West’s Cyber Appeasement Gave Putin Green Light: James Stavridis (1)

There were many reasons Russian President Vladimir Putin finally decided to invade Ukraine, but one was the failure of an international alignment on the consequences of such aggression. Tacit indifference to Russia’s behavior from both sides of the Atlantic — regarding previous invasions of Georgia in 2008 and Ukraine in 2014, nerve-agent attacks on political opponents, support for a bloody war criminal in Syria — undoubtedly encouraged the Kremlin’s provocations.

In 2015, Russia’s military intelligence directorate launched a cyberattack that knocked out power for over 200,000 Ukrainians two days before Christmas. This was followed in June 2017 when shadowy Russian actors compromised ...