Simply put, the Georgia-Russia War of 2008 should teach us that to arm other countries for war with more powerful neighbors when you have no intention of fighting to save them is not only irresponsible, it is deeply immoral.
The most volatile dispute in this region may not be in Ukraine itself, but Transdniestria, the breakaway Russian-speaking region of the former Soviet republic of Moldova that has since 1992 been protected by a garrison of Russian “peacekeeping” troops. […]
From a military point of view, the position of Russia’s force in Transdniestria is acutely vulnerable; because unlike Crimea, the Donbas, Abkhazia or South Ossetia, it is entirely cut off from Russia by the territory of Ukraine and Moldova. In the event of a blockade by these countries, the Russian troops there could not be supplied. Neither Moldova nor Ukraine has imposed a blockade — despite Kiev’s bitter hostility to Russia since 2014 — for fear that Russia would go to war in response. The United States must try to maintain that dynamic. Dmitri Trenin of the Carnegie Moscow Center has written that a blockade of the Russian force in Transdniestria “would present Russia with the dilemma of conflict or humiliation.” And there is little doubt what Vladimir Putin would choose. Läs artikel