[ajmurmann]

> He and his cohort were sponsored by the West and the West clearly loves Russian people and wish us the best possible future, yeah, we believe.

Why do you not believe this? As someone who identifies as Western, I want for all people's to prosper. I don't think I've ever talked to anyone in Europe or the US who had it out for Russians. All resentment send exclusively be towards nationalists.

[brabel]

For the same reason no one in the West believed Putin when he said expanding NATO was not necessary since Russia was not the enemy anymore. The West still wanted to allow ex Soviet countries to join NATO even if that would cause hostility from Russia. It really is a self fulfilling prophecy caused by mistrust from both sides. It’s always so easy to blame only one side when you’re strongly biased towards one of the sides, but if you look at it from a neutral perspective, clearly both sides behaved in a way as to make the current situation completely unavoidable. And neither is willing to make a change now and will just double down until one side is completely defeated. Russia alone has no chance, but if when shit hits the fan its BRICS friends continue to back it up, we may be heading to something even more disastrous than WWII. I am not optimistic.

[CamperBob2]

"I only broke into your house because you threatened to join the neighborhood watch" isn't the apology you were perhaps reaching for.

[benterix]

> The West still wanted to allow ex Soviet countries to join NATO even if that would cause hostility from Russia.

I find it hard to understand people still use this argument with the straight face. NATO is not an entity that expands itself - individual countries, like Sweden or Finland, request to join it to protect themselves from the situation when Russia attacks them and they have to fight alone like Ukraine. Of course Putin hates that as he cannot fulfill his dream of expanding Russia to the borders of Soviet Union, but this argument doesn't stand any scrutiny.

[ajmurmann]

Why do you think it is that any country had an interest in joining NATO even after 2000?