Liz Truss warns stopping Vladimir Putin now could save future wars in the Baltic states

Vladimir Putin will keep waging war on neighbouring countries if he is allowed to invade Ukraine, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss has warned.

As the Russian President put on a huge show of military strength with nuclear drills involving ballistic missiles, submarines and tank convoys yesterday, Ms Truss issued a last-ditch plea for the international community to unite to face down Moscow’s aggression.

Ms Truss used an exclusive interview with The Mail on Sunday to argue that if Putin attacked Ukraine it would be a precursor to Russia using force to annex more former Soviet states.

‘We need to stop Putin because he will not stop at Ukraine.

Vladimir Putin will keep waging war on neighbouring countries if he is allowed to invade Ukraine, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss has warned

As the Russian President (above) put on a huge show of military strength with nuclear drills involving ballistic missiles (left), submarines and tank convoys yesterday, Ms Truss issued a last-ditch plea for the international community to unite to face down Moscow’s aggression

‘He’s been very clear – his ambition doesn’t just lead to him taking control of Ukraine, he wants to turn the clock back to the mid 1990s or even before then,’ she said.

‘The Baltic States are at risk… the Western Balkans as well.

‘Putin has said all this publicly, that he wants to create the Greater Russia, that he wants to go back to the situation as it was before where Russia had control over huge swathes of Eastern Europe.

‘So it’s so important that we and our allies stand up to Putin. It could be Ukraine next week but then which country will it be next?’

The Foreign Secretary’s words came as Boris Johnson warned that a Russian invasion of Ukraine could cause ‘the destruction of a democratic state’ and ‘the shock will echo around the world’.

Speaking at the Munich Security Conference today, the Prime Minister said the ‘omens are grim’ from Russia on the possibility of an invasion in the coming days, and that the world could not ‘underestimate the gravity of this moment’.

Ukrainian soldiers taking part in military exercises on February 18, 2022 as fears of a Russian invasion persist

Mr Johnson, who met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the summit, said: ‘If Ukraine is invaded and if Ukraine is overwhelmed, we will witness the destruction of a democratic state, a country that has been free for a generation, with a proud history of elections. 

‘And every time Western ministers have visited Kyiv, we have reassured the people of Ukraine and their leaders that we stand four-square behind their sovereignty and independence.

‘How hollow, how meaningless, how insulting those words would seem if at the very moment when their sovereignty and independence is imperilled we simply look away.

 Boris Johnson has warned an invasion of Ukraine could cause ‘the destruction of a democratic state’ and ‘the shock will echo around the world’. Pictured: The Prime Minister meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy

A Tu-22M3 Russian bomber flies over the Mediterranean after taking off from the Hemeimeem air base in Syria in Putin’s latest show of force

‘If Ukraine is invaded, the shock will echo around the world.’ Mr Johnson added that new legislation allowing the UK to widen its sanctions against the country would ‘open up the matryoshka dolls’ of Russian-owned companies and make it impossible for them to raise finance in London.

The Russian military exercises involved Mig fighter bombers armed with hypersonic missiles patrolling over the Mediterranean from their bases in Syria, and included practice launches of intercontinental ballistic missiles.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that the manoeuvres, which included the Black Sea Fleet, based on the Crimean Peninsula annexed by Russia in 2014, ‘should not cause anyone concern’.

It came as Ukraine’s Russian-backed breakaway eastern territories have ordered military mobilisations, with men of fighting age in the self-declared people’s republics of Donetsk and Luhansk being put on stand-by.

Two Ukrainian soldiers were killed and four injured by shelling on Saturday, as international monitors reported a ‘dramatic increase’ in attacks along the line dividing rebel and government forces.