The UK Defence Secretary today compared Vladimir Putin to Hitler as he warned the Russian President is not in his “right mind”.
Ben Wallace repeated his claim that Moscow’s leader has gone “full tonto” by invading Ukraine.
The former Army Captain said Britain’s view is now that Russia intends to “invade the whole of Ukraine ” - but so far Moscow “failed” in its objectives, instead losing 450 soldiers.
He suggested Britain will be providing more military support to Ukraine - but ruled out RAF jets enforcing a no fly zone against Russian fighters, or putting British troops in the country.
Ukrainian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba compared the war to Kyiv’s shelling by Nazis as he condemned "horrific rocket strikes” on the capital.
“Last time our capital experienced anything like this was in 1941 when it was attacked by Nazi Germany," he tweeted just before 4am. "Ukraine defeated that evil and will defeat this one. Stop Putin. Isolate Russia. Sever all ties. Kick Russia out of (everywhere)."
Mr Wallace defended his controversial remark that there had been a “whiff of Munich” around diplomacy with Russia - suggesting the war has proven him right.
The Cabinet minister told Sky News: “It wasn’t the bit about appeasement I was referring to.
“In Munich in 1938, Adolf Hitler all along had a plan to invade parts of Europe. And all the diplomacy was about a straw man attempt by him to buy time.
“Putin has been set on this for many many months and certainly over a year. And I think that’s why - it doesn’t matter how much effort we made, and we all made unbelievable amounts of effort, we saw President Macron go, my Prime Minister regularly spoke to Putin - it didn’t matter.
“As we’re seeing today, it’s not about the Donbas, it’s not about a minority, it’s about a greed to subsume Ukraine into the Russian Federation or for President Putin to land grab.”
Mr Wallace said President Putin is “building a wall around himself” and “will be isolated” as he becomes an international pariah.
He added: “I certainly think what he [Putin] is doing is deeply irrational.
“I certainly think he has gone full tonto, that’s what I said the other day talking to some soldiers.
“No one else in their right mind would do what we are seeing in our telly screens today.
“No one else would impose their will on another sovereign country with all sorts of concocted conspiracies and very bizarre readings of history unless somehow they were acting deeply irrationally.
“But that’s no comfort to the people of Kyiv.”
In a full-scale invasion by land, air and sea, Ukraine has already lost the strategic Chernobyl nuclear site and there was fighting at Hostomel airport outside Kyiv, though Ukraine said it was later recaptured.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Facebook that he has been targeted as “enemy number one” as he ordered all males aged 18 to 60 to conscript in the Army and forbade them from leaving the country.
Boris Johnson told President Zelensky “the world is united in its horror” in a call this morning.
In a Cabinet meeting last night, the UK Prime Minister said it was a “dark day in the history of our continent, with Putin launching a cynical and brutal invasion for his own vainglorious ends.”
Western officials believe Russia intends to seize and control a very large section of Ukraine - including the capital Kiev - and will need ground troops to do so.
But they were still unclear yesterday whether that will mean occupying the whole country, or ruling Ukraine directly rather than replacing Zelensky with a favourable puppet regime.
Mr Wallace did not rule out fears that Russia will take Kyiv by the end of today - but said Moscow had repeatedly “failed” to achieve key objectives on Day One.
The UK last night boasted the "largest and most severe package" of sanctions "that Russia has ever seen" in a bid to knock several percentage points off the country’s GDP.
But Defence Secretary Ben Wallace ruled out sending UK troops into Ukraine itself.
He told the BBC : “We’ve done the next best thing, which is train over 20,000 Ukrainians, provided them with lethal capabilities which they are using right now.
“But I’m not putting British troops directly to fight Russian troops. That would trigger a European war, because we are a NATO country.”
The UK will freeze assets worth £154bn in VTB - the second largest bank in Russia - while Rostec, Russia's biggest defence company with over two million employees, with exports of over £10bn of arms each year, will also face strict sanctions.
Five new oligarchs with links to Putin, including Russia’s youngest billionaire who was married to the President’s daughter, will be targeted.
State-owned airline Aeroflot is now banned from entering UK airspace, a UK bank balance limit could be placed on Russians, and the UK is bidding to secure a global agreement to ban Russians from using the SWIFT bank payment system.
European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen also outlined sanctions, saying Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine marks the "beginning of a new era”.
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said he believes "further financial restrictions" against Russia are needed.
Speaking on Good Morning Britain, Sir Keir said he supported the Government's package of sanctions announced on Thursday but called for extra measures.
Mr Wallace said he expected Putin to be "held to account" if he committed a war crime.
He said: “I’m not, I'm afraid, an international lawyer. I couldn't tell you the difference between breaking international law insofar as directing your forces to invade another country, versus a war crime - eg. things like genocide, and indeed, you know, torture, etc.
"I wouldn't want to speculate the differences.
“What I would say is he's clearly broken international law, he's occupying or trying to occupy a sovereign country who made one mistake in his eyes. Their mistake in his eyes was not to choose the Kremlin as a way for their future. And that's all they have done."
Leaders of the 30 Nato allied nations will meet on Friday, US President Joe Biden confirmed, as they come under pressure to go even further than sanctions already announced.
By the end of the day on Thursday, the Ukrainian government said 137 civilians and military personnel had been killed.
However, the UK's Ministry of Defence (MoD) said it is "unlikely" Russia achieved its planned objectives for the first day of its military action in Ukraine, crediting "fierce resistance" from the Ukrainian forces.
The MoD said in a statement just after 1am: "The Ukrainian Armed Forces have reportedly halted Russia's advance towards Chernihiv. Fighting probably continues on the outskirts of the city.
"It is unlikely that Russia has achieved its planned Day 1 military objectives. Ukrainian forces have presented fierce resistance across all axes of Russia's advance."
