The Ukrainian people are mounting a courageous defense of their homeland. But the reality is that unless the West intervenes militarily to stop the Russian invasion of Ukraine, it is almost certain that the country will fall within a month or two. The myriad of sanctions that have been placed on Russia are not enough to curb the ambitions of its leader, President Vladimir Putin, who seeks no less than the restoration of Russian control over the former republics of the Soviet Union, and its predecessor, the Russian Empire. Indeed, history has shown that sanctions very rarely stop megalomaniac leaders like Putin from pursuing a path of conquest. Only force will deter Putin's Russia. Unfortunately, the West's leaders are reluctant to intervene militarily against Russia for fear of starting a third world war. Thus, Putin is free to pursue his agenda of conquest.
Ukraine is just the first country Putin seeks to conquer. So which country will he try to conquer next? Chances are that the Russian dictator will wait a while before moving into any other countries so that his forces can recover from the losses sustained in Ukraine. He cannot, however, wait too long, because the longer he waits, the more damage the sanctions imposed on Russia by the international community will do to the Russian economy, thereby increasing the chances of unrest in the country. Putin will probably wait a few months at most before embarking on his next conquest.
Any country bordering Russia and the territories it has conquered so far is a potential target for Putin, which means that the countries bordering Ukraine, as well as countries in the Baltic, Central Asia, and the Caucuses are all in his crosshairs. That being said, the Russian dictator will seek to avoid some of these countries for fear of upsetting other significant military powers. Hence, it is very unlikely that Putin will invade Latvia, Lithuania, or Estonia, because all three Baltic states are members of NATO, as are Ukraine's neighbors, Poland, Slovakia, and Romania. At this point, Russia is not strong enough to go into direct military conflict with NATO, so the Baltic states should be safe for now. Finland and Sweden, however, are not part of NATO, so Putin could conceivably set his sights on either of them. Finland in particular would be a tempting target for Putin since it was once part of the Russian Empire. But although both Sweden and Finland are not part of NATO, they are part of the European Union, so unless Putin wants a direct conflict with the EU, he will be careful to avoid these two countries.
This leaves Moldova and the former Soviet republics in the Caucuses and Central Asia. The countries of Central Asia are rich in oil and gas, making them a tempting target for Putin. However, Russia already exerts significant political and economic influence in these countries, to the extent that Putin does not have to exert direct control over them. Azerbaijan, located in the Caucuses, would be a very big prize if the Russians managed to conquer it, as it is also rich in oil and gas. But Azerbaijan has very close political and cultural ties to Turkey, which means that attacking it might incur the wrath of Turkey's dictator, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has proven himself to be very unpredictable. Moreover, Turkey is a member of NATO and has the alliance's second-largest military, thus Putin would probably be reluctant to make an enemy of the Turks.
Putin's next target will very likely be either Moldova or Georgia. Georgia borders Russia to the south, and Moldova is one of Ukraine's neighbors to the west. Neither of these countries are part of NATO or the European Union. In addition, Russian and pro-Russian forces have engaged in military conflict in both countries in the past. The self-declared Republic of Transnistria in Moldova, for example, was formed after Moldova gained independence from the Soviet Union, originally because the people of the unrecognized territory wanted to remain part of the USSR. Today, the territory maintains its own government, which is strongly pro-Russian.
Meanwhile, in Georgia, a Russian invasion of the country in 2008 resulted in the conquest of two of the country's formerly-autonomous territories, South Ossetia and Abkhazia. These two territories are now self-declared independent states supported by the Russian government. Putin can easily conjure up a pretext to invade either Moldova or Georgia, just as he did in Ukraine. Also, both of these countries have little significance from a strategic or economic standpoint, so at most, the international community will simply slap more sanctions on Russia in the event Putin decides to invade.
Jason Shvili is a freelance writer in Toronto, Canada.
