Putin arguments about Russian history points toward expansion. Putin arguments about being entitled to Ukraine due to them being forced into USSR or Ukraine not being real nation points toward expansion.
Russian recent history is not a history of peaceful trustworthy nation either.
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Edited to add: the material help is not coming there from pure empathy alone. Germany did not provided actual guns able to kill because of them feeling bad for refugees. This was major change against previous policies and cant be explained by "we feel bad for their president after seeing his cool videos". It can be explained only by "we think we have stake in outcome and it matters to us".
Nothing even hinted that Russia is interested expanding beyond Ukraine, and not even the whole of Ukraine. So like I've said, it's fear mongering by our politicians to keep people living in fear, it's getting to comical levels now, I get offers for psychological counseling at work due to the Ykrainey situation.
Russia is a nation, why are you taking offense on that statement? It is not an insult.
> Nothing even hinted that Russia is interested expanding beyond Ukraine, and not even the whole of Ukraine
I mean, except Putin talking about how Ukraine is fake nation that should be part of Russia.
And the pre-written victory announcement state media recently published and then pulled back announcing the reformation of a single union of all the Russias (Belarus, “Greater” Russia [i.e., just plain Russia], and “Little” Russia [Ukraine]).
>I mean, except Putin talking about how Ukraine is fake nation that should be part of Russia.
Source?
first full English transcript I could find: (the English language Kremlin site where it was hosted is nonresponsive, and most major media is just carrying excerpts.)
https://www.riotimesonline.com/brazil-news/modern-day-censor...
> So, I will start with the fact that modern Ukraine was entirely created by Russia or, to be more precise, by Bolshevik, Communist Russia. This process started practically right after the 1917 revolution, and Lenin and his associates did it in a way that was extremely harsh on Russia – by separating, severing what is historically Russian land.
Read the whole thing. If you're going to defend Russian policy online you should have a clear idea what you're defending.
There is nothing to contradict the view, that Putin doesn't want to restore the old Tsar or Soviet borders.
"NATO currently holds security dominance in Estonia, but according to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s former top economic adviser, Andrey Illarionov, “Putin has his eyes on eventually reclaiming Estonia”.
John Aravosis, “Putin wants Finland, Baltic States, says former top adviser,” http://americablog.com/2014/03/putin-wants-finland-baltic-st...
I think that in this case, multiple nato members think this makes Russia direct threat to them. You know, Poland is possibly next, because Russia always wants Poland. Eastern Germany used to be under Russian control too, what it means to Germans? Estonia probably sees themselves as target too. All satelite previously occupied by Russia republics. Russia is expanding again toward Europe and if Ukraine is easy, other European/NATO countries expect same treatment. If NATO countries further West did nothing, it would be sign that these countries will abandon others again .
Basically, Ukrainians fight for Polish, Slovak and what not freedom too.