically brilliant. By taking and then defending a chunk of Russian territory, the Ukrainians pose a grim strategic challenge for Putin.
He can either let the insult go unavenged – impossible – or else he will be forced to retake the salient, village by village, with waves of conscript troops. What this war has shown so far is that it is far costlier – in blood and weapons – to retake a piece of land than to defend it.
So Putin will probably have to divert troops from elsewhere, and the Ukrainians are naturally hoping that this will relieve the pressure in the Donbas.
Here, by contrast, it is the Russians who have been making some grinding progress: using huge air-launched glide bombs to flatten Ukrainian positions.
The Ukrainians have been unable properly to retaliate and unable to protect themselves, because we have been forcing them to fight with one hand tied behind their backs.
The only way to stop the glide bombs is to hit the air bases used by those Russian planes; and the only way to hit those bases is to use the Western kit they already have. The Ukrainians have the ATACMS system from the US, they have bunker-busting Storm Shadow missiles from the UK.
What they do not have is the permissions they need to use those missiles against their tormentors.
Why don't we do it? Why don't we give them the freedom to strike military sites in Russia? After all, the Russians have rained indiscriminate murder on Ukrainian cities – never mind military bases – for more than two years.
We are told, as ever, that we fear 'escalation'. But in truth the person who really fears escalation is Putin. He has lost hundreds of thousands of troops; he has lost huge quantities of armour; he is now severely overstretched. Now is the moment for the friends of Ukraine, led by the US and the UK, to go up a gear.
Boris Johnson when he was British Prime Minister warmly greeting Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv in 2022
Throughout this conflict we have tended not only to underestimate the Ukrainians but to be too slow and gingerly in coming to their aid. We always end up changing our minds, and recognising the case for arming the Ukrainians – but only after unconscionable delays and the consequent loss of life.
Remember that in 2022 we told the Poles that they couldn't even give the Ukrainians some Soviet-era MiG-29s. Well, the US has now moved so far as to furnish the Ukrainians with F-16s. We were told that it would be 'provocative' and 'escalatory' if we gave the Ukrainians the kind of battlefield armour they needed. Today, there are American, French and German tanks involved in that Kursk operation – and of course there are British Challengers.
It was the British Challengers that broke the taboo on sending tanks, and encouraged other countries to follow suit, just as it was the British decision to give the NLAW anti-tank missiles that emboldened other European countries to give their own lethal weaponry.
Now is the time for the UK to do the same again: show some leadership, show some initiative on Storm Shadow, and the rest of our friends and allies will follow suit.
When Volodymyr Zelensky came to Britain last month, he was mystified to be told, by Keir Starmer, that he had UK permission to use Storm Shadow against Russian bases – only for that permission to be rescinded a few days later.
There followed a peculiar briefing, to a newspaper, that Storm Shadow could only be used with 'French' permission. I can assure readers that this is complete nonsense.
Yes, of course it is always better – as Churchill said – to do things in concert with the Americans. But these are UK weapons, paid for by the UK taxpayer, and we should have the guts to decide how they can be used.
As my friend former Defence Secretary Ben Wallace never tires of saying, there are other things we should also be doing – such as training more Ukrainian troops. But the most important task now is to give the Ukrainians the permissions they need for the weapons they already have, to save time and save lives.
By their heroism, the Ukrainians have once again exploded the myth of Putin's invincibility. They have proved to their Western backers, again, that they can and will win.
We are morally obliged to help them – and faster.
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