Vladimir Putin threatened me with a missile attack, former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson reveals.
In a documentary, which will be broadcast today on the BBC, Johnson says that he spoke with the president of Russia in February 2022 before the invasion and warned him that it would turn into a disaster.
"He said to me: 'Boris, I don't want to hurt you, but with a missile, it will take a minute' or something like that...", Johnson recounts in the film, "from the relaxed tone in which he spoke, from the sense of detachment he conveyed, I felt that he was only pretending Collaborates with my attempt to negotiate."
Johnson also says that he warned Putin that "an invasion of Ukraine will lead to more Western sanctions and more NATO forces on Russia's borders." As part of the persuasion effort, he even promised that Ukraine would not be admitted to NATO "in the foreseeable future."
Since that conversation in February a year ago, a great deal has been lost from Russian deterrence.
Contrary to Putin's plans to keep NATO away from Russia's borders, Finland - a country that had been neutral for many decades - sought to join the transatlantic alliance, while the Russian military turned out to be much more cumbersome and vulnerable than thought before the invasion.
Boris Johnson was indeed kicked out of the house at 10 Downing Street, but in Ukraine he became almost a national hero due to his firm support for Kiev and his visits to the country in the midst of the war.
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