It is my current view that this BBC article and the recent announcement by national security advisor Powell are conditioning the public mind not for an actual hot war, but for a "tough winter" of eye-watering price rises, possible shortages, and maybe even utility supply problems if we are particularly unlucky. While talk of war increases, a glance at the state of the military suggests to me this is unlikely. What we have is rather limited, and even that is only about 1% deployable within 6 months. Much of Europe the same (Poland being an exception).

That said, I also believe that there is fairly widespread, low intensity, grey-zone action across Europe at the moment. Not every random fire or infrastructure failure is "The Russians", but I'd be surprised if none of them were. Indeed some of them have already been formally attributed.

It is, however, correct to attribute all sabotage and random failures to Russia until proven otherwise. No matter if we like it or not, Russia has decided to be hostile, and is actively committing sabotage.

It would be foolish to still just wring our hands about it. We have to name the enemy, Russia, and both support Ukraine's fight and do our own active hybrid actions on Russian soil. And yes, military buildup is required.

And to be clear, this will not end anytime soon. The war in Ukraine is but one aspect of Russia's imperial ambitions. It's fully possible we will not see friendly relations again in our lifetimes.

The correct answer.