Bloody warning from history - G7 leaders in summit

IN 10 days’ time, the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo will be marked. That great and brutal event was one of modern Europe’s defining moments and is still regarded in some countries’ military histories as one of the continent’s first concerted responses to tyranny.

That, of course, is a subjective view, but how disheartening it is to see the very same forces at play today as the leaders from the G7 gather for a summit in the Bavarian Alps. They strongly supported a call from US president Barack Obama for a tougher line against Russian ambitions in Ukraine. The summit will , among many other issues such as violent extremism, ebola, and climate change, discuss the crisis in Greece, but the cultural chasm between the West and Putin’s Russia will hardly leave the top of the agenda.

The consequences of a complete collapse in the relationship between Russia and the West are too stark to even contemplate. But the question remains: How do you dissuade a determined despot happy to deploy a well-armed and powerful army, one who enjoys considerable support among his countrymen?