It would be dangerously premature to say that Ukraine is winning the war with Russia, but Russia is undoubtedly doing worse. Ukrainian ingenuity and courage are outsmarting Russian mass. Ukraine has the advantage in technology, especially drone technology, and morale. The Black Sea fleet is held in port and Russian-occupied Crimea is now insecure. This is becoming apparent even on the streets of Moscow and St Petersburg. So what, I wonder, will western apologists for Vladimir Putin, led by Donald Trump and J.D. Vance, say if his situation worsens further? Will they still back him as the upholder of Christian values against the decadent West and champion of Russia’s historic territorial rights and its need for security? Or will they realise they overestimated his power and have been abetting the last and most idiotic war of imperialist aggression fought on the European continent? Will Trump, whose own power is now fading, keep urging a peace on Putin’s terms? Back in Britain, this shift makes life harder for Reform, a party which, though aspiring to government, still does not have a defence spokesman. Its isolationist ideology expressed in the phrase ‘Kent not Kyiv’ already looks pretty silly when the Russian shadow fleet can be spotted from the white cliffs of Dover. If Kyiv, which favours the West, prevails, the slogan will be in the dustbin of history.