Scott Ritter, a former US Marine Corps intelligence officer, has recently moved to Russia.

Ritter has argued that the West has failed to respect Russia's legitimate concerns about NATO expansion and missile defense, and has provoked a crisis by backing Ukraine's aggressive stance against the Donbas region. He has also accused the West of ignoring the Minsk agreements, which were supposed to resolve the conflict peacefully by granting autonomy to the rebel-held areas. Ritter has praised Russia's military operation in Ukraine, calling it a preemptive strike that prevented a NATO-backed offensive by Kiev.