A brief thread of essays and blogs that can provide a thinking person an overview of the forces at play in Ukraine. The first is Peter Hitchens (@Peter Hitchens) on NATO expansion, in a post on his blog in 2017. 1/4 https://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2017/02/lemmings-nato-the-russian-threat-and-the-merchants-of-death-.html…

The second is an extraordinarily prescient essay from 1997, written by Rodric Braithwaite, Britain's last ambassador to the Soviet Union. 2/4 https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/bringingrussiain…

The third is a superb piece from Rob Lee (@Rob Lee) on the current military buildup on the Ukrainian borders and what might come next. I also recommend following his Twitter feed, which is cataloguing the build-up in real time. 3/4 https://www.fpri.org/article/2022/01/moscows-compellence-strategy/…

The final piece offers a way out: application of the Minsk II agreement. This might be unpalatable to Ukrainians West of the Dnieper, and Ukrainian nationalists elsewhere, but it seems better than Russia imposing something worse for Ukraine by war. 4/4 https://www.thenation.com/article/world/ukraine-donbas-russia-conflict/…