Angela Merkel once described Vladimir Putin as a leader using 19th-century methods in the 21st century. What the former German chancellor meant was that Russia’s leader is a man of war and nationalism in an era supposedly defined by laws and globalisation.

Merkel was talking after Russia annexed Crimea in 2014. Now the US and British governments are warning that Putin is poised to start “the biggest war in Europe since 1945” by launching a much more extensive invasion of Ukraine, involving a direct assault on its capital, Kyiv.

Financial Times