By David Faris The Week

Discussion around the Ukraine crisis has mainly focused on what caused the massive, ominous Russian military buildup at the Ukrainian border, what would transpire in an invasion, and what policy options are available for the U.S. and its allies. Relatively less attention has been paid to whether Russian strongman Vladimir Putin will achieve his goals with force — or if an unprovoked invasion of a democratic neighbor might in fact be a terrible strategic mistake.

That’s a question we (to say nothing of Putin himself) should be asking. The history of this kind of pointless violence isn’t favorable to its perpetrators, who nearly always end up losing more than they anticipated or gained from the war.

War is, first and foremost, very costly, and it represents a failure of negotiation to resolve outstanding issues between states. No one yet knows whether this war will really happen or whether this is the century’s most elaborate and sustained international cage-rattling, but Russia’s stated objectives — forcing the withdrawal of NATO forces from Eastern Europe, a formal agreement that NATO’s expansion is over, and more — are both wildly unrealistic and disconnected from the situation on the ground. Annexing more territory in eastern Ukraine, or creating a territorial corridor to the breakaway Moldovan region of Transnistria may serve Moscow’s interests in a variety of ways, but it won’t roll back prior expansions of NATO or forestall future additions to the alliance.

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