The West scared Russia.

Eventually the Russia-Ukraine war will end.

Two things are true:

     -- Russia's invasion of Ukraine is a brutal, indefensible act of aggression. 

     -- The U.S. shaped the geopolitical context in which Moscow concluded that invading Ukraine was necessary.

I was 13 when I watched President Kennedy frighten my parents and the nation. Missiles in Cuba, 90 miles off our shore. I remember that detail. Only 90 miles.

"Unmistakable evidence has established the fact that a series of offensive missile sites are now in preparation on that imprisoned island [Cuba.]"

In a college class on the U.S. presidency five years later, the fall of 1967, I learned from a professor with highly-placed sources in the White House that our response to the presence of nuclear weapons in Cuba nearly set off the very nuclear war we feared. 

Russia has a problem. The vast Eurasian plain offers few natural barriers. Over centuries, Russia endured repeated invasions from the west—Polish armies in the 17th century, Napoleon in the 19th, and Nazi Germany in the 20th. These catastrophes are foundational to Russian strategic culture. A U.S.-aligned military alliance on its border feels, to Moscow, like a historical pattern repeating itself.

After the Soviet collapse, the U.S. championed a vision of Europe “whole and free,” which meant expanding Western institutions eastward. What could be more natural, Western nations thought, than for sovereign states to choose to be part of NATO and the prosperous, democratic west. This vision collided with Russia’s deeply-rooted belief that its security depends on buffer zones; strategic depth. Buffer zones saved Russia from Napoleon. They saved it from Hitler. Land is safety.  A Ukraine integrated into Western political, economic, and military structures represented, to Moscow, not a neutral choice but a direct strategic loss.

The Maidan Revolution crystallized the perception that the enemy was closing in on them. In late 2013, Ukraine President Viktor Yanukovych — elected on a platform that leaned toward Russia — abruptly abandoned plans to sign an association agreement with the European Union. Massive protests erupted in Kyiv’s Maidan Square. Over months of demonstrations, Yanukovych lost control. In February 2014, after security forces fired on protesters and political support collapsed, he fled the country. Parliament removed him from office.

To many Ukrainians, Maidan was a democratic uprising against corruption. Moscow viewed it as a Western-backed regime change. The U.S. had played a visible role: Senior officials like Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and Senator John McCain visited Kyiv during the protests and encouraged them to continue. A phone call leaked in which Nuland and other U.S. officials discussed preferred post-Yanukovych political outcomes. Moscow feared an enemy at the gates.

All wars eventually end, either in a win, a loss, or some kind of negotiated settlement.  Deals get struck. Someone is unhappy; probably everyone. The Russia-Ukraine war will end. I expect some kind of unsatisfactory land-for-peace carve-up of Ukraine. I won't like it. It will seem unfair to Ukraine. I will be reminded of Munich, Hitler, and Czechoslovakia.  

My sensibilities here are irrelevant. Russia's sensibilities are central. Russia is a great regional power and it wants what such powers think are essential to their long-term safety. They want space. 

The Hitler-Munich analogy is one way to think about the end of this war. If the war ends on any terms other than Russia's complete withdrawal from Ukraine, then I expect the settlement to be condemned by Americans on both the right and left as another Munich. Any possible end to the war will give something to Russia and that will give excellent justification to complain that the resolution is unfair, immoral, and sets a bad precedent. 

But in anticipation of some future settlement, I am attempting to hold two conflicting ideas in mind. The instructive analogy from history may be both Munich and the Cuban Missile Crisis. It requires something unpleasant to do: imagining the situation from the point of view of Russia. Russia was in the situation that JFK found himself.

The West didn't cause Russia's invasion. But the West underestimated the geopolitical shock of Maidan and how Russia would perceive Ukraine's lean toward NATO and the EU. Russia doesn't think it is acting out of ambition alone. It thinks it is acting out of necessity.  Necessity is a powerful motivator. It is diplomatic malpractice not to think through how Russia might perceive a Ukraine tilting toward the EU and NATO.  America risked blowing up the world to stop missiles from being within 90 miles of our shores. I expect Russia to be equally adamant and I expect that to show up in whatever resolution there is to this war.

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