TOKYO – For Japanese leaders and citizens, President Vladimir Putin’s brutal annexation of Crimea was an unsurprising return to the normal paradigm of Russian history. Indeed, most Japanese regard the move as having been determined by some expansionist gene in Russia’s political DNA, rather than by Putin himself or the specifics of the Ukraine crisis.
东京—对日本领导人和日本人民来说，普京总统的悍然吞并克里米亚只不过是对俄罗斯历史常规范式的正常回归。事实上，大部分日本人这一举动是由存在于俄罗斯政治DNA中的扩张主义基因决定的，而不是由普京本人或乌克兰危机的具体环境决定的。