Hi Alok,
I just read your article now. I think you are on target.
I have four specific response to what you wrote, and to how you describe yourself in your profile:
First, you have a typo in your unpacking of the acronym "NATO." You give that as "Non" Atlantic Treaty Organization--whereas it should be ""North Atlantic Treaty Organization." As this map --
--makes clear, we're dealing only with the norther Alantic region: the countries on either side of the northern part of the Atlantic Ocean. (In contrast, the southern part of the Atlantic ocean lies pretty much between South America and Africa, which are obviously not part of the NATO alliance.)
Second, I agree with your basic thesis about the causes of the war: the expansion of NATO and the encroachment of western military power right up to Russia's border. To get a really detailed view of the problem, you might want to read my long essay on Medium, which is titled "How the West Brought War to Ukraine":
To give you an idea of what this essay i about -- so you can decide if you want to read more -- I'll copy. after I sign off, as a long post-script, the "Overview" section of my essay. That will give you an idea what my main argument is.
Third, good luck with your writing. If you haven't seen it already, I'd like to recommend a book for you: "On Writing Well" by William Zinsser -- you can get it out of any library (either directly or via interlibrary loan). Some people I respect love the whole book, so if you're into it, read the whole thing. I myself, to be honest, liked only Chapers 2 & 3 -- but I thought that even those two chapters make it worth getting the book. So even if you just want to read those two chapters, your effort will be repaid. Those chapters really are gems.
Fourth, don't be cowed by people who accuse you of "repeating Putin's words," as one of your respondents did, which is just another way of calling someone things like a "Putin apologist" or a "Putin lackey." You could easily counter by calling that person an apologist for the CIA or for the military-industrial complex. But in truth, those are all hominem -- arguments, "to the man" (Latin"), rather than ad rem ("to the thing," that is, an argument based on substance). In fact, "ad hominem" is considered a logical fallacy. (There are lots of discussions of logical fallacies searchable online--you might enjoy some of those, if you're not already familiar with the concept.)
Okay, that's it from me. As I said, I'll copy below the "Overview" section of my essay, linked above. I hope you enjoy the overview and, just possibly, my whole essay.
Ben Abelow
--
Overview
For almost 200 years, starting with the framing of the Monroe Doctrine in 1823, the United States has asserted security claims over virtually the whole Western hemisphere. Any foreign power that places military forces near U.S. territory knows it is crossing a red line. U.S. policy thus embodies a conviction that where a potential opponent places its forces is crucially important. In fact, this conviction is the cornerstone of American foreign and military policy, and its violation is considered reason for war.
Yet when it comes to Russia, the United States and its NATO allies have acted for decades in disregard of this same principle. They have progressively advanced the placement of their military forces toward Russia, even to its borders. They have done this with inadequate attention to, and sometimes blithe disregard for, how Russian leaders might perceive this advance. Had Russia taken equivalent actions with respect to U.S. territory — say, placing its military forces in Canada or Mexico — Washington would have gone to war and explained that war as a defensive response to the military encroachment of a foreign power.
When viewed through this lens, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is seen not as the unbridled expansionism of a malevolent Russian leader but as a violent and destructive reaction to misguided Western policies: an attempt to reestablish a zone around Russia’s western border that is free of offensive threats from the United States and its allies. Having misunderstood why Russia invaded Ukraine, the West is now basing existential decisions on false premises. In doing so, it is deepening the crisis and may be sleepwalking toward nuclear war.
This argument, which I now present in detail, is based on the analyses of a number of scholars, government officials, and military observers, all of whom I introduce and quote from in the course of the presentation. These include John Mearsheimer, Stephen F. Cohen, Richard Sakwa, Gilbert Doctorow, George F. Kennan, Chas Freeman, Douglas Macgregor, and Brennan Deveraux.
