Keir Starmer’s willingness to stand up to Russian aggression has transformed the UK from EU outlier to a leading voice in Europe, a leading analyst said. But as he unites Europe over support for Ukraine, the PM’s toughness on Vladimir Putin will have to go beyond sanctions.

“Since 2014 the UK has been a disruptor when it comes to Russia; we were seen as the EU outlier trying to upend the cosy relationship which nations like Spain, Italy, France and particularly Germany were enjoying with Vladimir Putin. They’ve been telling us and the eastern Europeans that they understood Russia, that Putin and it was only about commerce,” said James agers, co-founder of the Council of Geostrategy think tank.

“And in 2022 they became a little unnerved by the fact that we then turned out to be right – and our intelligence turned out to be right – and everything that they’d been working for for the previous 20 years fell in a heap of cinders and we had been on the right side of history,”

The UK has held a consistent approach towards Moscow since 2014, he said, helping to train Ukrainian troops, rejecting the flawed Minsk agreements, deploying HMS Defender to assert freedom of navigation around Crimea in 2021, and sending the first batch of military aid to Kyiv one month before Russia’s full-scale invasion while other nations instead Russia would not cross the border.

“Now Europe has turned to the UK for leadership because , with a deteriorating situation, they need to look not only to the strongest military power, but also the one nation which is trusted by Eastern European and Baltic nations on the front line,” he said.

He praised PM Keir Starmer for “grasping the nettle” at this crucial moment in history.

“Keir Starmer has really turned the ship when it comes to UK defence spending – though we need to see the best go beyond 3% of GDP to 5% – and he’s done this by cutting foreign aid which was difficult within the context of his own party and people that might traditionally support him. “

Last weekend’s summit “defined effective diplomacy” in ​stark contrast to the bruising meeting held between Ukrainians President Volodomry Zelensky and US President Donald Trump .

“Starmer opened the door of London and extended a warm British embrace to Zelensky, who was even able to meet the King . Some quite effective diplomacy took place.

“Suddenly we are cast in the light of the saviour almost, even though we are not.”

Tough rhetoric and sanctions are enough to deter Vladimir Putin from his stated ambitions to recreate a Russian empire in Europe,he said, warning that the UK as well the Ukrainians “need ​to think through the implications” of what it would mean if the US “throw Ukraine under a bus”.

“The Americans have been watching how this crisis has accelerated the speed at which Russia and China have fallen together – or rather, the speed at which Russia and China have folded into the Sinosphere.

“If China, which remains our biggest threat, gains control of Russia’s resources, it will be able to draw on them and magnify its own power and then use that power against the United States. The US needs to slow that relationship down. “

While Trump’s approach is flawed, it leaves Europe’s two nuclear powers, the UK and France, to unite European states and ensure that he is stopped.

Both nations have offered to put boots on Ukrainian soil as part of a wider “coalition of the willing” in order to underwrite any peace deal.

But Keir Starmer could still lose the peace unless he is fully committed.

“We will require some really strong statesmanship from Starmer, President Macron and the new Chancellor Mertz in Germany, as well as Tusk in Poland,’ he said.

“Russia needs to take us seriously. If we send a European force of 50,000 that would be comparable to the 55,000 troops stationed in West Germany during the Cold War who were facing the. might of the Soviet Union.

“And we would need to impose a no fly zone while we start our own defence build-up and modernisation. And we would need to ensure that Ukraine’s million-strong armed forces also remain effective.”

Crucially, he added: “Keir Starmer and his allies would have to make it very clear to Russia what the implications will be if he agents a third invasion.

“If all these things fail into place, I’m of the view that this would be sufficient to hold Russia back.

“But ​there’s a​ long road to walk between now and then.”

Justin Crump of Sibylline strategic risk group added: “What Keir starmer has done is to bring the UK to the post-Brexit status in Europe which we were told we would have.”