Russia hasn’t forgotten the price and burden of direct Middle-East engagement. However Russia, unlike U.S. due to its long-standing relationship with Israel, has the luxury of poking and probing from the flanks of U.S. interests and it is doing so with the help of Syria and Iran.
Still, Russia, internally, has its own sectarian/extremists problems and Putin is well aware of the need to remain as anonymous as possible so as to not further aggravate more critical issues his country faces; Russia has a serious internal economic and territorial problem as we observed with their reclamation of Crimea. Russia believes it needs to fend off Western expansion which brings us to the issue of Ukraine; Mr. Putin clearly would love to reclaim Ukraine in its complete form however he’s well aware that he may need to settle for the vast resources of its eastern third. Expect that the E.U. Member States will not want to challenge Russia directly and will welcome the “cover” of NATO as a tool for containing Russia.
Will the, presently, pro-western Ukraine welcome NATO? Given the rabid behind the scenes influence-peddling of U.S. Department of State, it is a near certainty. How far is Putin/Russia prepared to battle? Not far at all; Putin knows the limits of conventional engagement and despite what western commentators might think, a nuclear engagement is not an alternative; he’s a calculating tactician, not an idiot.
Curtis C. Greco, Founder
