Instead, Mr. Putin is erecting a Great Russian empire. He has imposed a brutal police state at home. Journalists routinely are killed. Critics and dissidents are jailed. Media freedoms and opposition parties are under assault. A gangster elite runs the Kremlin, plundering the country’s vast wealth.
Yet the Russian bear seeks an even bigger prize: Ukraine. This nation of 46 million, whose size is that of Germany and Britain combined, is of vital geopolitical importance – to both Russia and the West.Read the story here.
