According to? It was supposed to be sovereign. It gave up its nuclear weapons in exchange for guaranties of never being attacked... Russia can't be trusted.
>there has been a faction that has wanted to push NATO boundaries east
Well, NATO membership works like this: Countries ask for membership. It's not "NATO" deciding "hmmm, let's expand east". You must be confusing with Russia expansion, forcibly annexing land, with all the war crime and deportation. Ex-soviet countries know what it's like to be occupied by Russia, so they want to be part of NATO. I'm sure you can see the difference.
> Putin has been responding to the antagonism with bold and efficient use of force to advance Russia's national interest in the face of such aggression.
Bold and efficient use of force??? Like, bold torture? Efficient killing and starving POWs? Smart kidnapping and re-education of Ukrainian children to draft them to fight against their own people? Yeah, what a genius. You're nauseating. You're talking just like a nazi would.
I think I'll stop there, I don't think it's worth discussing with people who casually admire war criminals.
> It was supposed to be sovereign. It gave up its nuclear weapons in exchange for guaranties of never being attacked... Russia can't be trusted.
The US was the first to violate the agreement, unfortunately.
> It's not "NATO" deciding "hmmm, let's expand east".
Lobbying groups from inside and outside those countries advocate for membership, etc. There are hawks in the US that don't care about Ukraine being neutral because they want to squeeze Russia.
> Bold and efficient use of force???
Putin has effectively used a much weaker military to thwart the US at every turn. He is a much, much smarter strategist (again, unfortunately). I am no admirer of Putin. Most recent US presidents most certainly qualify as war criminals, for what it's worth (unfortunately).
The sad part is that the US is encouraging Ukraininans to fight and die for a cause that the US has no intention of supporting in a significant way and has no intention of truly following through with. The US has been duplicitous with Ukraine and in spite of many US hawks wanting to go all in for Ukraine, it won't happen and they know it. The best they will do is donate weapons and let Ukraine harm Russia as much as possible while there are Ukrainians left to fight and while the conflict doesn't escalate to the point of endangering the US mainland.
Incidentally, it is quite likely that Putin will be nudged into attacking the US mainland at some point, either via cyber attacks that cost lives or actual munitions.
According to? It was supposed to be sovereign. It gave up its nuclear weapons in exchange for guaranties of never being attacked... Russia can't be trusted.
>there has been a faction that has wanted to push NATO boundaries east
Well, NATO membership works like this: Countries ask for membership. It's not "NATO" deciding "hmmm, let's expand east". You must be confusing with Russia expansion, forcibly annexing land, with all the war crime and deportation. Ex-soviet countries know what it's like to be occupied by Russia, so they want to be part of NATO. I'm sure you can see the difference.
> Putin has been responding to the antagonism with bold and efficient use of force to advance Russia's national interest in the face of such aggression.
Bold and efficient use of force??? Like, bold torture? Efficient killing and starving POWs? Smart kidnapping and re-education of Ukrainian children to draft them to fight against their own people? Yeah, what a genius. You're nauseating. You're talking just like a nazi would.
I think I'll stop there, I don't think it's worth discussing with people who casually admire war criminals.