It pursued that direction anyways, because what (aside from nuclear war) is the worst that could happen..?
(A full invasion of Ukraine, as it turns out is the worst thing that can happen - so far. But that's no sweat off the backs of anyone on this side of the Atlantic.)
Now, where are these people, why don't they pipe up and tell us that they told the higher ups what would happen but got ignored? Why can't we be honest that we made a grave mistake in this case?
if all Russia wanted was Donbas they could just go here, take it, and eject the ethnic Ukrainians if they like, and steal the resources and territory instead of paying for them. Instead they go all-in on destroying as much of the country as possible before they most likely retreat to a relatively small region in the east, which I think was the original objective.
Russia chose to commit this massive crime, no one else.
But we have to be careful of what stages we are setting up. another example is the "Mujahudeen". Yes, convenient thorn in the Soviets' ambitions but they would come back to haunt us. It's still their fault for their acts of terror, but we also gave them "life" by setting up the stage for them.
If we look at the timeline, US signaling intent to expand nato lines up perfectly with Russia’s belligerence, and it’s not exactly subtle.
Putin more or less said “we won’t stand for this” at the time.
Perhaps it is a lack of empathy as implied by the parent comment, but that seems surprisingly oblivious.
The US has been incapable of putting ourselves in the shoes of a has-been empire, so when Russia sees expansion as a threat, we can't fathom what their fuss is about. But if you look at it from Russia's perspective, as a post Soviet Empire that is in severe retreat and is beset on many fronts, one can begin to understand some of their PoV, especially given the Syria-Ukraine-Caucasus entanglement stoked by Obama. Obviously a cretin like Putin takes all this as personal affront on behalf of all Slavs and results in this disaster.