Those are the Russian dominated areas where Russia is protecting Russians who moved there over hundreds of years. They announced that Russia is recognizing them as sovereign states independent of the Ukraine. This upsets the US Empire because they don't want Germany to buy Russian natural gas and form deeper alliances rather than buying our natural gas that costs 3x as much but keeps Germany aligned with the USA. The most important thing to us in America is preventing other countries from forming alliances against us, ie Russia and China.
