Russian leaders know all about this, given their experience in Afghanistan, which military adventure at least accelerated the collapse of the Soviet Union if it did not outright cause it.

So why is this happening anyway?

I think many people in the west overlook a critical motivating factor for Putin. Yes he’s Machiavellian, yes he’s good with propaganda, yes he’s untroubled by ethics that constrain many leaders. Yes, he’s become increasingly huberistic. All that is true.

When people overlook is his intense Russian patriotism and his determination to fulfill a legacy he’s been reaching for since he decided to become a political leader instead of an oligarch.

Putin was fundamentally shaped by the fall of the Soviet union, which he experienced as tragic and deeply hurtful to the Russian people. He watched people in Moscow and Leningrad starve in throes of the economic collapse that ensued. He passed through the Leningrad Metro station in Moscow where homeless children in rags sniffed glue and sold their bodies.

That’s what the fall of the Soviet Union meant to him. That’s the lens a lot of Russian people look at it through, rather than the optimistic way we westerners tend to think about it.

Putin rose to power, grasped for power by striking deals with oligarchs whom he could have joined instead, with the purpose of restoring Russian power and glory. I’m sure he enjoys exercising power, and I’m sure his pride has swollen, but he has never deviated from that central purpose.

To Putin and to many Russians, the seemingly relentless expansion of the EU and NATO eastward is an intolerable, existential threat. I’m not saying they’re correct to feel that way, nor does that justify aggression, but they aren’t kidding about feeling that way. It’s not just propaganda, it’s real to them.

Putin overstepped, but western leaders who didn’t think he would go this far haven’t been listening. Or they haven’t been hearing.

I’ve been listening to Putin’s speeches with Russian in my left ear, and an English translation in my right ear for clarity, for days. I don’t recognize the characterization that most western media is making of those speeches.

I have no idea what kind of product western intelligence communities have been delivering to policy makers, but if it’s anything like what western media have been delivering, it’s bound to produce more conflict and more war.