We now need to urgently turn the pressure up on Putin to withdraw from Ukraine

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It would be a timely demonstration of western frustration with Putin’s intransigence (AP)

Since Vladimir Putin seems to be showing absolutely no intention of stopping his annexation of Donetsk and Luhansk, never mind the Crimea, is it not time to turn up the pressure on him to withdraw? It seems to have escaped notice that the Kaliningrad Oblast (previously German Konigsberg) lying between Poland and Lithuania, would be a suitable candidate to be invited to join Nato, the EU or even to be found “a fascist regime”, hence ripe for “liberation”.

Deploying Putin’s false rhetoric against him, a threatened invasion of Kaliningrad could be a suitable bargaining tool to force a Russian withdrawal from Ukraine. Obviously, it would be a strategy that involves significant (massive) risk of nuclear escalation, but might be a timely demonstration of western frustration with Putin’s intransigence. Time for a build-up of Nato forces on the Polish and Lithuanian borders with Kaliningrad, perhaps?

Alistair Vincent