
Ukraine became the place where the open crisis of the post-Soviet model occurred. This means that the country may become only the first stage in the chain of future collapses. Also, with Russian invasion in Ukraine the entire international system that came into being after 1991 is starting to crumble.

Every week a selection of leading experts answer a new question from Judy Dempsey on the foreign and security policy challenges shaping Europe’s role in the world.

The recent developments in Ukraine have effectively put an end to the interregnum of partnership and cooperation between the West and Russia that generally prevailed in the quarter-century after the Cold War.

The West is scrambling to find a response to recent events in Ukraine. Military engagement is not an option, but there are other steps the United States and Europe can take.

If Vladimir Putin’s Russia succeeds in Ukraine, it will conclude that it can act like an empire. An empire has no borders and does not respect the borders of others.

The EU committed a series of strategic blunders in the way it dealt with Ukraine. Europe’s leaders need to learn from those mistakes and avoid repeating them in the future.

Europe is divided over how to respond to Russia’s invasion of Crimea. The most powerful figure in the diplomatic tango is Germany’s Angela Merkel.

The Kremlin’s intervention in Crimea and direct involvement in the destabilization of the southeast of Ukraine exemplifies Putin’s Doctrine. This concept is based on the premise that Russia can only exist as the center of the galaxy surrounded by the satellite-statelets.

America’s recent foreign-policy actions, or rather its relative inaction and fecklessness, have sent a message to the world that there are no political consequences.

If the conflict in Ukraine develops into a lasting standoff between the U.S.-EU camp and Russia, it may shift the dynamics in Syria in more direct ways as well.