Well as far as the Russian threat goes you have to look at what we thought of Russia's military pre-invasion and post-invasion. Also what $113 billion in aid to their adversary and a year of high intensity symmetrical war has done to them. Since the Soviet Union split into 14 countries in 1991 we have thought of Russia as a 2nd rate power compared to the US and now China, but never doubted they could annex their neighbors.One one hand, Russia has no missiles and their military sucks; on the other, "if we don't' stop him now, he will take all of Europe!" Wake up man, it's so obviously you're being lied to just like Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya, and virtually every war in the last 70 years.
It turns out their military was more of a paper tiger or potemkin village than we thought. There is now a debate in Washington that "hey they're not a peer and our focus should be elsewhere" but we can't just cut off Ukraine's aid either and 70-80% of Ukrainians don't want to stop fighting. We need to deter this from happening in the future and leave Ukraine with defensible borders for the next Russian invasion.
I mean, Putin has said that Ukraine and Belarus are really just Russians that have been split apart from Russia by outside forces:
On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians - Wikipedia
I've watched a lot of Mearsheimer, hours and probably much more than you @falseprophet09 , and I've tried to get Hughinn to watch him too so he stops with the "Biden and his handlers wanted this, intentionally started it with a coup, did nothing to stop it, and is the only thing preventing peace" stuff because Mearsheimer would never say any of that.I will leave this for everyone to read, so you understand that this indeed was engineered by the West. Russia, has national security interests, and we crossed them, time and time again. We would never tolerate China opening up bases, putting weapons, or couping a nation right in our backyard, why should Russia?
Again, the era of "American Exceptionalism" (hypocrisy) is over.
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Why John Mearsheimer Blames the U.S. for the Crisis in Ukraine
For years, the political scientist has claimed that Putin’s aggression toward Ukraine is caused by Western intervention. Have recent events changed his mind?www.newyorker.com
What he says is we probably angered Putin a bit too much by expanding NATO into Putin's spheres of influence (which we told him multiple times he couldn't have anymore) and a big dumb bear attacks when he's angry. He also says Putin saw Ukraine becoming NATO a threat - adding, it doesn't matter if it really was a threat that's how Putin saw it.
But, his whole argument falls apart once you realize Ukraine wasn't getting into NATO. Their application was denied. When Russia grabbed Crimea in 2014 and armed the separatist militias it was actually written in Ukraine's constitution they are neutral. And Putin had been assured many times by many people Ukraine wasn't getting into NATO any time soon, especially by the Germans. The Russians never objected when Clinton expanded NATO, the Soviets signed off on East Germany joining NATO. Also, idealists argue that sovereign countries decide for themselves which groups to join - Russia shouldn't decide that for Ukraine.
Mearsheimer said all along ever since '94 that Ukraine giving up their 1200 nukes would cause Russia to attack Ukraine.
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