Nuclear fears return with ‘Cold War II’

AS a child growing up in the 1960s and ’70s there was a constant background threat of nuclear apocalypse due to the Cold War tensions between the Soviet Union and the West.

Whereas children’s most pressing fear nowadays is probably the climate crisis, for me and my generation it was the dreaded mushroom cloud and, if you survived the blast itself, death by radiation or nuclear winter.

For the first time in decades my nuclear fears have returned thanks to Putin’s irrational and brutal invasion of Ukraine. Is this tyrant compos mentis, and if not, do any of his subordinates have the courage to stand up to him? Given his predilection for poisoning opponents, I seriously doubt it.

Clearly our military leaders in the West also fear Putin’s nuclear arsenal, otherwise we would have surely set up a no-fly zone or even sent in troops to aid the Ukrainians. We don’t want to provoke the bear.

So sad that after decades of relative peace we now have Cold War II.

Dave Priest Vale of Glamorgan