Rus­sia and Ukraine are at war.

A short time ago, with dark­ness still envelop­ing east­ern Europe and with the Unit­ed Nations Secu­ri­ty Coun­cil in ses­sion at UN head­quar­ters in New York, Russ­ian forces began attack­ing Ukraine at the behest of Russ­ian dic­ta­tor Vladimir Putin, who is obsessed with bring­ing Rus­si­a’s neigh­bor under his control.

In Moscow, Putin announced that he had ordered a “mil­i­tary oper­a­tion” with­in the bor­ders of Ukraine, despite the fer­vent protests of much of the world community.

Ukran­ian offi­cials report­ed that the cap­i­tal, Kyiv, had been struck by Russ­ian mis­siles. Uncon­firmed reports sug­gest­ed that Russ­ian forces were mov­ing against Kyiv’s air­port and oth­er strate­gic tar­gets with­in Ukraine. Loud booms have been heard in Kyiv and Kharkiv by cor­re­spon­dents work­ing for CNN and the BBC.

“Putin has just launched a full-scale inva­sion of Ukraine. Peace­ful Ukrain­ian cities are under strikes. This is a war of aggres­sion. Ukraine will defend itself and will win. The world can and must stop Putin. The time to act is now,” tweet­ed Dmytro Kule­ba, the Min­is­ter of For­eign Affairs for Ukraine.

“A whol­ly unpro­voked attack on a peace­ful coun­try 🇺🇦 is unfold­ing. Hor­ri­fied. Just because you’ve pre­pared and thought about this pos­si­bil­i­ty for weeks and months doesn’t mean it isn’t shock­ing when it actu­al­ly hap­pens,” said Britain’s ambas­sador to Ukraine, Melin­da Sim­mons.

“There is no pur­ga­to­ry for war crim­i­nals,” Ukrain­ian Ambas­sador Sergiy Kys­lyt­sya told Russ­ian Ambas­sador Vasi­ly Neben­zya, who was iron­i­cal­ly chair­ing the afore­men­tioned meet­ing of the Unit­ed Nations Secu­ri­ty Council.

“They go straight to hell, ambas­sador,” Kys­lyt­sya added.

The Unit­ed States harsh­ly denounced Putin’s attack and warned Putin that he and Rus­sia would pay a steep price for insti­gat­ing a total­ly nec­es­sary war.

“The prayers of the entire world are with the peo­ple of Ukraine tonight as they suf­fer an unpro­voked and unjus­ti­fied attack by Russ­ian mil­i­tary forces. Pres­i­dent Putin has cho­sen a pre­med­i­tat­ed war that will bring a cat­a­stroph­ic loss of life and human suf­fer­ing,” said Pres­i­dent Joe Biden in a statement.

“Rus­sia alone is respon­si­ble for the death and destruc­tion this attack will bring, and the Unit­ed States and its Allies and part­ners will respond in a unit­ed and deci­sive way. The world will hold Rus­sia accountable.”

“I will be mon­i­tor­ing the sit­u­a­tion from the White House this evening and will con­tin­ue to get reg­u­lar updates from my nation­al secu­ri­ty team. Tomor­row, I will meet with my G7 coun­ter­parts in the morn­ing and then speak to the Amer­i­can peo­ple to announce the fur­ther con­se­quences the Unit­ed States and our Allies and part­ners will impose on Rus­sia for this need­less act of aggres­sion against Ukraine and glob­al peace and secu­ri­ty. We will also coor­di­nate with our NATO Allies to ensure a strong, unit­ed response that deters any aggres­sion against the Alliance. Tonight, Jill and I are pray­ing for the brave and proud peo­ple of Ukraine.”

“Cana­da con­demns in the strongest pos­si­ble terms Rus­si­a’s egre­gious attack on Ukraine. These unpro­voked actions are a clear fur­ther vio­la­tion of Ukraine’s sov­er­eign­ty and ter­ri­to­r­i­al integri­ty. They are also in vio­la­tion of Rus­si­a’s oblig­a­tions under inter­na­tion­al law and the Char­ter of the Unit­ed Nations,” said Cana­di­an Prime Min­is­ter Justin Trudeau.

“I strong­ly con­demn Russia’s reck­less and unpro­voked attack on Ukraine, which puts at risk count­less civil­ian lives,” said NATO Sec­re­tary Gen­er­al Jens Stoltenberg. “Once again, despite our repeat­ed warn­ings and tire­less efforts to engage in diplo­ma­cy, Rus­sia has cho­sen the path of aggres­sion against a sov­er­eign and inde­pen­dent country.”

“This is a grave breach of inter­na­tion­al law, and a seri­ous threat to Euro-Atlantic secu­ri­ty. I call on Rus­sia to cease its mil­i­tary action imme­di­ate­ly and respect Ukraine’s sov­er­eign­ty and ter­ri­to­r­i­al integri­ty. NATO Allies will meet to address the con­se­quences of Russia’s aggres­sive actions. We stand with the peo­ple of Ukraine at this ter­ri­ble time. NATO will do all it takes to pro­tect and defend all Allies.”

“There will be tremen­dous dis­in­for­ma­tion point­ed at the US & EU in com­ing days,” not­ed John Scott-Rail­ton. “Any­thing to turn us against each oth­er & neuter our resolve. Please, before the next wave of lies lands, take a minute to edu­cate every­one you know about what is actu­al­ly hap­pen­ing in Ukraine.”

Sev­er­al media out­lets are offer­ing liveblogs:

• Here is the BBC’s
• Here is The Guardian’s
• Here is CNN’s
• Here is the New York Times’

Although not unex­pect­ed, this is nev­er­the­less a very dark and dis­turb­ing devel­op­ment. Our strong sym­pa­thies are with the peo­ple of Ukraine tonight and in the dif­fi­cult days that lie ahead.