I think we’ve covered some ground this week…
- Monday the NHSE board and their Bermuda Square.
- Tuesday, the Cavendish Report, destined for the shelf… I think.
- Wednesday, a management idea and the importance of ‘and’.
- Thursday a new book and a great read it is…
… by the way, there’s a discount code to buy it with 20% off in the news column.
There’s always plenty going on.
But, honestly, my week was trivial. For forty-four million people…
- Monday was murder,
- Tuesday was terror,
- Wednesday weeping,
- Thursday the thump of bombs
- Friday fear and dread.
I really thought the prospect of a war in Europe went with my parent’s generation.
Exhausted women and children arriving in Germany and Poland tell a different story.
Heroic men, in jeans and anoraks, standing with AK47’s and Molotov cocktails, in the rubble of their homes, in snow waiting for the tanks to come, is a different picture.
A war waged, in board-rooms, by banks, sanctions, associations, airlines, shipping companies, clubs, sports organisations, insurance companies and politics.
This is a world at war but not a world war. This is just too dangerous for the world to fight. This is a war, with too high a cost.
The energy sector has been exempted from the financial sanctions imposed by the UK, US and EU because avoiding Russian fuel, completely, will drive up the already sky-high price of petrol and heating…
… we would do well to remember, perhaps, there is a difference between price and cost.
On the TV the red arrows, on the map of Ukraine, are creeping across the screen.
Most of life in the cities has gone underground. Mayors are defiant.
Putin cannot win this war. He may win the territory, but it will be a pile of rubble. He may win a battle against the people but those who are left will pursue him until the day they die.
Where does this end?
All wars end in peace. An uneasy peace, a resented peace, a sort of peace.
What will the end look like?
Partition, demilitarisation, what will be given to Putin? What will he take? It might be the end of Putin, which is probably the only way Russia could find its way back into the fraternity of the world.
We watch as civilians have their homes flattened, families torn apart and children traumatised.
And the weekend…
… Saturday shopping and football, kids going to their clubs. Relatives and friends.
Less than three and half hours away, by plane, shops are a pile of bricks and broken glass. Kids and families, their only goal, is to survive another night in a bunker.
Sunday, lunch and a bunch of flowers. Browse the papers.
Or, back to the bunker, frantically searching social media for news about families and enemy advances.
As we fill a supermarket trolley at the weekend, people are stuffing their lives into a bin bag and heading west. I can’t imagine what that must be like. I really can’t.
All killing is wrong. Because it is done with tanks and missiles with men in braid and khaki, makes no difference. What is happening is a crime and we have a front-row seat…
… the tragedy of people’s lives, played out on the tea-time news like it was a Netflix box set.
What can we do, other than spectate?
We can give our money. More arms, military aid, medical supplies. Protest, provoke politicians, pray to our Gods and hope.
War is a defeat for diplomacy and the art of politics. Humanity is the loser.
This weekend, to be honest with you, I am, totally at a loss…
News and Comment from Roy Lilley
Contact Roy – please use this e-address roy.lilley@nhsmanagers.net
Reproduced at thetrainingnet.com by kind permission of Roy Lilley.
