“The idea was to keep NATO, and what is NATO? It’s the United States, off of Russia’s border.”
For crying out loud, how dumb does anybody need to be to even swallow that?
Russia’s less than 50 miles from having a land border with the USA, courtesy of Alaska. And some Russians actually want Alaska back.
The idea Putin doesn’t want the USA too close to Russia’s border is beyond stupid. He couldn’t care less.
What bothers him is having EU NATO (backed by the USA) preventing Russian land expansion on one side, with the USA (backed by NATO) on the other side preventing Russian expansion into the Atlantic.
It must be so terrible, being an eleven time zone superstate feeling boxed in by so many minnow countries that remember the last time they spent a few decades forcibly locked against their will into Moscow’s “sphere of influence”.
Free Republic Scoreboard Place number 55 -- United Kingdom -- 20.00 -- 1 contribution -- for an aggregate of this quarter of $20.00
If that ONE Freeper in the UK is you, you can do better. If it isn't you, why the heck not, since you use this forum with such regularity?
800 miles of NATO on Russia’s eastern border, and NATO wanted 600 miles on Russian’s western border as well.
FAFO.