Ah yes! Russia was completely unprovoked and are evil goblins who just like killing folks. I’m starting to miss the old cold war... at least then we had principles to hang our hats on and not just hob-goblins screeching in the night.
Independent countries have a right to join any economic or military alliances, or are you arguing that the eastern European countries(Ukraine, Poland, Baltics, etc) should always be under Russian control?
Russians are peculiarly vulnerable to getting taken over by brutal and corrupt rulers. Its ground in to Russian society and culture, by a tragic history.
These rulers are highly likely to turn to external adventures, by the dynamics of such regimes. Thus the nature of the USSR was only in part the result of its ideology, the rest was Russia as it always was.
Ref “Russia Under the Old Regime”, Richard Pipes, 1974
Which I read in the 80’s.
And that WAS one of the “bibles” of the Cold War, cited by everyone. Here are your Cold War principles.
Most of the resto f the world is opposing Russia. Don’t you think they have a good reason. In fact Russia was completely unprovoked.