W screwed up not continuing working with Putin as he did right after 9/11. But our State Department has been screwed up ever since we supported the Afghan insurgents against the USSR occupiers. And supporting the Islamists in the Balkans and in Chechnya is a continuing blunder.
Makes no sense forcing them to find allies, however undesirable.
We have every business expanding NATO in the eastern europe to those who invite it - they have tasted "russity", have been puking from the rotten taste, and would like to get guarantees that they will not be forced to eat that crap again. Their high degree of self-interest in it is precisely the stuff of which solid allies are made. And working with a kegebun putin was a mistake from the day one, regardless of anything else.