Personally, I would like to see NATO and Russia reaching a full co-operation status, in the world we now face, we have common enemies and common values. If it comes to an us against them final showdown, the us should be all who are threatened by imperial Islam and China for that matter.
I can’t really fault Putin for wanting to restore Russian parts of Crimea and east Ukraine to the Russian federation.
Putin has also shown far more common sense in his approach to Syria than any of the NATO countries.
He should keep his hands off the Baltics though. They have been through enough in the past century.
Other than that, much of the antagonism between NATO and Russia is a counter-productive diversion, and I bet Trump sees it this way too. Gingrich, perhaps not so much, but he’ll come around if Turkey gets too frisky with the Plan B Caliphate.
What’s your distinction? What’s to keep Putin from “restoring” [snort] those portions of Latvia and Estonia that are “Russian?” Because they suffered “more” than the Georgians and Ukrainians?