Putin aims to make Russia a leader in the area. The Ukraine finds Its forces are ill equipped to take Crimea back from Russia because in1994 the Ukrainian government agreed not to develop nuclear weapons or build up its armed forces if the U.S. and the West would agree to protect the Ukraine from Russian aggression. In response to that, the Budapest Memorandum was signed in 1994 by Bill Clinton, the Democratic president of the US, and John Major of Britain who agreed to protect the Ukraine if Russian troops crossed into the country.
Ukraine's interim government today reminded Washington of the treaty. The Ukraine government did not ask for military assistance but did ask Washington to provide its military forces with arms, ammunition and intelligence support, senior U.S. officials said, but they said that Obama, (a Democratic president) "has declined, wary of inflaming tensions with Russia."
That was one of the things that Putin was counting on. Last year, Barack Obama ended up humiliating himself after drawing a red line for American military intervention in Syria, if Syria used chemical weapons against their civilian population, and then did nothing when Syria ignored him and went ahead and used chemical weapons on their civilian population. Of course it is also against the Geneva convention and the Western nations also just stood by and did nothing. In addition to that, Putin saw that Obama was more than willing to disregard the national interests of America's allies, such as Israel and Saudi Arabia, when he backed off on sanctions against Iran to stop working on its nuclear bomb facilities and even destroy them, because Russia objected to this, and instead made a treaty with Iran to stop sanctions for six months, or longer because the treaty can be extended, in exchange for Iran to slow down its work on the project. Not stop it, just slow it down. Obama knows that Iran has promised to use its nuclear bomb on Israel and Saudi Arabia feels that they would be next because Iran also hates them. And what probably had Putin laughing, was that after the treaty was signed, it was discovered that Obama had already talked to the Iranian government and agreed to it before he even announced to congress that he was going to initiate a treaty with Iran.
So before even starting his offensive against the Ukraine, Putin knew that Obama was weak and frivolous and would not even hesitate to disregard the best interests of any pro American government, including disregarding any treaties between them. And considering that Europe has done nothing against Iran for violating the Geneva Convention in using chemical weapons against civilians, Putin probably also felt that they would do nothing if he intervened in the Ukraine.
Obama is also acutely aware that; "Russia is the only country in the world that is realistically capable of turning the United States into radioactive ash," as Dmitry Kiselyov said on his weekly current affairs show, and with Putin you never know what he might do. In order to let America (Obama) and the West to save face, Obama will go along with some minor sanctions, but nothing important. Putin's first priority is to build up his military capability in order to walk heavy and carry a big stick so that he can regain control of the countries bordering Russia, the first step of which he just took , but he is also not stupid, he knows that his country is in economic shambles, so there is a good chance that he will also take steps to correct this. And if he accomplishes this, Russia will prosper and so will the RUSL. Very iffy right now, but if it comes to pass, then anybody that buys the RUSL at these levels will be very well rewarded.