Will Russia attack the UK? What Putin has said and why there are fears that he will expand the Ukraine war

The ministry said the settlement of Tabaivka, home to 34 people, was “liberated” and under Russian control. In order to continue its war, Russia has needed to ramp up its defence spending, which has come at the expense of other areas and accelerating inflation. This has forced the Central Bank of Russia to double interest rates to 16% since July 2023. Every weekday The Telegraph’s top journalists analyse the invasion from all angles - military, humanitarian, political, economic, historical - and tell you what you need to know to stay updated. On Tuesday, the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, stopped the certification process for the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline in response to Russia’s recognition of the two self-proclaimed republics.

But the head of the British Army Gen Sir Patrick Sanders is not alone in issuing a national call to prepare for a major conflict on European soil. Russia has sent tanks over the border into Ukraine and Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said the UK and NATO allies will support Kyiv. The Prime Minister also suggested Britain could provide more military support to Ukraine as legislation to allow for tougher UK sanctions against Russia were expected to come into force today. "A victorious Ukraine would not be a permanent ward of the West," it says, arguing that restored to its 1991 borders its economy is big enough to support its own military. By early summer Ukraine will be able to use US-made F16 fighter jets for the first time, which it hopes will improve its ability to counter Russian aircraft and strengthen its own air defences. Russian forces may try to push again along the entire front, at least to secure all of the Donbas region.

The fear is that if Russia is allowed to invade Ukraine unresisted, that might act as a signal to other leaders that the days of Western powers intervening in other conflicts are over. It is called self-determination, and perhaps the most important aspect of this principle is that borders cannot be changed by invading armies. In 1994, the UK - along with the US - signed a memorandum at an international conference in Budapest promising "to respect the independence and sovereignty and the existing borders of Ukraine". They also promised to provide assistance to Ukraine if it "should become a victim of an act of aggression". We will continue to work with Ukraine and our international partners for a just and sustainable peace.

• Russia could also justify a further invasion of Ukraine by recognising the territorial claims of the two separatist governments.
• To bolster his depleted forces President Putin announced Russia's first mobilisation since World War Two, although it was partial and limited to some 300,000 reservists.
• Mr Heappey said "British and Nato troops should not [and] must not play an active role" and that any miscalculation could escalate quickly.

According to a 2022 YouGov poll, only one in five Britons would volunteer for service in the event of an invasion. Britain has also allowed ammunition supplies to dwindle to “dangerously low levels,” according to a Parliamentary Defence Committee report. Gen Sir Richard Barrons, the former head of the British Joint Forces Command, told the committee that he doubted there were “sufficient munitions to sustain a high-intensity conflict for more than about a week”. https://euronewstop.co.uk/how-the-conflict-in-ukraine-will-affect-the-uk.html have increasingly sent Ukraine air defence systems to protect its cities, as well as missile systems, artillery and drones that helped turn the tide against Russia's invasion. Russia's long-time leader was also desperate to prevent Ukraine from entering Nato's orbit, but his attempt to blame the Western defensive alliance for the war is false. Dissent in Russia is highly risky, with jail sentences handed out for anyone spreading "fake news" about the Russian military.

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Labour's Keir Starmer and many Conservative backbenchers have called for further military options to be explored. So far the UK government has sent troops (now withdrawn) to train the Ukrainian army, and supplied them with defensive weapons. There is a sense in the upper echelons of the British military that many politicians and most of the public have not grasped the threat they see. It is the duty of the military to analyse that threat, and they still might be proved wrong.

“I am legitimately worried that in that circumstance Putin might use a nuclear weapon, most likely on the ground in Ukraine to terrify everyone and get his way. President Putin ordering the use of nuclear weapons against the UK remains very unlikely, but is not impossible. What would happen if Russia decided to target the UK with nuclear weapons?

"To think war could be contained to one nation would be foolish," they added.

• In Rostov, governor Vasily Golubev said a drone was downed over a campsite in the Neklinovsky district, which borders eastern Ukraine.
• As diplomats met in Brussels on Tuesday, it remained unclear whether Putin’s order to send troops into Ukraine would be the trigger for the massive sanctions the EU has been threatening for weeks.
• According to this scenario's predictions, the NATO alliance would itself deploy 300,000 troops to Eastern Europe, but not until early 2025.

Russia also has the world’s largest supply of operational nuclear warheads – at around 4,500 – making the threat of a nuclear attack the largest since the Cold War. If war broke out in Ukraine and Russian forces occupied large swathes of the country, many civilians might flee. A lot of the stark warnings we are hearing from our own government should be seen in that light. What we might want to worry about more is the impact on energy prices. Your parents are likely to pay even more for gas and electricity because of this crisis. US President Joe Biden has ruled out sending troops even to shepherd American citizens out of Ukraine because he said if Russians and Americans end up fighting that would be World War III.

• Despite this, Russia actually launching an attack on the UK is very unlikely, and would probably require Russia to first invade a Nato nation to even become a possibility.
• The Type 45 destroyer is joining offshore patrol vessel HMS Trent, with four additional RAF Typhoon jets being deployed to Cyprus to take part in patrols.
• While the Channel has long been the country’s greatest defence, it makes it hard to import in times of war.
• Exploiting its overwhelming superiority in land, sea and air forces, Russia is expected to attack simultaneously on several fronts, from the north-east, the Donbas and Crimea.
• Russia’s defence ministry has claimed its forces have captured the Ukrainian village of Tabaivka in Kharkiv.