Russian President Vladimir Putin, on Rossiya-1 TV on Sunday, could not have been clearer in his language to a national audience, as to what a red line actually is. “I want everyone both in our country and abroad, our partners, to clearly understand: the matter is not a line that we don’t want anyone to cross. The matter is that we have nowhere to step back. They have driven us to such a line, excuse my language, that we have nowhere to move.” Referring to his repeated emphasis on the risks of new supplies of missile systems, deployed at a distance of four- to five-minute’s flight from Moscow. “Well, where are you going to go now? They have simply driven us to the state when we must say: Stop!”

He further stated that this is also why Russia’s Dec. 15 initiative on security guarantees was made public on Dec. 17. “Our proposal is open and clear. We want people in Russia, in Ukraine, in Europe, and in the United States to understand our idea that we want to implement during this negotiating process…. It sets certain limits for all participants in this [negotiating] process. But we have only one goal—to reach agreements ensuring the security of Russia and its people now and in the long-term perspective.”

Then Putin made the effort to pre-empt some of the games used to preclude serious negotiations: “They will indulge in endless talk about the necessity of negotiations, but will do nothing but pump a neighboring country with state-of-the-art weapons systems and build up threats to Russia. And we will have to do something with these threats.”