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We often exaggerate how important the specific US President and US foreign policy is to Russian decision-making, in particular across the post-Soviet space. The 2008 war with Georgia happened under Bush, and the 2014 invasion of Ukraine under Obama. https://twitter.com/juliaioffe/status/1294352927394537473">https://twitter.com/juliaioff...
In both of those cases, Russia& #39;s leadership knew that the US wouldn& #39;t use military force and was willing to accept whatever response the US took because it had more significant interests at stake. Instead, Russia& #39;s decision-making in this case is based on other factors. 2/
The protests in Ukraine in 2014 centered around closer ties with the EU or Russia, and domestic support for them wasn& #39;t unanimous. In Belarus, the primary issues during the protests are: free and fair elections, no more repression, and no more Lukashenko. 3/
As a result, these protests have wide-spread support among different age groups, professions, and cities in all regions of Belarus. So it doesn& #39;t present the same threat to Russia, and the Ukraine template of using military force in certain regions wouldn& #39;t work in this case. 4/
It doesn& #39;t seem anyone in Belarus would welcome a Russian invasion (including the OMON/SOBR officers abusing the protesters), and such an act would only threaten Russia& #39;s relationship with Belarus. Not to mention, the protesters have shown that police brutality won& #39;t stop them.5/
And there& #39;s a reason Russia took a different approach to the 2018 Velvet Revolution in Armenia (in fact, Russia began exporting sophisticated arms like the Su-30SM fighter to Yerevan after this event it never had before) than it did with Ukraine in 2014. 6/
Russia& #39;s foreign policies to countries across the post-Soviet space aren& #39;t uniform, so applying a template from one country to another isn& #39;t appropriate. The underlying factors in Belarus now are quite different than in Ukraine in 2014, so Russia& #39;s actions will be different. 7/
And the primary instrument the Obama admin used in response to Russia& #39;s actions in Ukraine was sanctions. Well further sanctions were passed against Russia by Congress under Trump (with a veto-proof majority), so Moscow probably thinks a US response would be pretty similar. 8/
@lincolnpigman has a good thread on this as well. 9/ https://twitter.com/lincolnpigman/status/1294355914263343107">https://twitter.com/lincolnpi...
