During the NATO summit in Bucharest in April 2008, American president George W. Bush lobbied for offering a Membership Action Plan  to Georgia and Ukraine. However, Germany and France said that offering MAP to Ukraine and Georgia would be "an unnecessary offence" to Russia. NATO stated that Ukraine and Georgia would become members of the alliance and pledged to review the applications for MAP in December 2008. Russian President Vladimir Putin was in Bucharest during the summit. At the end of the summit on 4 April, Putin said that expansion of NATO to Russia's borders "would be taken in Russia as a direct threat to the security of our country". After the Bucharest summit, Russia became more aggressive and began to actively prepare for the invasion of Georgia. Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces Yuri Baluyevsky said on 11 April that Russia would take "steps of a different nature" in addition to military action to prevent NATO membership of former Soviet republics. General Baluyevsky admitted in 2012 that when the decision to attack Georgia was taken by President Putin before Dmitry Medvedev assumed the office of president of Russia in May 2008, a military action was planned and explicit orders were issued in advance before August 2008. Russia aimed to stop Georgia's accession to NATO and also to bring about a "regime change".

What happened to Russia?
Russia became more aggressive