In a speech to campaign workers before his reelection in March, Russian President Vladimir Putin chillingly hinted at what is clearly now a foreign policy crusade.

"The collapse of the Soviet Union is a national tragedy on an enormous scale," the former KGB agent told the gathering at Moscow State University. "We cannot only look back and curse about this issue."

In nearly five years as president, Putin has seen the Baltic states join NATO and the European Union and the U.S. establish military bases in Central Asia, Shenzhen Daily reported Tuesday.

The Kremlin's behavior over Ukraine's election suggests the former Soviet republic has become Russia's line in the sand.

Opposition leaders in Ukraine say the Kremlin sank millions of dollars into the campaign of pro-Russia Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych. It also sent him an army of campaign advisers.

Opposition candidate Viktor Yushchenko ran on an agenda of securing Ukraine's entry into the EU and NATO.

The EU's and NATO's recent acceptance of the former Soviet republics of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania had already brought Western economic and military might to Russia's doorstep, but Ukrainian membership would pave the way for NATO ships in Black Sea ports and troops on the streets of Kiev. Putin is bent on stanching that creep of Western influence, analysts say.

"A pro-European Ukrainian policy would be perceived by Russia as a loss of its territory, loss of its satellite," said Olga Kryshtanovskaya, a Moscow-based sociologist who studies Russia's ruling elite. "So to Russia, that would mean a dramatic weakening of its strength."

Many Russians never have fully accepted Ukraine's breakaway from the Soviet Union in 1991, analysts say. A poll conducted last weekend by the Moscow-based Levada Center found that nearly 70 percent of Russians do not consider Ukraine a foreign state.#13#10