UKRAINE

Seldom has so much been said about a country the West knows so little about.

Historically Russia did everything to erase Ukraine's identity, renaming it Little Russia, enforcing the Orthodox church and considering Kiev as an ancient Russian city.  Still on December 1, 1991, 91% of Ukranians, including the majority of the Russian minority, voted in a referendum for independence.

They did not realize that their "independence" was mortgaged from the start. Their room for manoeuvre was left in limbo. Putin never got over the demise of the Soviet Union, and the West chose not to push the advantage it had then. 

Ukraine became some ersatz of a Sudetenland in Russia's political games, Now the permanent crisis arrives at an artificial breaking point. It is no longer that important to guess what Moscow will do, since it has already achieved most of its goals. Ukraine will neither be a NATO or EU member.  It lost the Krim. The northern border is just a Russian protectorat. The EU has its hands full and its pockets empty. The Americans probably care more about Tigrae than about Kiev. 

It sounds cynical but most things that are Russia related are hard to sell. Even the Chinese do better in understanding imagery. Ukraine pays the price of being for too long obliged to cavort with the Russian bear. This befell others in similar historical situations, but none came as close, to be considered part of the Russian psyche.

Here again the terminal villain is Trump. He considered Ukraine as, yet again, just a means to arrive at a selfish purpose, while sending his minions to Kiev to find dirt on the son of now President Biden. He would never have lifted a finger to embarass Putin, and would have been too willing to send Ukraine to the scaffold in return for whatever blackmail material the Kremlin might have about his conduct.

It is doubtful that Russia will invade Ukraine. The sanctions would be real and hurting. The blame would be almost universal.  Putin has no desire to end up in a St. Helena of his own making. He enjoys a nibble but is enough of a health freak not to risk indigestion.

The world gets more cynical by the day and in the prelude of the 2024 US presidential elections, these years belong to the sociopaths.