CHAPTER 1 CHURCHILL IN A T-SHIRT

The invasion of Ukraine by Russia was barely a week old as the populace took shelter from the bombardment, some in their basements, some in the metro stations — and some in the familiar embrace of self-preserving humor.

President Putin and his driver were on their way to Kyiv in a car when all of a sudden they hit a pig near a farmhouse, killing it instantly.

Putin told his driver to go up to the farmhouse and explain to the owners what had happened. About one hour later Putin sees his driver staggering back to the car with a bottle of Horilka (Ukrainian vodka) in one hand, a cigar in the other and his clothes all ripped and torn.

“What happened to you?” asked Putin.

“Well, the farmer gave me the Horilka, his wife gave me a box of cigars and their 19-year-old and 21-year-old daughters made mad passionate love to me simultaneously.”

“My God, what did you tell them?” asks Putin.

The driver replies, “I’m president Putin’s driver, and I just killed the pig.”

Dozens if not hundreds of such jokes riddled the internet, a perfectly apt phenomenon for a country whose President was a successful Jewish comedian in the years before being sworn in on May 20, 2019, with over 72% of the vote. Jews have a sharpened belief in the saving grace of humor, acquired over millennia as God’s chosen punching bags.

On January 25, 2022, less than three years after taking office, Volodymyr Zelensky celebrated his 44^th birthday, a month before the invasion. Refusing offers to be whisked out of Ukraine to safety, Zelensky’s stature on the world stage grew even faster than Putin’s stature shrank. “The fight is here; I need antitank ammo, not a ride,” he said in a video he posted on twitter on the morning of February 26.

This guerrilla President — quickly labelled ‘Churchill in a T-shirt’ — broadcast courage to his people and admonished the West.

“Today, the leadership of the alliance gave the green light for further bombing of Ukrainian cities and villages, having refused to set up a no-fly zone.”

The President then took to Twitter, calling on world leaders to “not watch, but help.”

The day before, Zelensky’s emotional plea inspired a standing ovation from members of the European parliament, and brought interpreters to tears, as ABC News reported:

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has urged the European Union to prove that it stands with Ukraine in its war with Russia, a day after signing an official request to join the bloc.

“We are fighting to be equal members of Europe. I believe that today we are showing everybody that is what we are,” an emotional Mr Zelensky told an emergency session of the European parliament via video link.

“Nobody is going to break us.” (See Chapter 4 for transcript.)

[It was irony on a grand scale: there was Zelensky, successfully urging and inspiring his nation, whose flag is half yellow, to bravery.]

EU politicians, many wearing #standwithUkraine T-shirts bearing the Ukrainian flag, others with blue-and-yellow scarves or ribbons, gave Mr Zelensky a standing ovation.

The speech came hours after Mr Zelensky submitted an application to the European Union to grant Ukraine immediate membership.

In an open letter, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Romania expressed support for Ukraine’s swift entry.

Russia’s war on Ukraine is now in its sixth day, with a miles-long convoy of Russian tanks and armored vehicles inching closer to the Ukrainian capital and fighting intensifying on the ground.

Russian artillery hit the main central square in Ukraine’s second-largest city Kharkiv, and other civilian targets, Ukrainian authorities said.

Mr Zelensky has remained in Kyiv to rally his people against the invasion.

“Do prove that you are with us. Do prove that you will not let us go. Do prove that you are indeed Europeans and then life will win over death and light will win over darkness,” he said in Ukrainian, bringing the English interpreter to tears.

A German interpreter translating the speech on live TV abruptly stopped before she broke down into tears.

Mr Zelensky accused Moscow of resorting to “terror” tactics in Europe’s largest ground war since World War II.

He said 16 children had been killed around Ukraine on Monday, and mocked Russia’s claim that it was only going after military targets.

“Where are the children? What kind of military factories do they work at? What tanks are they going at?” he asked.

From inside a bunker, Mr Zelensky told reporters he was open to dialogue, but Russia needed to stop bombarding Ukraine before any ceasefire talks.

“Stop bombarding people first and start negotiating afterwards,” he said.

“Everybody has to stop fighting and to go to that point from where it was beginning.”

He also called for security guarantees if NATO members were not ready to admit Ukraine to the bloc.

On day 14 of the invasion, Zelensky gave an interview to Ben C. Solomon of VICE News, reiterating his and his country’s defiance. He also reflected on how he saw NATO at that time.

“First of all. I want security guarantees from NATO. I only know one thing. As of today, it looks like this. The current situation is a betrayal of our ideals and trust. We are grateful to NATO countries for giving us weapons and other things. But we just wanted to be equal. That’s it. But it turns out that equality costs a lot, and not everybody gets it.”

“What is your message for young people?” asked Solomon.

“I can’t come up with a message for them… these people are independent, free and very strong. They will endure everything, overcome everything, go through fire and water.

“Can you make a compromise with Putin? Can you trust Putin?” Solomon asked Zelensky in the interview. “Trust? Oh no. I trust only my family.”

“How can you make a deal with somebody you don’t trust then?”

“We have to. We have to. Because this war had to stop. Only dialogue, and only dialogue with him, the President of Russia. Russia is fighting against Ukraine. They came to our land, to our houses, to our children. We didn’t invite them. But they’re here now. They are here.”

“What would be your message to President Vladimir Putin right now?”

“Right now, stop the war, begin to speak.”

It cannot be any clearer: 141 countries of the world condemned Russia for its invasion of Ukraine as illegitimate in a vote at the UN General Assembly. And all 141 countries had done nothing to stop Russia continuing to break international law. But Putin got a good finger wagging… Addressing the UN membership, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres stated that “the fighting in Ukraine must stop.”

He continued: “I must say, President Putin: In the name of humanity bring your troops back to Russia. In the name of humanity do not allow to start in Europe what could be the worst war since the beginning of the century, with consequences not only devastating for Ukraine, not only tragic for the Russian Federation, but with an impact we cannot even foresee in relation to the consequences for the global economy in a moment when we are emerging from the COVID [pandemic] and so many developing countries absolutely need to have space for the recovery which would be very, very difficult, with the high prices of oil, with the end of exports of wheat from Ukraine, and with the rising interest rates caused by instability in international markets. This conflict must stop — now. Thank you very much.”

The UN resolution was passed at a special meeting of the General Assembly called because of a lack of unanimity of the permanent members, so that the UN’s Security Council fails to:

“… exercise its primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security in any case where there appears to be a threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression.”

Unlike a Security Council resolution, a General Assembly resolution does not have the potential to become legally binding.

Tough talking UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the resolution sent a message “loud and clear” to Russia. “End hostilities in Ukraine now. Silence the guns now,” he said. “Open the door to dialogue and diplomacy now. The territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine must be respected in line with the UN Charter. We don’t have a moment to lose.” That was many, many lost moments ago…

Incapable of passing a resolution to do something to halt Russia’s invasion by force in the Security Council where Russia and China have veto rights, the UN proved itself as useful as that proverbial ashtray on a motorbike.

NATO allies rejected Ukraine’s request to set up and enforce a no-fly zone over Ukraine, saying that it would lead to a larger, more devastating conflict across Europe. “We are not part of this conflict, and we have a responsibility to ensure it does not escalate and spread beyond Ukraine,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told a news conference on Friday in Brussels, echoing statements made by White House officials several days earlier (and subsequently) about a no-fly zone.

It was argued in a column in The Spectator Australia (March 8, 2022): “The Russian invasion force is acting illegally in a sovereign state; Ukraine is a democracy which is asking, begging, for military assistance to defend itself against a more powerful aggressor. If that assistance endangers the respondents, what hope for any peace at the hands of Putin?

“The major powers — the US, UK, Germany, France — joined by other willing nations, should be able to form a ‘pop up’ United Nations-like force that diffuses the target among themselves and does what the UN should be doing. Under the operational command of a tested military leader, that ‘international peace force’ would patrol the no-fly zone and perhaps extend its operations to assisting the Ukrainian ground forces.”

And there was another possibility, canvassed in a letter to The Australian (March 9) from reader Glenn Simpson.

A possible solution to the Ukraine crisis would be a UN-sanctioned peacekeeping force, backed by a Security Council resolution, but such a resolution would be vetoed by the Russian Federation. However, the UN Charter provides that the Soviet Union has a permanent seat on the Security Council, not the Russian Federation, which is only one successor state representing only part of the former Soviet Union and has succeeded to that seat by courtesy and general agreement. That courtesy should be withdrawn, and the seat on the Security Council declared by the General Assembly to have lapsed with the demise of the Soviet Union. Then a fresh resolution can be put to the Security Council requiring the Russian Federation to withdraw its troops, or face a combined UN force such as fought in Korea in 1949–52.

Earlier, on February 24, the eve of the invasion, Zelensky’s video address (translated below) demonstrated his determination for averting war:

“Today I initiated a phone call with the president of the Russian federation. The result was silence. Though the silence should be in Donbas. That’s why I want to address today the people of Russia. I am addressing you not as a president, I am addressing you as a citizen of Ukraine. More than 2,000 km of the common border is dividing us. Along this border your troops are stationed, almost 200,000 soldiers, thousands of military vehicles. Your leaders approved them to make a step forward, to the territory of another country. And this step can be the beginning of a big war on European continent.

“We know for sure that we don’t need the war. Not a Cold War, not a hot war. Not a hybrid one. But if we’ll be attacked by the [enemy] troops, if they try to take our country away from us, our freedom, our lives, the lives of our children, we will defend ourselves. Not attack, but defend ourselves. And when you will be attacking us, you will see our faces, not our backs, but our faces.

“The war is a big disaster, and this disaster has a high price. With every meaning of this word. People lose money, reputation, quality of life, they lose freedom. But the main thing is that people lose their loved ones, they lose themselves.

“They told you that Ukraine is posing a threat to Russia. It was not the case in the past, not in the present, it’s not going to be in the future. You are demanding security guarantees from NATO, but we also demand security guarantees. Security for Ukraine from you, from Russia and other guarantees of the Budapest memorandum.

“But our main goal is peace in Ukraine and the safety of our people, Ukrainians. For that we are ready to have talks with anybody, including you, in any format, on any platform. The war will deprive [security] guarantees from everybody — nobody will have guarantees of security anymore. Who will suffer the most from it? The people. Who doesn’t want it the most? The people! Who can stop it? The people. But are there those people among you? I am sure.

“I know that they [the Russian state] won’t show my address on Russian TV, but Russian people have to see it. They need to know the truth, and the truth is that it is time to stop now, before it is too late. And if the Russian leaders don’t want to sit with us behind the table for the sake of peace, maybe they will sit behind the table with you. Do Russians want the war? I would like to know the answer. But the answer depends only on you, citizens of the Russian Federation.”

When the threat of invasion hung like a black cloud over Ukraine and Western leaders were jittery, Zelensky’s now famous, sarcastic but misunderstood jive about the anticipated timing of Russia’s move (‘February 16’) was buried in his February 14 address to the Unity of Ukrainian Society:

[As translated by the Ukrainian Government]

Great people of a great country! I am addressing you at this tense moment.

Our state is facing serious external and internal challenges that require responsibility, confidence and concrete actions from me and each of us.

We are being intimidated by the great war and the date of the military invasion is being set again. This is not the first time.

The war against us is being systematically waged on all fronts. On the military one, they increase the contingent around the border. On the diplomatic one, they are trying to deprive us of the right to determine our own foreign policy course. On the energy one, they limit the supply of gas, electricity and coal. On the information one, they seek to spread panic among citizens and investors through the media.

But our state today is stronger than ever.

This is not the first threat that the strong Ukrainian people have faced. Two years ago, we, like the rest of the world, looked confused in the eyes of the pandemic. However, we united and with clear systemic steps practically defeated it. In this difficult time, the strong Ukrainian people have shown their best qualities - unity and the will to win.

Unlike the pandemic two years ago, today we clearly understand all the challenges we face and what to do about them. We are confident, but not self-confident. We understand all the risks. We are constantly monitoring the situation, working out different scenarios, preparing decent responses to all possible aggressive actions.

We know exactly where the foreign army is near our borders, its numbers, its locations, its equipment and its plans.

We have something to respond with. We have a great army. Our guys have unique combat experience and modern weapons. This is an army many times stronger than eight years ago.

Along with the army, Ukrainian diplomacy is at the forefront of defending our interests. We have managed to gain diplomatic support from almost all leaders of the civilized world. Most of them have either already visited and supported Ukraine, or will do so in the near future. Today, everyone recognizes that the security of Europe and the entire continent depends on Ukraine and its army.

We want peace and we want to resolve all issues exclusively through negotiations. Both Donbas and Crimea will return to Ukraine. Exclusively through diplomacy. We do not encroach on what’s not ours, but we will not give up our land.

We are confident in our Armed Forces, but our military must also feel our support, our cohesion and our unity. The foothold of our army is the confidence of their own people and a strong economy.

We have formed sufficient reserves to repel attacks on the hryvnia exchange rate and our financial system. We will not ignore any industry that will need government support. As it happened the other day with airlines. And evidence of this is a stable hryvnia exchange rate and open skies.

An important front of defense is the objective coverage of the situation by the domestic media. And now I want to address our Ukrainian journalists. Some of you sometimes have to perform the tasks of media owners. Most of them have already fled their own country.

Work for Ukraine, not for those who fled. The fate of the country today depends on your honest position.

And now I want to address not those who stayed with Ukraine and in Ukraine, but those who left it at the most crucial moment. Your strength is not in your money and planes, but in the civic position you can show. Return to your people and the country due to which you got your factories and wealth. Today, everyone passes a real test for a citizen of Ukraine. Pass it with dignity. Let everyone understand for whom Ukraine is really the Homeland, and for whom it is just a platform for money making.

I address separately all representatives of the state: civil servants, people’s deputies of all levels who have fled the country or plan to do so. The people of Ukraine have entrusted you not only to govern the state, but also to protect it. It is your direct duty in this situation to be with us, with the Ukrainian people. I urge you to return to your homeland within 24 hours and stand side by side with the Ukrainian army, diplomacy and people.

We are told that February 16 will be the day of the attack. We will make it the Day of Unity. The relevant decree has already been signed. On this day, we will hoist national flags, put on blue and yellow ribbons and show the world our unity.

We have one great European aspiration. We want freedom and are ready to fight for it. 14,000 defenders and civilians killed in this war are watching us from the sky. And we will not betray their memory.

We all want to live happily, and happiness loves the strong ones. We have never known what it is to give up and we are not going to learn that.

Today is not just Valentine’s Day. It is the day of those in love with Ukraine. We believe in our own strength and continue to build our future together. Because we are united by love for Ukraine, united and unique. And love will win. Yes, now you may think it’s darkness all around. But tomorrow the sun will rise again over our peaceful sky.

Love Ukraine!

We are calm! We are strong! We are together! Great people of a great country.

Support for him and Ukraine was universal. For example, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison held a private phone call with Zelensky where they discussed ways Australia could assist Ukraine further. The Prime Minister tweeted on March 5 that he also “condemned” Russia’s actions on behalf of all Australians: “Just spoke with Ukrainian President Zelensky. He thanked Australia for our military & humanitarian support & extensive sanctions. We discussed ways we could assist further. I praised Ukraine’s courage against Russia’s aggression & condemned Russia’s actions on behalf of us all.”

MailOnline’s Dan Wootton perfectly captured the feelings of the brand new, spontaneous, and global Zelensky Admiration Society in his March 1 column:

Oh, how they sniggered.

When famed physical comic Volodymyr Zelensky was elected President of Ukraine in 2019 with over 70 percent of the vote on an anti-corruption mandate versus his pro-Russia opponent, the mainstream media treated his elevation as, well, a bit of a joke.

“Ukrainians are waking up this morning and discovering that the last few months were not a dream. They really have elected a man who currently stars in a TV series as the president — as the country’s next real president,” the BBC sneered in the hours after his historic election, having previously described him as “clueless”.

Commentators were even harsher.

The famous Ukrainian writer Oksana Zabuzhko wrote: “I hear an offscreen laugh of scriptwriters who have conjured all this plot for stupid Ukrainians.”

No one is laughing at Zelensky now.

The Ukrainian president has proven he’s nothing like our craven modern politicians who don’t give a damn about the folk they represent; so much so that he’s prepared to die alongside his fellow Ukrainians to defend the capital Kyiv against the near certain upcoming onslaught from Vladimir Putin.

When the 44-year-old received an offer of evacuation from US authorities this weekend, with Russian troops continuing to encircle Kyiv, he delivered a line straight from a Hollywood action movie: “We need ammo, not a ride.”

Who believes that would be the response from a snivelling Macron, pampered Trudeau or braindead Biden in the same circumstances?

It certainly wasn’t the response by Afghanistan’s former president Ashraf Ghani who jumped on a US helicopter full of cash out of Kabul last year before it was even officially confirmed the Taliban were nearby.

No wonder Boris Johnson remarked after a recent phone call with Zelensky: “Jesus, that guy is brave.”

Because be in no doubt that the lives of Zelensky, his screenwriter wife Olena Zelenska and two children, daughter Aleksandra, 17, and son Kiril, nine, are now unquestionably on the line.

They’re Putin’s “number one targets”, with a death order being given to 400 brutal Russian mercenaries already operating in the city, who have express orders from the Kremlin to assassinate Zelensky, according to The Times today.

In a twist no scriptwriter could have predicted, Zelensky — once a comic star in Russia, the country now out to kill him — has become the world’s heroic leading man.

It’s Zelensky’s career in showbiz — he also won the local version of Strictly Come Dancing and is the Ukrainian voice of Paddington — that has helped Ukraine win the propaganda effort hands down.

His powerful oratory via official channels and social media has already changed the course of this conflict.

Indeed, some of his speeches over the past week have been so powerful that TV translators have had to stop talking because they can’t contain their emotions.

There was his savage taunt to Putin: “When you attack us, you will see our faces, not our backs.”

Or his address to the Munich Security Conference on February 19, where he helped the world wake up to the coming horrors by saying: “When a bomb crater appears in a school playground, children have a question: ‘Has the world forgotten the mistakes of the 20th century?’ Indifference makes you an accomplice.”

And when the Russian disinformation campaign suggested Zelensky had fled the capital, he simply took his mobile phone to the streets and made a selfie video to reassure his people he wasn’t going anywhere.

“We’re all here. Our military is here. Citizens in society are here. We’re all here defending our independence, our country — and it will stay this way,” he insisted.

Then there’s the video call with EU leaders — reluctant to enter the conflict — soon after the Russian invasion, where he warned them: “This might be the last time you see me alive.”

These are all the sorts of powerful lines that could have been uttered by his character Vasyl Petrovych Holoborodko in the TV series Servant of the People, which ended in 2019, where his character, a teacher, became the president after a rant he made about corruption went viral after being posted on the internet by his students.

As politicians around the world, from Sleepy Joe Biden to Mr Blackface Authoritarian Justin Trudeau, become more of a joke AFTER they take office, Zelensky has morphed from comedian to statesman over the course of just a few weeks.

Compare Zelensky’s rhetoric with that of Britain’s MI6 chief Richard Moore.

Moore has spent the crisis talking about gay rights for some unknown reason, unfathomably tweeting: “With the tragedy and destruction unfolding so distressingly in Ukraine, we should remember the values and hard-won freedoms that distinguish us from Putin, none more than LGBT+ rights.”

WTAF? No wonder Putin and China’s Jinping continue to treat us with such disdain.

But in hardman Zelensky — dressed in his green military fatigues, showing off a body once toned on Dancing With The Stars — Putin has encountered a far tougher opponent.

His authenticity and ability to speak directly to Russians in their language has convinced many to support his cause, helping lead to large illegal anti-war protests on the streets of Moscow and St Petersburg.

Zelensky’s personal story has also helped repudiate Putin’s propaganda campaign that the first illegal invasion of a sovereign country by a superpower in 80 years is all down to ridding Ukraine of Nazis.

He is from a Jewish family and his grandfather Semyon Ivanovych was the only one of his four brothers to survive the Holocaust, with the others all killed by Nazis.

As an incredulous Zelensky has pointed out: “How can I be a Nazi? Explain it to my grandfather, who went through the entire war in the infantry of the Soviet army and died a colonel in an independent Ukraine.”

Zelensky — most famous before the war for starring in that infamous phone call with Donald Trump that resulted in the US president’s political impeachment in the house — had been down in the polls before Putin decided to go to war with Ukraine, having been unable to stamp out the country’s rampant corruption as promised.

His close relationship with the billionaire oligarch Ihor Kolomoyskyi raised eyebrows and critics believe he surrounded himself with too many pro-Russian, anti-Western advisers who may have wrongly convinced him that war could be averted, despite intelligence from the UK and US to the contrary.

But none of that matters now.

Leaders are judged by history on their actions in wartime.

And Zelensky’s approach has been highly effective, garnering tougher sanctions, more military supplies and piling the pressure on the West to man the hell up and stop appeasing Putin.

His history-making news clips posted directly to social media have seen his followers soar, with over three million on Twitter and 12 million on Instagram.

Like Donald Trump before him, he has the authenticity so lacking in our modern-day politicians, who seem to have become paranoid, scripted robots.

Biden couldn’t even get through a press conference on the conflict without breaking into inappropriate smirks, for God’s sake.

Zelensky is rightly now a global hero, but whether he survives the war is impossible to predict, given Putin — who runs a well-oiled international killing machine — wants him dead.

Perhaps what’s most heart-warming is that Zelensky never needed to enter politics; he had national superstardom, millions in the bank, luxury villas and a highly successful career in Russia, until he donated money to help support the Ukrainian army in 2014.

Zelensky once said: “You don’t need experience to be president. You just need to be a decent human being.”

And it’s that innate decency which is why he’d rather die alongside his citizens in Kyiv than cut and run on a US helicopter.

I pray that this inspirational figure can lead Ukraine out of this quagmire — the world will be a better place for it.

Indeed, a “decent human being” may well deliver better outcomes than experience in politics.

But, of course, it wasn’t just his stirring speeches that gave him a hero’s glow; it was that defiant stand against the Russian bully, that action which spoke louder even than his accented Churchillian words.

Comparing his country’s fight against Russia to the British war effort against Nazi Germany, he told the British House of Commons via video link: “You didn’t want to lose your country when Nazis wanted to take your country,” as he invoked Winston Churchill and said Ukraine “will continue fighting for our land, whatever the cost. We will fight in the forests, the fields, the shores and in the streets.”

(Fuelling Churchill memories… a couple of weeks later, the Prime Ministers of Poland, Czech Republic, and Slovenia covertly took a train into Kyiv to meet with Zelensky, reminiscent of US President Roosevelt’s flight to meet Churchill in Casablanca.)

Zelensky was speaking in an informal sitting as the first non-member to address the Chamber (usually world leaders speak in the Royal Gallery or Westminster Hall) and appeared on large screens over MPs’ heads at 5pm on March 8, 2022.

For all the applause and promises of support across the political board that followed his short speech (and a standing ovation that replaced taking a stand with a fist Putin would understand), his central and unwavering call for the protection of a no-fly zone remained a no-go. It wasn’t even mentioned in reply speeches by either PM Boris Johnson or the Opposition’s Keir Starmer. (But an embargo on Russian energy was finally declared by the US soon after.)

But more than his repeated appeals to the West, it was those video clips of him as literally “the man in the street” when the street was deadly dangerous that showed a clear case of the moment making the man.

The resume of his life prior to his Presidency was not out of the Ukrainian ordinary for a successful entertainment performer.

Nor was his decision to adopt the name of his TV show as the name of his political vehicle: Servant of the People. In Western culture, it may seem flippant. In the culture of Eastern Europe, and in a country where politicians had been anything but servants of the people, it seemed apt, a promise. It struck a chord, as they say. (Western politicians should resist feeling smug: they, too, could take on that promise as a personal mission.) Zelensky also adopted the show’s storyline: actor/comedian becomes popular President.

The party was created in March 2018 by the founders of Kvartal 95, the TV production company. A year after its creation, Zelensky gave an interview to Der Spiegel, in which he declared that he “wanted to bring professional, decent people to power” because he “would really like to change the mood and timbre of the political establishment, as much as possible”. Old hands in politics would have laughed behind his back — especially in Ukraine, one of the most corrupt countries in Europe. But they didn’t have the majority of the votes… Nor did they feature as favorites in opinion polls, like Zelensky did.

Many will remember the headlines when he was elected: “Ukraine election: Comedian Zelensky wins presidency by landslide” as the BBC had it. Was it his wonderful humor that made people laugh when nothing else was funny? Or was it his old fashioned (romantic?) notion that politics should be clean? It wasn’t his looks: neither ugly nor handsome, he looks… well, average, with a pleasant if nondescript face, pointed chin and neat hair. He married Olena Kiyashko in 2003; they went to the same school but didn’t meet until later, and she joined Kvartal 95 as a writer. They have a daughter, Oleksandra, born in July 2002 and a son, Kyrylo, born in January 2013.

In the golden years of Hollywood, Zelensky would have been played by Jimmy Stewart. These days, probably Tom Hanks… In the media rush amidst the invasion, The Economist portrayed Zelensky as the boy from the rough neighborhood who stared down all his adversaries:

Zelensky was born in 1978 in Kryvyi Rih, a Soviet-looking industrial city in the southeast of Ukraine, a center of iron mining and metallurgy.

His favorite film was Once Upon a Time in America.

To survive among the town’s knife-wielding gangs, you had to have a sense of humor, chutzpah and a posse that had your back. Zelensky had all these things in abundance.

He burst on to the political scene in 2019. He was not a candidate of Ukrainian-speaking western Ukraine or of the Russian-speaking east. Instead, he rejected the linguistic, historical and ethnic split that has long been exploited both by Ukrainian politicians and by the Kremlin.

Partly as a result, he has brought the country closer together than it has been for years. Zelensky was driven by neither nationalism nor ideology. Nor was he a revolutionary. He was an everyman.

“Zelensky is fighting like a lion and the whole of Ukraine with him,” says Sevgil Musaeva, a Ukrainian journalist and the editor of Ukrainska Pravda, the country’s main online news site.

Some news reports in February and March 2022, named the Private Military Company (PMC) Wagner Group as one of the teams seeking to assassinate Zelensky on behalf of Putin. This is an international operation active since 2014, under its granite faced leader Dmitry Valeryevich Utkin, who named the unit in honor of the German composer… a nod to Utkin’s passion for the Third Reich. Previously, Utkin had been a lieutenant colonel and brigade commander of Special Forces of the Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces.

In December 2016, Utkin was photographed with Putin at a Kremlin reception given in honor of those who had been awarded the Order of Courage and the title Hero of the Russian Federation.

But the man ultimately behind Wagner and its source of finance is said to be Yevgeny Prigozhin, aka “Putin’s Chef”, a reference to his closeness to Putin and his extensive catering interests.

Russian and some Western observers believe that the organization does not actually exist as a private military company (owned by “Putin’s Chef”) but is a disguised branch of the Russian Ministry of Defence (MoD) that ultimately reports to the Russian government.

Sure enough, Wagner personnel — of whom there are now estimated to be some 6,000 — are trained at the Russian MoD facility Molkino, near Molkin village, in Krasnodar Krai. Described as a holiday camp for children, these barracks are not officially linked to the MoD.

Wagner employees were among the “little green men” who participated in the Russian takeover of Crimea in 2014 and assisted Russian separatists in Eastern Ukraine attempting to secede from the country, according to Weapons and Warfare. “Due to the group’s involvement in conflicts in these countries, Wagner has been repeatedly targeted for sanctions by the US government. In 2016, the US Treasury Department placed sanctions on Prigozhin via executive order for his ‘extensive business dealings with the Russian Ministry of Defence’ and for building bases to support Russian military actions in Ukraine.”

Early in 2020, Erik Prince, founder of the Blackwater Private Military Company, sought to provide military services to the Wagner Group in its operations in Libya and Mozambique, according to The Intercept. By March 2021, Wagner PMCs were reportedly also deployed in Zimbabwe, Angola, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, and possibly the Democratic Republic of Congo.

In late 2019, according to Wikipedia, a so-called Wagner code of honor was revealed that lists ten commandments for Wagner’s PMCs to follow. One is to protect the interests of Russia always and everywhere, to value the honor of a Russian soldier, to fight not for money, but from the principle of winning always and everywhere.

Since foiling three separate attempted assassinations (thanks to betrayal by anti-war elements within Russia’s Federal Security Service), the Ukraine Government has made plans to ensure a smooth transition to a successor if such an attempt is successful in future.

On March 7, Zelensky (perhaps recklessly) issued a defiant video of himself disclosing his location, saying he is “not afraid of anyone and not hiding” and reiterating that he plans to stay and fight.

Nobody in the political establishments of the world nor among the public thinks the invasion is anything but a Putin solo flight.

Farida Rustamova of the BBC’s Russian service, in a piece written for Substack, described the demeanor of Putin’s closest advisors days before the invasion:

As a former security officer, [Putin] always wants to take everyone by surprise… We saw this during an emergency extended meeting of the Security Council three days before the war. The stammering of Foreign Intelligence chief Sergei Naryshkin, the disorientation of the deputy head of the Kremlin administration, Dmitry Kozak, and the anxious face of Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, were more than eloquent.

The most influential people in Russia sat in front of Putin like schoolchildren before a teacher who suddenly announced a test. And this meeting after all wasn’t even about the war, they discussed only the recognition of the self-proclaimed DPR [Donetsk People’s Republic] and LPR [Luhansk People’s Republic].

Rustamova, as author and journalist Matt Taibbi reported on his TK News website, went on to quote a source close to the discussions describing the reaction among the officials: “They carefully pronounced ‘p—ts.” The missing word is pizdets, not an easy word to translate — like a more profane and dire version of clusterfuck. She noted that “according to him, the mood in the corridors of power is altogether not rosy, many are in a state of stupor.” Another source told her, “Nobody is thrilled, many understand that this is a mistake, but out of duty they come up with rationalizations for themselves in order to make it work in their heads.”

Even Putin’s fiercest critics have always seen him as cold, calculating, and pragmatic, writes Taibbi. That soon changed. Bloomberg’s Leonid Bershidsky, a former Moscow Times co-worker, tweeted:

If Putin does attack, the presumption of his rationality, which has been part of my analysis of his actions for the last 23 years, not just the past few weeks, will need to be thrown out the window.

The prospect of a Putin victory quickly faded. “As the Russo-Ukrainian War takes a darker turn it is important to emphasize this essential point: This is a war that Vladimir Putin cannot win, however long it lasts and however cruel his methods,” wrote Lawrence Freedman, emeritus professor of war studies at King’s College London, in Homeland Security Newswire. But he also noted: “If only for reasons of prudence, we must still assume that the Russians will be more successful in bringing the weight of their military strength to bear.”

Freedman captured the essence of the issue: “From the start, the Russian campaign has been hampered by political objectives that cannot be translated into meaningful military objectives. Putin has described a mythical Ukraine, a product of a fevered imagination stimulated by cockeyed historical musings. His Ukraine appears as a wayward sibling to be rescued from the “drug addicts and Nazis” (his phrase) that have led it astray. It is not a fantasy that Ukrainians recognize. They see it as an excuse to turn their country into a passive colony and this they will not allow.”

Indeed, Admiral Sir Tony Radakin, the chief of the UK defence staff, told The Times (March 8) that Moscow had “got itself into a mess” and that its invasion was “not going well”.

The Times reported that as many as 11,000 Russian soldiers had been killed in the fierce fighting, according to the latest approximate figures published by the Ukrainian armed forces on Sunday March 6. An estimated 44 aircraft, 285 tanks, 985 armored vehicles, 109 artillery systems and 60 fuel tanks have also been destroyed. Admiral Radakin said the Kremlin had lost more troops in a week than the UK did in 20 years in Afghanistan. He also said that the morale of the invading soldiers had been knocked so badly that some had abandoned the convoy destined for Kyiv to camp in the forest.

Dejà vu? The Nineteen Days (Heinemann) is ‘a broadcaster’s account of the Hungarian revolution’. That broadcaster was my father, George R. Urban. The book was written in the immediate aftermath of the revolution, my father sitting at his trusty typewriter in a Hampstead cottage, while I floated around in childish joy at my new-found freedom as a refugee in London. The following excerpts document a significant time in the 1956 Revolution: Point of No Return.

One pertinent reason for the poor fighting spirit of the Soviet tank crews was their supply position. They were expected to be able to live on the land or buy food in the shops. Faced by a hostile population, they could not do either. It did not take them long to discover that only arms and ammunition could buy the precious articles and that the men to contact were the freedom fighters. It is difficult to overestimate the part which the Russian’s foods shortage played both in undermining their own loyalties and raising the hopes of the population. In the capital and later in other cities and industrial centers, guns and even tanks were freely offered to the freedom fighters and the population in exchange for a few loaves of bread. The evidence that comes from a young worker from Miskolc is typical of many similar cases:

I was on my way to X when I saw two Russian tanks come up behind me. I was carrying two loaves of bread and about a kilo and a half of sausages. The Russians in the tanks must have seen that I had food in my basket. They stopped and one of them got out. He carried an automatic. He knew a little Hungarian as he had been in the country for some time. As far as I could make out, he asked me to give them my loaf and offered his tank in exchange. He looked completely starved. I took a loaf from my bag and cut a chunk for them. We talked for a while. Then he began to ask me for the rest of the food I was carrying. As they had the guns and I had nothing, I gave them all the food I had. Then I said to him, “Give me a gun.” He gave me his automatic with 14 bullets. When they got the food, he and another one who had joined him, began to weep. They told me they would take me home. I said there was no need to do that. I would go on my own. The first Russian then told me that they would like to come with me. They would do any work as long as they were allowed to stay in Hungary. If they were sent home, they would be liquidated. Of course, I couldn’t take the tank. I didn’t know how to drive it, and even if I did, what would I do with a tank single-handed? So I said to them, “Look, boys, I don’t want your ruddy tank. All I wanted was a gun and I got that.” But they didn’t think it was a good idea to stop there talking to me. So, I said goodbye to them and walked off.

Zelensky is the direct opposite of Putin, politically and personally. For example, it was Zelensky (on March 5) who expressed sympathy for the thousands of young Russian soldiers, “children really, 18, 19, 20,” dying in the conflict. Ten days later, Zelensky was offering them “a chance to survive.”

“Russian conscripts! Listen to me very carefully,” Zelensky said, during an address, according to his Presidential office. “Russian officers! You’ve already understood everything. You will not take anything from Ukraine. You will take lives. There are a lot of you. But your life will also be taken. But why should you die? What for? I know that you want to survive.

“Therefore, I offer you a choice. On behalf of the Ukrainian people, I give you a chance. Chance to survive. If you surrender to our forces, we will treat you the way people are supposed to be treated. As people, decently. In a way you were not treated in your army. And in a way your army does not treat ours. Choose!”

No wonder he is embraced by the global community, whereas Putin is reviled.

Zelensky’s Presidential campaign was conducted largely on social media (sound familiar?) and he succeeded in unseating incumbent President Petro Poroshenko, a well-known oligarch.

Several members of the Presidential Administration were former Zelensky colleagues from his production company, Kvartal 95, including Ivan Bakanov, appointed deputy director of the Ukrainian Secret Service (Americans will recognize this familiar jobs-for-the-boys routine from their observations of Washington DC).

Like all politicians and especially leaders, Zelensky had (and no doubt still has) his critics. Some were critical of the way his moves to reduce the influence of oligarchs helped centralize his own power. The question yet to be answered is how did he use (or intend to use) that power?

As the Russians pushed towards Kyiv, most of the US political class swung behind Zelensky. But not all. The US response to the Russian invasion has divided the old guard of the GOP — including figures like Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who have called for heavy US involvement in the conflict — from more populist-leaning newcomers like Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-N.C.), Senate candidate J.D. Vance, and conservative Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson, who have demanded that the US stay out of the conflict.

In March, footage emerged of Cawthorn saying: “Remember that Zelensky is a thug, remember that the Ukrainian government is incredibly corrupt and it is incredibly evil and it has been pushing woke ideologies. It really is the new woke world empire.”

Karl Rove, a Republican strategist, first mentioned Cawthorn’s remarks while speaking to a crowd in Asheville recently, before WRAL-TV published footage of Cawthorn speaking.

According to Joseph Lord reporting in the Epoch Times, Cawthorn provided no examples of thuggish or evil behavior as evidence to support his assertion. But the assertion became a political football around the Russian invasion of Ukraine. “Let’s be clear,” said state Sen. Chuck Edwards (R-NC) on Twitter. “The thug is Vladimir Putin. We must unite as a nation to pray for President Zelensky and the brave people of Ukraine who are fighting for their lives and their freedom.”

“I do not understand how anyone in American public office could call Zelensky a ‘thug’ while Ukraine is under such vicious assault,” said Michele Woodhouse in a statement posted to her campaign website. “Conservatives in my district are terrified that we will lose this republican seat to a leftist Biden democrat if Cawthorn somehow wins the nomination.” (Cawthorn is a first term Representative.)

Cawthorn has made clear that he does not approve of Russia’s actions either. “The actions of Putin and Russia are disgusting,” Cawthorn said on Twitter on March 10, the same day the footage was released. “But leaders, including Zelensky, should NOT push misinformation on America.”

The report did not mention any examples of what Cawthorn termed misinformation.

The Epoch Times reported that Cawthorn’s office didn’t respond to a request for comment.

In a statement to a news outlet, a spokesman for Cawthorn explained his position further. Cawthorn “supports Ukraine and the Ukrainian President’s efforts to defend their country against Russian aggression, but does not want America drawn into another conflict through emotional manipulation,” the spokesman said. Again, without supporting examples.

Ironically enough, one of Zelensky’s stated ambitions was to end the protracted conflict with Russia and he wanted to engage Putin in direct dialogue. Obviously, it was a popular, if unfulfilled, goal.

The Ukrainians threw out their Russia-friendly President, Viktor F. Yanukovich, without guns, in early 2014. The Maidan Square-centered protest, which had begun at the end of 2013, was maintained in the face of armed official and brutal unofficial forces. It is superbly captured in the 102-minute documentary, Winter on Fire: Ukraine’s fight for Freedom (2015).

The film, directed by Evgeny Afineevsky and written by Den Tolmor, shows in vivid detail the sheer determination, courage and resourcefulness of the Ukrainians. Putin should have watched the film before stating his objective of breaking the spirit of the Ukrainian people. They had no guns but they did have guts, and they had the will to free themselves from the cruel rule of communist puppet Yanukovich. There is security camera footage of him fleeing at dawn…

Astonishing footage of the fighting, rousing speeches of the protesters, heartbreaking scenes of brutality and sacrifice are woven together with the words of the participants themselves, speaking to camera. It is effectively making us an embedded observer.

And so are we embedded observers of the 2022 Russian invasion, with cameras recording it for now and for posterity. We watch in our homes as a war criminal in the Kremlin murders Ukrainians and dictates to the world. Only Zelensky, it seems, is really standing up to him, as best he can.