PuckstownLane

Tonight, fires are raging around St Petersburg after another Ukrainian drone attack. All because a 74-year-old man in the Kremlin decided that conquering his neighbours was more important than giving his own people a future. Imagine what Russia could have been. Your children studying at universities in Paris, Oxford or Berlin. Families spending summers on the Mediterranean, skiing in the Alps, discovering Rome, Barcelona and Copenhagen. Russian scientists working alongside Europe's finest minds. Businesses flourishing, borders opening, young Russians falling in love, travelling freely and building prosperous lives in the world's most extraordinary neighbourhood. And Russia's vast oil wealth could have continued filling the national savings account, building a financial cushion for a rainy day and securing the prosperity of future generations. Instead, that fortune has been drained by war, and the country's financial future has been mortgaged to one man's imperial ambitions. You had an entire continent on your doorstep, ready to trade, cooperate and prosper. Instead, you have sanctions, burning oil facilities, military funerals, censorship and a generation sacrificed to one elderly man's imperial fantasies. Children raised on militaristic propaganda, families struggling with poverty and alcoholism, and young men sent to die in Ukrainian fields. And your great international friendship? North Korea. A miserable dictatorship famous for prison camps, hunger, compulsory displays of loyalty and children taught to march in formation. Now Russia's future is increasingly tied to the failed Trump regime. And if you believe a man whose business empire has seen six corporate bankruptcies involving casinos and hotels is going to rescue the Russian economy, you may be in for another disappointment. Sorry, but Donald Trump is not Russia's financial salvation. You could have shared Europe's prosperity. Instead, Putin has brought you closer to Pyongyang, with a bankrupt casino magnate as your supposed lifeline. What a catastrophic waste of a great country's future. Oh well, anyway.