The war in Ukraine is showing up the inconsistency and moral sloppiness of how Britain deals with regimes
War is a good time to bury scruples. We may hate Vladimir Putin, but one dictator at a time appears all we can handle. So Britain’s Boris Johnson is to make a humiliating dash to plead with Saudi Arabia’s ruler Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to lower the price of oil. What will he offer in return? Will it be a blind eye to the state murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi, the continued devastation of the Yemenis, or the execution at the weekend of 81 men, some of them political prisoners? Who next is to be appeased, the “oligarchs” of the UAE, or Nicolás Maduro, ruler of oil-rich Venezuela? How kind must Britain suddenly be to China, as the latter equivocates in its attitude to Putin and greedily eyes Taiwan?
Ukraine has brought an enhanced moral sloppiness to British policymaking. Sanctions were thought a price worth paying in lieu of coming more directly to Kyiv’s aid against Putin. But as the war has not gone well for Putin, nor have sanctions for the west. They have sent energy prices and inflation soaring. At first this was to be a noble display of sharing Ukraine’s agony, sort of. Now it has all got too much. Political scientists may call it realpolitik, but in truth it is merely starting to hurt.
Simon Jenkins is a Guardian columnist
