THIS Saturday, activists from across the country are coming together for an emergency day of action, calling on our political leaders to step back from the nuclear brink and work to secure peace talks in Ukraine.

A majority of Ukrainians now urgently want a peace settlement, yet Britain is continuing to recklessly escalate the conflict there.

Starmer’s decision to follow Biden and allow Ukraine to fire its long-range missiles into Russia has precipitated a rapid and dangerous escalation. These missiles can only be targeted using US GPS technology, which means that the US is decisively participating in the conflict.

Biden had previously refused to grant permission for the use of these weapons precisely because it could draw Nato into an all-out confrontation with Russia. But now, that is exactly what both leaders are doing.

Reports suggest Biden is escalating the conflict in order to secure a more favourable situation for Ukraine going into talks with President-elect Trump in January. This was echoed by Keir Starmer at his Lord Mayor’s Banquet speech on Tuesday.

Yet, even if Trump can secure a political settlement, this is an incredibly reckless and dangerous strategy. It puts at enormous risk the lives of Ukrainians and Russians, as well as endangering populations across Europe and here in Britain.

Biden and Starmer knew full well that Russia was planning to change its nuclear use policy should the US and Britain allow Ukraine use of the Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) and Britain’s Storm Shadows. Yet both leaders went ahead.

This was despite the fact that military experts and diplomats from across the political spectrum made clear that the use of these long-range weapons would not make a decisive difference to the outcome of the war. For instance, reports show that Ukraine has now lost 40 per cent of the territory it had gained in its offensive in Kursk in the summer.

This escalation takes place in the context of the US’s new nuclear build-up of Nato bases across Europe. Satellite imagery shows that nuclear shelters at Lakenheath in Suffolk have already been upgraded, ready to station new US B61-12 nuclear bombs early next year.

And in July, the US announced it will deploy new long-range missiles in Germany from 2026. Such missiles had been destroyed under the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, but under Trump, the US administration withdrew from the Treaty in 2019 to start development again.

As Trump heads for the White House in January, advisers are urging him to ditch the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and start underground nuclear testing.

Meanwhile, Starmer’s government is continuing to increase tensions, whipping up the threat of an expansionist Russia, not only to bolster a continued war in Ukraine but also to justify the central role of the defence industry in Britain’s economic growth.

While John Healey has presented the government’s Defence Industrial Strategy as a necessary response to a much more unstable and insecure world, it is Britain’s aggressive militarism that is contributing to this very instability.

The reality is that Starmer’s government is trying to justify the billions it is pouring into military aid to Ukraine and defence spending — and the billions more it plans to spend to reach its 2.5 per cent GDP goal — as something that is beneficial to the British population. Something that is more beneficial than alleviating child poverty, halting pensioner winter deaths, and scaling up investment in renewables.

But you can’t build sustainable growth on genocide, global militarism and the threat of nuclear war.

So, Saturday’s emergency day of action, called by CND and Stop the War, is a vital opportunity to show the British government that we want an end to this reckless escalation in Ukraine.

We need to pressure our political leaders to pull back from the nuclear brink. The British government should withdraw the Storm Shadow missiles from Ukraine that risk us being dragged into an all-out confrontation with Nato and Russia. Instead, it should listen to the Ukrainian people and use its influence to secure an urgent negotiated settlement.

Morning Star readers are encouraged to join the protests and rallies taking place across the country, including the protest in London at 2.30pm opposite Downing Street.

Emergency day of action: join local events across the country taking place in Birmingham, Brighton, London, Manchester and Plymouth. See www.cnduk.org.