Ukraine from a Russian perspective - Take Two

A second attempt to open a thread that analyses the Ukraine mess from a Russian perspective, as a counter-balance to the standard one-sided NATO perspective. In this thread, I hope that neither the Russian government nor the US government will be dismissed as ravenous spawn of Satan. Each has its national interests that it is bound to defend. Whatever we may think of the dubious morality of the outside forces (Russia on the one hand and the NATO coalition on the other), it is Ukrainians who are dying in this "game".
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