I am sure I am not mistaken in saying that this entire month can be called a month of waiting for war. Throughout January, the world media, primarily the American media, discussed the possibility of a new Russian attack on Ukraine. At the same time, there were intensive diplomatic contacts, meetings between the US Secretary of State and the Russian Foreign Minister, but each time the negotiations ended without any real results, with the Kremlin continuing to insist on its outrageous demands.
In essence, these demands boil down to one thing: an attempt to limit the sovereignty of Ukraine and other former Soviet republics. After the virtual summit between the American and Russian presidents, drafts of the Treaty between Russia and the US on Security Guarantees and the Agreement on Security Measures for Russia and NATO Member States appeared on the Russian Foreign Ministry's website. As is well known, one of the Kremlin's main proposals to the United States and NATO countries in general was to refuse to allow former Soviet republics to join NATO, with Ukraine mentioned separately.
It is noteworthy that the Russian proposals did not even mention the ongoing territorial conflicts in the post-Soviet space involving Russia and proposals for their settlement. In other words, Moscow, on the one hand, demands that countries such as Ukraine and Georgia not be allowed to become NATO members or even develop independent relations with other states, while on the other hand, it refuses to offer solutions to conflicts provoked in these countries primarily by Russia itself. Russia wants NATO countries to commit to not expanding the alliance unilaterally, but at the same time, it is not going to commit to not expanding the CSTO, even though this military bloc includes the former Soviet republics. By and large, we are witnessing a return to the old Soviet propaganda rhetoric, where NATO is an “aggressive bloc” and cannot be allowed to expand because it threatens Moscow, while the CSTO (well, back then it was the Warsaw Pact) is a “peace-loving alliance” and the more members it has, the better, because this ensures the security of “good countries” that are defended from “bad ones” — well, we saw this in January in Kazakhstan. And Russian troops and mercenaries on the territory of the former Soviet republics are not noticed, because this interferes with the perception of the propaganda picture of the world – “we are not there.”
At the same time, I will not say that this is only the first attempt to limit Ukrainian sovereignty. The Russian political leadership, headed by Vladimir Putin, has been taking decisive steps to limit this sovereignty for a long time. And these actions did not begin after the victory of the Maidan in 2013-2014. Moscow did not doubt the legitimacy of Viktor Yushchenko or Viktor Yanukovych. However, when Yushchenko made efforts to ensure that Ukraine received a NATO Membership Action Plan, representatives of pro-Russian forces in the Verkhovna Rada practically blocked the work of the Ukrainian parliament. Even then, the Russian capital was talking about the inadmissibility of Ukraine's Euro-Atlantic integration and supporting politicians who were ready to abandon this integration — primarily Yanukovych himself.
When Yanukovych came to power, he not only signed the notorious Kharkiv Accords with his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev, but also achieved the declaration of Ukraine as a non-aligned state. At the same time, Yanukovych was ready to negotiate with the European Union on the signing of an association agreement. Even this intention caused irritation in Moscow. Russian leaders claimed that the agreement was not in their country's interests and would lead to losses and a deterioration in relations between Russia and Ukraine. In the end, Putin persuaded Yanukovych to effectively refuse to sign the agreement, which triggered a sharp political crisis in Ukraine.
The Kremlin is doing everything possible to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO and the EU, primarily because it sees this as a way to protect Ukrainian sovereignty. And Moscow no longer hides the fact that this protection does not suit Russia, that even 30 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the former Soviet republics should have limited sovereignty and that they cannot have the right to make independent choices. This thesis is set out in black and white in the “security proposals” that the Russian Foreign Ministry has sent to its American colleagues.
The most important issue for Ukraine, however, is not even the obvious rejection of Russia's proposals by the West. The most important thing is what Moscow intends to do when it becomes clear that neither the US leadership nor the leadership of other NATO member states are going to take seriously proposals that effectively limit the sovereignty of NATO member states and potential members of the alliance. The most important thing is why Moscow decided in the first place that it could make such proposals.

It seems to me that when Vladimir Putin planned his campaign of intimidation against Ukraine, he seriously expected that the new president of the United States would simply capitulate and begin discussing with his advisors how to quickly satisfy all his “wishes” in order to prevent war and another humiliation for America. But to assume this is to be completely ignorant of who Biden is. It means having no interest in history—although perhaps Putin is not interested in it either. If he were interested, he would know that Biden was the senator who consistently advocated the use of force against Milosevic's regime, arming Bosnian Muslims, and bombing the positions of the so-called Yugoslav People's Army, which the Belgrade dictator had turned into a genocidal gang. And all this happened at a time when most of the American political establishment was strongly opposed to such an approach and intervention in distant European conflicts. Biden recalls how impressed he and other senators were by the words of the then Bosnian Foreign Minister Haris Silajdžić, who asked the US for weapons simply so that his compatriots could at least die with dignity while defending themselves against the aggressor. And it was Biden who was one of the American politicians who convinced President Bill Clinton of the need for NATO's military operation against Milosevic's regime to save the Kosovars who had been expelled from their homes. Therefore, when President Biden agreed with Putin's definition as a murderer, it was no coincidence. Senator Biden said this to Milosevic's face. That is why this time Putin faced an opponent for whom confrontation like this is a lifelong pursuit. And he has backed himself into a corner from which it will be very difficult for him and all of us to escape. Not responding with force to the blatant unwillingness to agree to his insane demands means showing himself to be a “weakling” in front of his own ghouls. Responding means incurring sanctions that could soon leave no stone unturned in the entire Russian economy, turning the whole country into a project of his beloved Gelendzhik palace — only not as envisioned by opposition leader Navalny, but in real time. Not responding means accepting that Ukrainians—and, in the future, the inhabitants of other former Soviet republics—will have the right to make their own choices and will not become serfs of the Kremlin. And, by the way, Russians themselves will one day have this right. Responding means hastening one's own collapse, only making it more painful and bloody, taking millions of lives with one to the grave...

Biden outplayed him. Where is all this Russian propaganda? All over the world, people are comparing Czechoslovakia in 1938 and Ukraine in 2022, Putin with Hitler, and soon they will be identical not only in the mass consciousness, but even in history textbooks. But there will be no Munich. Where are all those Russian sympathizers who yesterday were talking about how sanctions against Russia were getting in their way? NATO is voting for a response to Moscow, agreeing on the need for new restrictive measures in the event of Russian aggression. And if anyone shows weakness, they are publicly criticized, like the German politicians who are still trying to defend Nord Stream 2. And this trend will only intensify—very soon, anyone who dares to defend the Kremlin will be shunned. Their careers will end immediately, like that of the notorious German vice admiral who said that the new Führer deserves respect. And the Americans are right when they say that the ball is now in Russia's court. Putin really has a choice: to talk his ultimatums into an endless negotiation process, to achieve at least the preservation of the status quo, to hiss rather than bite. Or to try, after all, to invade Ukraine. To start a war, face desperate resistance from the Ukrainian army and people, a series of coffins in Russian cities and villages, Western “sanctions from hell,” and the collapse of his own regime.

That is why I really want Ukrainians not to be afraid of war. I want Putin to be afraid of it.