I was raised to believe that we should treat others as we ourselves would wish to be treated. That ideal still exists among the people that I know and deal with, and I do not believe we are that different to everyone else. It is the nature of humanity in all cultures. But it is not what we see today in Russia and the Middle East – and in certain quarters closer to home.

The ‘two-state solution’, so beloved of Western politicians, requires two things that appear increasingly unlikely. It needs Israel to give up land, whereas its actions in multiple wars and the partial peace between testify to the opposite aspiration. And it needs that new Islamic state to accept Israel as neighbour if not partner.

Instead, the sheer, brutal inhumanity of both sides in the conflict is evident for all to see, as if the opponent was less than human. With each side accused of genocidal intent, the horrors continue. Hopefully, we will get to see all such accusations tested in the International Criminal Court in the Hague. What leaders decree is not compatible with the natural humanity of the majority. If we ever do make it beyond the death and destruction, the national trauma and sense of guilt for both sides will not easily fade.

The war in Ukraine and now the Kursk region of Russia, is both similar and different. Putin’s forces inch forward, but at a terrible cost in both men and machinery. Both resources are finite, suggesting this is not a never-ending war. Before you even count the cost to Ukraine, Putin’s inhumanity towards his own people is reflected in the figure of 700,000 Russian losses to death and injury to date. That is much of the regular forces at the start of the war, plus legions of the rural poor. So far, he has balked at conscripting the sons of the urban middle classes, recently turning for help to the pariah state of North Korea. Add in the diaspora of refuseniks and the loss to Russia’s economy is immense.

There are websites dedicated to keeping score. And it is not just human losses. Ukraine has been targeting its opponent’s equipment, its planes, ships, tanks, artillery and radar systems, and recently its stockpiles of munitions and fuel. They have been very successful in this, aided no doubt by the best of Western satellite reconnaissance and the precision of donated weaponry. Billions of dollars’ worth of Russia’s most sophisticated equipment has literally gone up in smoke. Reports of older and older equipment being pressed into service are widespread.

As the West pensions off its F16 fighter jets and sends them to Ukraine, with French Mirage bombers now promised, the screw is turned tighter on Russia. The F16s may be old technology to us, but they are a generation better than what Russia has.

Increasingly, bloggers and military experts online are concluding, almost universally, that both the Russian military and economy are running on fumes. There have been delegations to the Kremlin. In the Middle East, Israel seems determined to leave its opponents in such a state that it will take them decades to recover, while in Eastern Europe, Putin has already assured that will be the fate of Russia. When the leader of Belarus dares to criticise him openly, you get a sense of how weakened he is.

So will Putin, increasingly backed into a corner, turn to his nuclear arsenal in an attempt to win this hubristic war? Some argue that he is held back by the fact that gaining irradiated land would be a pyrrhic victory. Others that he is genuinely frightened by the potential response. I have a different view, one that is increasingly being discussed online.

No doubt, Kremlin files show that its missiles have been maintained to a peak of perfection, but Putin knows what we also know, that Russia is a corrupt mafia state, and he will wonder how much of that essential funding, across the decades, ended up as dachas and swimming pools. How many of his missiles would actually fly, if initiated? What proportion would not make it out of the silo? Is it even possible that one or more would explode before leaving the ground? And bear in mind that these silos exist in groups. They are unionised: if one detonates within Russian soil, its close friends do, too. In recent tests, British nuclear missiles (with dummy warheads) failed to leave the launch site. Austerity with a similar effect to what we imagine from Russian corruption.

But just in case Putin decides to target Britain, perhaps believing that few will miss us, the new government has stationed German aircraft in Scotland and the ousted administration invited U.S. nuclear bombers back to Suffolk. Thankfully distant from peace-loving Foresters, these are nevertheless two very tangible examples of NATO solidarity, and certainly an improved deterrent to Putin’s potential spite.

Meanwhile, in Britain, I see the same venom in His Majesty’s increasingly disloyal opposition. A generation of power and edging ever further to the Right has exposed a fury when Democracy did not go their way. An unapologetic, shouty Conservative Party exposes its natural disdain for those it has governed so poorly.

Will its new leader recognise and correct this, or will it take a further political generation?

And, more importantly, will the economic strategy of the new Government, one with the intent to make the lives of you and I better, actually work?