OF all the big questions about Ukraine currently being avoided by the UK’s political savants perhaps the most intriguing one is this: why, eight years after the first Russian incursions, is this country still not in NATO? The answer is also one they would all rather body-swerve: that none of the big players in the world’s most powerful and tooled-up military alliance are willing to go to actual war to defend Ukraine.

Instead they choose to fall back on the West’s weapon of choice when there’s some geopolitical belligerence for which (for once) they’re not directly responsible: they shake their fists and impose their sanctions. And they tell the Ukrainian people that President Vladimir Putin will pay a heavy price for his actions by being marginalised and excluded from the theatre of global affairs. That’ll make them feel better, right enough.

Given that the West has been marginalising and excluding the Russian president for the last two decades I’m not entirely convinced this will give him pause for thought. I’m sure too he’ll have gamed the sanctions bit. Perhaps that’s why China have been somewhat cautious in joining the chorus of global condemnation about the Russian invasion of Ukraine. One country’s sanction is another one’s opportunity.

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We’ve been here before and many times. When the old Soviet Union brutally repressed the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 there were similar expressions of outrage from the West. Curiously though, NATO adopted a somewhat more callous line to the effect that the Hungarian uprising was a collective act of national suicide.

In 1968, in Czechoslovakia when the Prague Spring was similarly dealt with by the Soviets and its eastern bloc allies there was more outrage and condemnation. This included UEFA imposing a punitive sporting sanction when they decided to rearrange the first round of fixtures in the European Cup to separate western clubs from eastern European ones. That’ll learn them Soviets.

Happily, the poor citizens of Hungary and Czechoslovakia didn’t have to contend with social media. Thus, they were spared all the tears and emoting that turns the internet into a giant virtual therapy session for Western liberals at times like this. Within a few hours of the Russian advance people were sending love and kisses to Ukraine by painting their social media profiles in blue and yellow.

In Edinburgh, St Andrew’s House was bathed in blue and yellow as the most empathetic and narcissistic government in the world stood “shoulder to shoulder” with the Ukrainian people. This is retaliation by group hug. Already, Twitter firing-squads are being assembled targeting those who aren’t sufficiently in touch with their feelings. “Putin-lover” is this year’s “kill the witch”.

In the absence of “boots on the ground” the UK’s politicians have reached for sanctimony. On Thursday morning Lord Richard Dannat, former head of the British Army, stopped just sort of saying that the Russkies deserved a damn good thrashing. “Russia has got to be made to pay for this,” he spluttered. “It’s unacceptable to bring this sort of damaging and destructive war into Europe in the 21st century. Frankly, we finished with that in the middle of the 20th century.”

This will be news to the people of Kosovo. And it cheerfully ignores the fact that NATO, led by the US and Britain, have spent much of the last 50 years bringing “damaging and destructive war” to most of the Middle East and large parts of Africa. “Welcome to our world,” as the innocent families of Iraq, Iran, Yemen, Syria and Afghanistan might be saying right now.

On BBC Question Time on Thursday night the British political and academic establishment gathered to wring their hands. This was a time for unity of purpose, said the Tory minister and his Labour shadow as they congratulated themselves for putting political differences aside. Now isn’t the time to be divisive, said the posh magazine editor.

We need more tanks, said the Polish MEP.

An entire hour passed without anyone going anywhere near the other big question being studiously avoided by UK conservatives and liberals alike: why do we even need NATO years after its main purposes for existence had all been settled: the denazification of Germany; the dismantling of the Soviet Union and bringing the US into the orbit of European affairs?

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As all her satellite states seceded from Mother Russia even the stalwart chap on the Clapham Omnibus could have foreseen that at some point a Russian strongman would emerge. And that in his dotage he’d seek to shore up popular support and preserve his stolen multi-million-pound retirement plan by seeking to restore some of the old republics. And that Ukraine, the most spiritually Russian of them all, would be in his crosshairs.

Elsewhere, Ben Wallace, the British Defence Minister, channelled the Charge of the Light Brigade. The Brits kicked Tsar Nicholas I’s fundament in 1853 in Crimea and “can always do it again”, he said. The Labour MP Chris Bryant wants those who have dual Russian/UK citizenship to choose a side. A prominent right-wing commentator suggested none of this would have happened if only we’d armed Ukraine with some nukes.

The best chance of removing Vladimir Putin lies with those brave Russian anti-war protesters who risked their freedom to take to Moscow’s streets on Thursday. It always has been. Yet, rather than give them money, resources and organisational support the West chose to provide corrupt safe havens for the booty that Mr Putin and his oligarchs looted from his own people.

Yet, we have a government which normalises corruption on the grand scale. The US is run by a desiccated remnant of Washington’s capitalist elite who reached the White House after years of being a stooge of the credit card industry. We routinely facilitate brutal regimes by supplying them with weapons. The cultural cornerstone of the UK Government is a Brexit campaign fuelled by xenophobia and military fetishism.

Vladmir Putin’s most potent weapon in thwarting the dissidents has been supplied by his NATO enemies. He simply points to the West and says: “Look at what they say about you; them and their western values.” Some values.

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