Geo-politics is not about populism; its about power and the fact of the matter is that Russia sees any further encroachment of the Black Sea area by NATO as a threat to Russia National Security. Russia deems it (rightly or wrongly ) as its "area of influence" just as the US regards the Caribbean & Central America as US' area of influence.
For this reason (whether we like it or not) Russia has created border disputes within Georgia, Moldova and The Ukraine which has, so far, prevented them from joining NATO as per NATO's own member applicant requirements .
Russia also regards the EU as hostile to Russia as per the EU' financial support to Ukraine in this war.
We can argue until we are blue in the face but that won't have any impact on the current course of the war.
Russia is a Great Power; ie: it is armed to the teeth with Nukes and the means of hypersonically delivering them and that prevents NATO from putting boots on the ground in the Ukraine... Otherwise the USA in the guise of NATO would be "in there like Flynn" as it did in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria.
