Alexander S. Vindman

“weapons. In the post-9/11 period, the basis was a mirage of cooperation with Russia. After the start of the 2014 Russia-Ukraine war, the basis was fear of a confrontation: the West deterred itself from supporting Ukraine and challenging Russian aggression. The West has thus repeatedly reinforced a Russian belief that it can act with impunity on historical fantasies of regional dominance. In the process, the entire post–World War II and post–Cold War liberal world order has been thrown into perilous chaos. As I will show, this faulty Russia-centric policy has a background in the Cold War. Given the peril of that period, and the optimism over partnership and peace that arrived at the Cold War’s end, a policy focus on integrating Russia with the West was at least somewhat understandable in the 1990s. Nevertheless, overinflating the importance of Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union, and giving primary attention to the global war on terror after 9/11, contributed to obscuring both a clear US understanding of Russia’s ambitions and”
― Alexander S. Vindman, The Folly of Realism: How the West Deceived Itself About Russia and Betrayed Ukraine