© Mikhail Metzel/POOL/TASS
PA Media: Putin warns West: Russia has ‘red line’ over Ukraine
Russian president Vladimir Putin has warned Nato against deploying troops and weapons to Ukraine, saying this represents a red line for Moscow and would trigger a strong response.
Commenting on Western concerns about Russia’s alleged intention to invade Ukraine, he said that Moscow is equally worried about Nato drills near its borders.
Speaking to participants of an online investment forum, the Russian president said that Nato’s eastward expansion has threatened Moscow’s core security interests.
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WNU Editor: I do not think the West is listening .... NATO warns Russia to avoid costly mistake in Ukraine (ABC News/AP).
More News On Russian President Putin Warning The West That Russia Has A 'Red Line" On Ukraine
Putin warns West: Moscow has ‘red line’ about Ukraine, NATO -- AP
Moscow Says West, Ukraine Threaten Russia Security -- Moscow Times/AFP
Putin Warns on Ukraine ‘Red Line’ as U.S., U.K. Pledge Response -- Bloomberg
6 comments:
Hillary Clinton, Obama and the Democratic leadership caused the mess we're in.
Victoria Nuland, directed by Obama administration, inserted the USA into domestic elections in Ukraine to throw their election. Russia reacted.
The Clintons, Obama and Dems scripted, produced and directed the single most damaging sedition against the US by falsely accusing the Russians of meddling in the US 2016 election, a reverse replay of what Nuland did in Ukraine.
These clowns have pushed Russia into a corner for purely domestic partisan advantage in the USA.
Throw them in prison, throw away their booking papers and hopefully the ghost of Epstein stalks their cells.
Russia certainly has security interests that the West must respect, but NATO drills is not what this issue is about. If this was simply about military drills being too close to their borders, then both sides would have resolved this a long time ago.
The problem is that Putin sees Ukraine as illegitimate. He doesn't think it's a real country or that Ukrainians are a separate people from Russians. He views it in the same way that Nazi Germany and the USSR saw Poland between the wars - an illegitimate creation (of Versailles for Poland, for Ukraine its the collapse of the Soviet Union) that needs to be wiped off the map.
Unlike Hitler or Stalin, Putin can probably accept some kind of rump state to exist. But he clearly believes that the most Russified bits of Ukraine - the entire east and south - should belong to Russia.
Putin isn't alone on this. This attitude is common in Russia and can be traced back to Tsarist times when Ukrainian nationalism first began in the 19th century. It's not ideological. It's based on deep seated cultural assumptions as well as political/economic interests. If you fundamentally don't view the Ukrainians as a separate people, then it's existence is simply dividing the Russian world in two simply to keep Russia down.
As a result, Putin sees his actions as legitimate while Western attempts to support Ukraine aren't legitimate. So he is going to continue to do so, and escalate whenever he thinks it is tactically opportune. So this continually pushes the West and Russia into conflict.
Chris
If Putin wanted Ukraine he could have taken it 7 years ago
About Nuland
When Russia poisons the Ukrainian president the US will get involved. It has to get involved.
Loosing Russia for Ukraine? I don't think Putin will go that far.
Putin did try to take Ukraine seven years ago, at least its southern half. After his "little green man" invaded and took Crimea without much pushback, he tried to duplicate its success in "Novorossiya". It failed because Ukrainian citizens and improvised militia defeated his agents and provocateurs. He was able to partially succeed in the Donbas because he could transfer Russian military equipment and volunteers directly across the border. And when even that failed, Putin escalated by using direct Russian military assets to defeat the Ukrainian army. That only stopped when Russians shot down a Dutch airliner and created a diplomatic crisis, and he quickly deescalated while still preserving a stalemate in the Donbas.
Putin made a gamble on calculated risk by invading Crimea, and it worked. He made a second gamble when invading southern Ukraine, and it failed. Putin has made similar gambles like his invasion of Georgia in 2008 to prop up separatists there. So we know Putin is open to invading other countries provided he thinks the risk/reward ratio is right. He doesn't want a full blown war. But limited military interventions that present a fait accompli fits his profile.
Putin is willing to tolerate some risk, but not too much. The only question is whether he sees a world dealing with Covid, and a senile US President as presenting him a real opportunity to try and grab another bit of Ukraine, or whether that's too much risk for him. Either could be true. In any case, constant military exercises near Ukraine 1) creates a cover story to conceal future attempt at invasion, 2) wears down Ukrainians psychologically, and 3) eats up Ukrainian military budget if it mobilizes in response. The Arabs tried the same thing with Israel in the 1960s.
Chris
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