Small Wars Journal

American Paratroopers in Ukraine Have Putin Rattled

Thu, 08/13/2015 - 9:34am

American Paratroopers in Ukraine Have Putin Rattled by Anna Nemtsova, The Daily Beast

… U.S. troops and Ukrainian troops learning from each other seems to be just the kind of thing that Russian President Vladimir Putin was worrying about when he called an emergency meeting of his security council on Wednesday.

As the pace of fighting in eastern Ukraine picks up (with each side blaming the other, as usual), one of Moscow’s stated concerns is about Ukraine’s new defense doctrine, officially released this week.

Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev told journalists it “provides the United States and NATO with an opportunity to use Ukraine’s resource base and provokes further escalation in the southeast of the country.” Kiev’s doctrine includes major military reforms and names Russia as the most dangerous enemy. The U.S., British, Polish, Canadian, and other NATO military forces drilling with Ukrainian forces this summer are a strong signal for Putin and his closest circle that the West is ready to be involved in a military conflict. They may also give him a pretext to raise the stakes in Ukraine’s eastern region, known as Donbas.

Rival exercises in other areas by NATO and the Russians represent the biggest build-up in military tensions with Moscow since the Cold War, according to many analysts. And Putin seems to relish the confrontation, even when his security cabinet recommends caution…

Read on.