ADUN SPEAKS | Russian aggression in Ukraine would not have taken place if the United States and its allies had not pursued a liberal enlargement policy.

If only they had considered the national and strategic interests of Russia.

A worldview based on realism rather than liberalism might have stopped Russian aggression.

With the end of the Cold War, the US and its allies believed in the logic of liberal expansion, the supremacy of the market forces and others.

This meant that the former Soviet republics became the target of incorporation into the EU and at some point in Nato.

In the earlier years after the fall of the Soviet Union, Russia was weak and unable to counter the US moves in eastern Europe.