The longer this goes on, the more I see Ukraine as being just another cold war ball for each side to kick around. The initial attack on the Russian economy by the west has just about run its course and now the Rouble has recovered, China, India and most of the rich middle eastern states still back Russia and Putin and he has never been so popular with his own people. I see talk of him being ousted as a matter of course but I'm beginning to doubt that very much, as he has an iron grip on all of the Russian institutions of state and security. Any war of attrition, which this is turning into, will always favour Russia, with its massive resources and with the west declining to go any further than it has, I can't see it going but one way. The west might close its Moscow McDonalds and a few other tokenisms but the fact is, Russia has Europe by the goolies, as we have been idiotic enough to become dependent of Russian energy, which will always be our Achilles heel. We are stuck on the Russian tit. Here in Europe a few years ago the ruling classes in Brussels issued a diktat stating that diesel engines were cleaner than petrol ones, a blatant pile of crap if ever there was one. Any person with an inkling of knowledge of engines knew this was a blatant lie and who benefitted most from it? The German car industry. Here in Britain, following our decades long policy of getting everything produced abroad, we gave up refining our own fuels on a huge scale and guess who refines all of our Diesel? Yep, Russia. There is now talk of Diesel rationing later in the year and if that happens where will our shops get their goods from? Russia holds all the cards, as far as I can see. Gas and electricity are now set to rise by up to 400% in Britain in the next two years and our political class have only added to the crisis by pampering to the ridiculous green lobby. Naturally they're having to quietly backtrack now as their own political futures are in jeopardy. Do you know that 25% of all we pay over here for energy is a green tax? If the war has any benefit for us, it will be the dawning of an energy reality in the corridors of power.