Not his fault per se, but he certainly didn't help the Russia/Ukraine situation by pushing for Ukraine to join NATO. That was one of Russia's hot button issues and he wasn't exactly diplomatic about it.

One take is, Putin is too self-unaware to realize that the reason Eastern European countries want to join NATO is because they're afraid he will invade them sooner or later, just like what he did to Georgia in 2008.

But then again, maybe there's some merit to Putin's paranoia that NATO is "gobbling" up these countries to create a military circle around Russia in preparation for a future invasion. At least in his understanding, that's a logical conclusion.

But he must knows he's running the country like a thug, with oligarchs being forced to tithe to him, and he hates the idea of citizens revolting to topple down other thugs (like they did in Ukraine), because if that idea catches on, that might happen to him too. I wonder if he draws a faulty conclusion that these revolutions are EU/NATO/Western-engineered because they're evil, instead of coming from the citizens themselves who are fed up with being robbed by the elite.

Hah, ironcally enough, Russia runs a propaganda network (or so we've been told) that tricks the population in EU/USA to moan about their rulers and be rightwing populists...

You know so much about Putin and his knowledge - are you his therapist?

Yes I am.

For the non-stupid answer to your opposite-of-that question: these are takes, and for one thing I claimed, I said "he must", i.e. it's a guess, because if he doesn't realize he's a thug, he'd be dumb.

OK I did not signify that the sentence "At least in his understanding, that's a logical conclusion." is a guess of mine. My bad?

Just like how Putin didn't invade Georgia because they appeased Putin's preferences?

No wait a minute, Putin did invade Georgia! He was going to invade Ukraine no matter what appeasement offerings were presented.