| I don't think it's a mistake as much as it is multiple parties making statements, interpreting them and/or using them rhetorically in whatever way served their purposes. Imo, a straightforward rendering is A - russians strongly desired that NATO would not expand east, except maybe east Germany.
B - Various Western diplomats made unofficial, nonbinding statements
C - russian leaders knew these were not binding statements, but present the statements as commitments in order to legitimise their demands and grievances
D - almost all russian neighbors mistrust them, want defensive alliances to help avoid russian influence in their borders.
E - western leaders ignored russian nervousness about NATO expansion.
I think you can make a case for "US should have been less scary." NATO is an anti-russian alliance, and it means hostile troops on russian borders.Itoh, it's disingenuous to ignore the case that russian influence has been malign. Political, social & economic disfunction are near guarantees if your country falls in thee "russian sphere." No o e wants to be Belarus. The russian desire for estonia, Latvia, Poland, etc to be like Belarus is one hell of a demand. The people of those country certainly don't want that. In any case, I think the "legitimate russian security concerns" discussion is a dead horse now. The Ukrainian invasion and Putin's imperialist speech moots the whole thing. Russia declared Ukrainian statehood void and Imperial Russia as the legitimate source for territorial claims. You can't declare that and also argue for legitimate security concerns. Also, Russia assured Ukrainian independence. Where's that promise? |