One reason for Russia’s invading Ukraine is that they want to block the invasion route provided by the European Plain that has been used before to invade Russia from the west. There are other geopolitical reasons for Russia doing this, but this one does the most to assuage Russian paranoia about invasions.
[Note: Even paranoids can have real enemies. In this case, it is global warming, which will eventually turn tundra into temperate farmland which, in turn, will attract massive numbers of climate change refugees. Hence, the fear of yet more invasions that will use various historical invasion routes from the west, south and east. Securing Ukraine will help block at least one such invasion gateway.]
“In the past 500 years, Russia has been invaded several times from the west. The Poles came across the European Plain in 1605, followed by the Swedes under Charles XII in 1707, the French under Napoleon in 1812, and the Germans—twice, in both world wars, in 1914 and 1941. In Poland, the plain is only 300 miles wide—from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Carpathian Mountains in the south—but after that point it stretches to a width of about 2,000 miles near the Russian border, and from there, it offers a flat route straight to Moscow. Thus Russia’s repeated attempts to occupy Poland throughout history; the country represents a relatively narrow corridor into which Russia could drive its armed forces to block an enemy advance toward its own border, which, being wider, is much harder to defend.”
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/10/russia-geography-ukraine-syria/413248/
An article written by Peter Zeihan in December 2021:
“A Ukraine War and the End of Russia”
https://zeihan.com/a-ukraine-war-and-the-end-of-russia/
Maps showing invasion gateways:
https://twitter.com/PeterZeihan/status/1495884487917715456
For more from Peter Zeihan, search;
‘peter zeihan russia‘
‘Peter zeihan china’
