Wasnt his aim to stop Ukraine moving closer to the EU / NATO? How is that going, again?
from what i can see his aim all along was to keep Ukraine stable and press for a solution that would satisfy everyone. Thats why he publicly pressed Yanukovich not to use repression against protestors and used his influence to broker repeated peace deals between the protestors and Yanukovich..acceding to their demands. Which were then reneged upon and a coup implemented instead.
Followed by an outpouring of Galician chauvinism against ethnic Russians emanating directly from Kiev .. openly expressed contempt and discrimination against them and the mass suppression of political dissent and political parties ....which led directly to ethnic Russians rejecting the coup appointed junta and ..after they were repressed...ultimately the state itself .
Alongside brokering those concessions to the protestors and warning against their repression he was repeatedly calling for tripartite talks between Ukraine Russia and the EU to fnd a solution they could all live with. A necessary solution because the EU accession treaty would mean UkraineS favoured trade status with Russia would have to be renegotiated. Along with gas and all sorts.
Those calls for talks were rebuffed too .
To judge the decision by the junta and its western backers to both renege upon peace agreements and spurn dialogue as Putins failure takes some doing . They took the decision to plunge the country into chaos and suppress internal dissent by brute force discrimination and marginalization . Preventing that idiocy was not within his gift..only to warn of the repercussions of t . But it was certainly within the wests gift to prevent it . Seemingly they encouraged it.
Now it may have escaped your notice but Crimea is now firmly ensconced within Russia..its Black Sea fleet is secure for good with no worries about leases ..accomplished bloodlessly. South Eastern Ukraine is where the bulk of the industry minerals and agricultural land...best in the world..is located. Kiev is totally screwed without it .The DPR forces are knocking the absolute tar out of the Kiev army and advancing along the coast with no sign of any force capable of routing them ... their opponents totally demoralized surrounded and basically bankrupt. if the DPR take Mariupol..which seems very likely...then Odessa will surely be next ..certainly within reach. And Kiev wont have much of a coastline any more...no navy.
Russian military reach ..if they recognize and incorporate rebel
Novorussia n the future..will have gone westward...compensating for any reach projected against them .
The EU and NATO can then have the bankrupt unviable ultranationalist freakshow that remains of Ukraine. They bought it and then broke it. its theirs now not Russias job to fix it or prop it up. And in time its current junta will suffer the same fate as the failures that went before them as the fruits of their imposed unrealistic and bigotted policies fall on their citizens.
The very reason why at this very moment the EU and NATO are getting so hysterical and upset and shrieking in such indignation is certainly not because Putin has been defeated. Quite the opposite. Theyve seen victory slip from their grasp when they thought the east was on the verge of defeat . Now its their proxies staring defeat in the face and possible collapse in the field.
And in the face of their threats Putin has sent them a very clear message. Your sanctions and threats will have zero effect and if you want this to stop go tal directly to the DPR . Negotiate with them . Negotiation then entails recognition .
Now at long last the EU are talking about the necessity for negotiations and diplomatic solutions. They could have had that at the very outset but they opted for brute force. Thats what being defeated entails and yet again Putin has secured yet another victory . Largely by sitting back and letting reality bite. Reality has a bit more to bite yet but bite it will .
