I never claimed that Russia was some sort of angelic state. Quite the opposite. It is because Russia is dangerous when it feels its interests are at stake that it shouldn't be provoked, unless one means to take the provocation all the way. In 2007 Putin gave an ultimatum about further NATO expansion. It could have stopped there. Georgia and Ukraine, being right next doors to Russia should have stayed neutral. The U.S. insisted on the same policy and Georgia was attacked almost immediately as a result. Then Yanukovych was removed and the threat of Ukraine's NATO membership (and the loss of Sevastopol as a port) became all too real for Russia. A similar scenario with Georgia's Ossetia and Abkhazia regions played out in Ukraine with Donetsk and Luhansk, in addition to the annexation of Crimea. NATO then proceeded to arm and train the Ukrainian army, without offering any guarantee of extending its protection, but leaving the prospect on the table. This wasn't a mistake. It was a deliberate tactic. Even if they didn't believe Putin would attack before Georgia, what was NATO's excuse after that? Kennan and Mearsheimer are not seers, but they both warned their country against this policy, the former did so decades ago, from day one. Now Ukraine is devastated and Russia is closer than ever with China, much more so than the USSR was with China as a communist state.