Editorial: ​UK right to help Ukraine against a vulnerable Putin

Mr Prigozhin is, after all, a mercenary - and mercenaries are generally people of whom to be wary, let alone their leaders. But while the rebellion might have been preposterous in its ambition and while it failed fast, it has made President Vladimir Putin look vulberable.

The Russian military had to scramble to defend its capital, Moscow, and a city, Rostov-on-Don effectively fell without resistance. This is in part perhaps because a coup d'etat is an implausible event even in Russia, and so while defeating it might be easy, preparations for it might also be patchy.

However, the saga helps to illustrate why the UK has been so right to be one of Ukraine's biggest moral supporters. President Putin's invasion was, self evidently, an outrage and yet in an important respect it has failed. All sorts of political voices, including some here in Northern Ireland, seem pleased with themselves when they wearily intone about how a negotiated settlement is inevitable, as if they are realists in a sea of idealists.

But President Putin has not just helped turn one of the world's biggest countries (the biggest in size, the ninth biggest in population) into a deeply corrupt, semi rogue state, but he has triggered by some measures the worst war in Europe since 1945.

The western countries that repudiate these atrocious values are still dominant in the world, but they face a rising and brutal China. In the West there are powerful voices and interests that want easy relations with both Moscow and Beijing. But western values of democracy and freedom are fragile. We should be prepared to withstand some economic damage, for example in terms of helping invaded nations or in loss of types of trade, to try to prevent very dangerous tyrannies becoming yet more powerful on the world stage.