The only provocation was Biden's weakness, in full display in our skedaddle from Afghanistan.
Our weakness convinced Putin that he'd never have a better opportunity to begin reconstituting the old Russian Empire.
And if we stand by and let him, then the world will soon enough be ruled over by the likes of Putin & Xi.
We are already being ruled over by the likes of communists. It is called the democrat party and they stole an election to install biden into the presidency.