A nervous and anxious time…

As I write to you today, I am more nervous than usual. I am trying to repress my anxiety, but it keeps simmering and spitting. It’s hard to keep a lid on it.

I am currently on my way to a safe zone to carry out administrative work, after which I intend on getting some R&R (rest and recovery). I have not had a break since September 1.

But there is a sense of foreboding hanging over the whole country today. It’s palpable. Like a thin screen of insidious gas, it hangs in the air.

You see, pictures have been circulating; pictures that show countless Russian bombers being packed with heavy duty armaments.

The date is November 28, and we are worried that the hardest strike of the war is now imminent. We are scared that we are about witness an aerial assault that eclipses that of October 10.

The pictures

PHOTOGRAPHS are being passed around from phone to phone and group to group. You can see them on Twitter. They show huge missiles, bombs, ordinates, being loaded into aircrafts.

As I move toward the safe-zone, stopping and camping in different buildings each night, thoughts of the worst rush into my head. You cannot stop them completely – all you can do is try your best to reason your way back to a calmer state of mind.

Looking after myself

FOR the next few weeks I will be writing about the war from afar. I’ll be well back from the frontline, away from the battlefield.

I have come to realise that, for my own psychological welfare and also so that I can be a useful actor in this war, I need to look after myself.

The struggle to survive

WHAT I have witnessed recently is the struggle of the Ukrainian people to survive. Basic self-preservation – and the protection of family – has become the level at which many people are being forced to live their lives.

Things that were once important now seem trivial. Life’s luxuries have been burned away. Only that which is truly essential remains.

Crisis time

EVERY day, everybody is dealing with some kind of crisis that is generated by the war.

At one end of the spectrum, you have people who are scared for their job security, and those isolated by the destruction of infrastructure and telecommunication pathways.

At the other end, you have people who are homeless, people who are legless, people who are friendless, sisterless, wifeless, childless.

You have people going through the worst of what the human experience holds.

The unassailable spirit

HOWEVER, people remain together. They hold themselves together. They reach an arm around their friends and family and try to hold them together too.

I imagine that the new Russian general’s intentions will be revealed in the next day or two. This could prove pivotal. It will tell us what he wants and what he is willing to do.

Unfortunately, we are about to find how much killing he is ready to unleash on the innocent people of Ukraine in order to further the so-called ‘Russian cause’.

A general who kills

SERGEY Surovikin, for those who do not know, was a leading general when Russia provided support for al-Asaad in Syria. There, he displayed a capacity to use violence against civilians as ‘tactical terror’.

Is his desire to destroy the will of the Ukrainian people through similar means?

If he wishes, there is no doubt he will be able to put people in life-threatening positions over the winter.

However, this would only strengthen the resolve of the Ukrainian people to push through to spring. Many, it seems, would quicker die than submit.

Out of touch

THEREFORE, if Russia thinks such a campaign of terror might spark a revolt or some sort of quasi-liberation campaign, they are totally out of touch with the Ukrainian psyche.

Yes, the Russians have the military might to kill hundreds of thousands of civilians, however, all they will be left with are bodies and hate.

The more wrongs the Russians commit, the more the Ukrainian hatred of them intensifies. It will only cement and reinforce their will to resist.

Help must increase

THIS is a pivotal moment in the war and the NATO nations are failing to provide the help Ukraine so desperately needs.

NATO and the European Union need to step up and help repair the infrastructure.

They should already have guaranteed a Ukraine no-fly zone, particularly over areas that hold critical infrastructure.

The lesson to be learned – and that can be learned – is that outside help is irreplaceable. With it, lives will be saved. Without it, they will be lost. That’s what we are talking about.

Enough people will die from bullets and bombs during this war. People should not be freezing and starving to death as well.