What is Vladimir Putin up to?

The question arises for the second time this year.

In the spring, the Russian president massed troops in Crimea and east of Ukraine.

It was a show of power, with airborne troops and all the trimmings.

After four weeks the spectacle was over.

Now there are unusual movements, especially in the north of Ukraine, but also in positions that were already taken in the spring. That goes hand in hand with massive propaganda. Putin himself presented their narrative this week: Russia is not threatening Ukraine, but vice versa. NATO and Ukraine were getting closer and closer to Russia militarily; his country urgently needed security guarantees, and legally enforceable ones.

This is actually a "bad joke," as the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken put it.

Not only because NATO is of course a defensive alliance and Ukraine has no appetite for war with Moscow.

But also because Vladimir Putin suddenly discovered international law for himself - although it is not entirely clear which court in the world could be sued for a guarantee of security.

But it would be a question that Putin should discuss with the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Selenskyj.

Ukraine knows its way around.

She got a security guarantee when she gave up the nuclear weapons that remained on her soil in 1994.

One of the guarantee powers at that time was Russia.

That was then obsolete twenty years later when Putin conquered the Crimea.

NATO has to play its own match

Nobody can say exactly what he's up to - probably not even himself. He's a gamer, and games have their own dynamics.

He seeks the tactical advantage, the moment for the surprising advance.

But he watches exactly how his opponents behave.

Whoever wants to stand up against him must not allow his system to be imposed on him.

You have to play your own match and remain sufficiently unpredictable yourself.

When the NATO partners are now booming warning of a deployment, drawing war on the wall, talking about tough sanctions and military reinforcements on the eastern flank, then they are following this logic.

This also applies to Zelensky when he accuses his opponent Rinat Akhmetov, the richest man in the country, of a coup.

It is certain that it will not be the last confrontation with Moscow over Ukraine. So far, Putin's “red line” has been the country's admission to NATO. The alliance respected that, despite a corresponding commitment 13 years ago, accession is a long way off. Recently, Putin has been portraying any rapprochement between the country and the West as an existential threat. He no longer dreams of New Russia, an 18th century project, but of the much older Kievan Rus, a territory that includes Belarus and the whole of Ukraine .

You have to take this seriously, because Russia has enormous weapons and disruptive potential.

But the West must not allow itself to be blackmailed.

As long as the Ukraine wants it, the path leads westwards, into an ever closer partnership.

There are forces at work here that neither arms nor gas deals can stop.