The new Hitler

With the death of Alexei Navalny it is surely obvious to all that Vladimir Putin is the 21st century equivalent of Adolf Hitler. Similar to Hitler, he has built for himself an impregnable authoritarian position, and similar to Hitler, has surrounded himself with yes-men and cronies whom he has rewarded through making them multi-millionaires by way of corruption and the gifting of state assets.

He has also deliberately associated with equally authoritarian states, such as North Korea, Belarus, China, and Iran. We have recently heard the threats issued by Dmitry Medvedev, Putin’s equivalent to Hitler’s Goebbels, should the western democracies interfere further with the Russian illegal invasion of Ukraine.

Following the deaths of so many opponents of Putin over the past 20 years, including the poisonings in the UK of Litvinenko and the more recent poisoning attempts on the Skripals by the Kremlin’s FSB operatives in Salisbury, it is imperative that that UK, US and EU democracies step up their assistance to Ukraine, even to the point of providing their armed forces to drive the Russian army out of Ukrainian land.

Turning a blind eye to what is going on will lead to further future atrocities, and we are already hearing of the fears being expressed by Finland, Sweden and Moldova

The beginning of the end of Hitler came about when the UK finally countered the Nazi invasion of Poland. That must now be replicated by all of the democracies in the world, but particularly, by the US, UK and the countries of the European continent

Derek Farmer Anstruther, Fife