>Ukraine joining or not joining NATO is irrelevant, a canard, a red herring, a strawman.
It's the number one reason why this is is happening.
Putin said it was a red line on about 75 separate occasions. Ukraine ignored and pushed ahead anyway. NATO ignored and pushed ahead anyway.
Two days before the invasion as Putin announced a "semi" pull out of amassed, Zelensky reiterated his commitment to joining NATO.
NATO destroyed Libya (now on its second civil war). I doubt they'd leave Russia alone after incorporating Ukraine. It would be irrational to not fear its encroachment.
He also wrote 5000 words long essay last year how Ukraine shouldn't really exist and is really just a part of Russia and in his long rant announcing the invasion barely mentioned NATO at all.
But sure, all that NATO name dropping surely is the reason for this aggression on a sovereign nation.
Yeah he said that he wanted to "denazify" the place too which is bollocks as well. These were both pretexts. He probably believes the crap about them being brothers but it wouldnt be enough to trigger an invasion.
NATO as a threat is very real, though. It is enough.
NATO until this week was full of countries who couldn't bother equipping their armies with basic necessities. German soldiers used broomsticks during one NATO exercise and even those with somewhat competent armies were optimising for "surgical" interventions instead of large conflicts. Threat was more rhetorical than real.
Angry heavily armed NATO troops in Warsaw matter less to Moscow than the potential for NATO troops in Mariupol poised to cut Russia off from the caucauses and the black sea.
It's like the geopolitical equivalent of shouting aggressively at a bear from a mile away vs just being between her and her cubs.
Ukrainian-Russian border is where Russia is at its most vulnerable, hence why the reaction to projected NATO encroachment is so violent.
I don't really see how anything changed. The strategic criticality of the Ukrainian coast hasnt changed. The Russian position on NATO hasnt changed.
From day 1 of the invasion it seemed clear to me that their goal was not to occupy all of Ukraine but to "break" it and potentially to cleave off strategic pieces in negotiations and extract a promise of neutrality/demilitarization.
Such as? With respect to NATO membership it was fairly plain that everything from asking nicely all the way up to 200,000 troops deployed on the border wasnt enough to deter either NATO or Zelensky.
You don't seem to understand the concept of Sovereignty, what other countries do is not up to Putin, and if they don't do what he wants that does not give him a right to invade or dictate terms.
I'm never said he did have a "right to invade". I'm just trying to explain, against MUCH resistance, why he did.
Because I think the real reason why this all happened A) matters rather a lot B) is being swept under the carpet.
NATO's (lack of) respect for Libya's sovereignty can perhaps explain why Putin didnt think that it would have much respect for Russia's sovereignty which is, in turn, why he didnt have much respect for Ukraine's.
No country respects the sovereignty of another when it feels threatened.
You seem to know Putin very well. Better than I think any outsider has a right to claim.
The real reason why this happened is utterly irrelevant, but you seem to be a bit stuck on that subject as though there is a possible justification to be found there.
> No country respects the sovereignty of another when it feels threatened.
There was no conceivable way in which Ukraine was a threat to Russia. Full stop.
He's always been a fairly plain speaker. We dont tend to always pay attention to what he says though. His rage in reaction to NATO's Libya incursion is pretty well documented even if we did ignore it.
It wasnt like he was unclear that pursuing NATO membership => invasion either.
>The real reason why this happened is utterly irrelevant
This is precisely the way to make this kind of thing happen again and again and again...
> This is precisely the way to make this kind of thing happen again and again and again...
No, the way to make sure this won't happen again is to make sure that little tinpot dictators don't get their hands on nuclear arms. Apropos, North Korea...
As I recall this was Cuba's argument after the failed bay of pigs invasion. They asked for nuclear weapons on their soil and the USSR agreed to provide them.
The US took a dim view of it if I recall correctly.
When the defence of the heartland is threatened, notions such as sovereignty tend to take a back seat and invasion is very much on the table.
Strategically the Ukrainian border is kind of like Russia's jugular. Hence the insistence that NATO membership is a red line.
> Strategically the Ukrainian border is kind of like Russia's jugular.
How true is this since circa 1950, though? There are very few plausible scenarios involving a ground invasion and most of Russia is exposed to modern weaponry so it’s not like the primary threat is a bunch of B-52s flying out of Kyiv. It’s true that distance affects reaction times but they already have similar range borders & submarine launches substantially affected that, too.
Long range, aircraft launched, deployed hypersonic nuclear delivery systems will render this even more moot, relative to the current status quo, in the next 20 years.
At the end of the day, it appears Russia wants eastern Europe politically.
Until they can accept it as independent and sovereign, any protestations about military systems are smoke screens for their general unhappiness with an independent eastern Europe.
If Putin isn’t afraid of NATO even defending an invasion of Ukraine, what makes you think he’s actually afraid of NATO attacking Russian soil?
Btw the Russian troop “pullout” was a fabricated lie. It was a few tanks sent back needing mechanical repairs from heavy drills. So it appears we’ve already established you’re falling for Russian state propaganda talking points that turned out to be false.
It's the number one reason why this is is happening.
Putin said it was a red line on about 75 separate occasions. Ukraine ignored and pushed ahead anyway. NATO ignored and pushed ahead anyway.
Two days before the invasion as Putin announced a "semi" pull out of amassed, Zelensky reiterated his commitment to joining NATO.
NATO destroyed Libya (now on its second civil war). I doubt they'd leave Russia alone after incorporating Ukraine. It would be irrational to not fear its encroachment.