It's not up to Russia to determine what Ukraine chooses to do. You can't force a country to align with you.
No but you can and will be pissed off with your enemies signing military pacts with countries on your border. Do you think the USA would sit back and say nothing if Mexico and Canada went into a military pact with Russia and China. If Argentina and Spain signed a military pact with Ireland, do you think the UK would feel threatened? Of course we would.
Times have changed. Countries who used to be intimidated by Russia are finding their voice and are saying they want to be a free democratic nation and to move in to a new direction. Your examples of Mexico and Canada etc are unrealistic. We all know that will never happen.
It doesn't have to be realistic. It was hypothetical. The UK and the US would not accept our neighbours going into military pacts with our enemies. We would push back against it, which is what Russia are doing.
I think it's a lot more involved than a NATO pact. This has been going on since the first time that Ukraine elected a pro European president. That did not sit well with Russia and they began supporting seperatists. There's a lot of info out there. Putin personally labeled part of Ukraine, Donbas "New Russia" in 2014
I’ve said previously on this and this is the bit I don’t understand. Russia don’t want NATO on their borders, yet by invading they are moving their borders next to NATO.
That's the trouble and a part cause of all this. Russia ( and China) know that Biden is barely capable of reading a teleprompter. They sense weakness and drift, exacerbated by the influence of a rump of far left Democrats who actively dislike their own country. They are right. They know that this is the best time to do whatever they want. Whoever replaces Biden - and this will come as soon as the Democrats work out a way for it not to be Harris - will be harder to deal with.
K They would be creating distance between nato and Mother Russia’s land, giving them time and distance to respond if ever nato did attack. I know we look upon that as very unlikely, but they see it differently. Better for both sides if there was a neutral strip between them both.
Wouldn’t be the actual Russian border but, they want a one country buffer all around them from any nato alliance member to the actual Russian border
Well mainland Russia already has land borders with Estonia and Latvia - both NATO members. Plus NATO mambers Lithuania and Poland compose the entirety of Russia's land borders for their Kaliningrad enclave and, unlike Russia, they have totally respected the border integrity of their neighbour!
I am now starting to believe that a conflict won't happen, many countries withdrawing troops and staff, Putin will spin this as a victory against the west.
Bit pointless Russia complaining about NATO encroachment on their SW border when they are the only country that has actually transgressed over their neighbour's borders! Ukraine aren't in NATO and Russia have annexed Crimea and are sponsoring rebellion in the Donbas oblasts, but it's all nasty NATO's fault - apparently for respecting the territorial integrity of Kaliningrad.
Looks like the next 48hrs are going to be crucial. Hopefully common sense will prevail and there will be a de-escalation, followed by diplomatic solutions.
Bottom line is this. Every country should be allowed to choose their own path. You can't force a country to align to you. If Ukraine want to align with the west then Russia just have to get their heads round it. It's what democracy is all about.
