Well, that's a prize for Moscow, hence why it goes to very long lengths to garrison and supply the area known as Transnistria, a Russian enclave in Moldova. This place is one of the gaps in geography that allows access to the Russian interior or steppes and anywhere you can drive a division of tanks through, the Kremlin wants control over.
That's what this Russian aggression is all about, the access points to the Russian space... there are 7 of them, and when the Soviet Union was around, they controled all of them, but when it fell they lost control of most of them. This is why we have had the Chechen/Georgian wars because that is one access point that Russia has been historically attacked from, Moldova is another gap but is on the other side of Ukraine, Poland and the Silwalki Gap to Kalinningrad is another, Estonia and the Baltics are more.
Russia is paranoid about this and wants natural barriers as defence (which are offered next to these gaps when you check the geography), then can just plonk a division or so in the gaps, and ta-da, it's fixed. When you look back through history, the Russian steppes have all been invaded through these access points, from the Ottoman Empire to the Nazis etc. That's what they really want and why they are so pissed that Nato has expanded so far as it places some of these gap out of reach (and Putin wants to roll things back to the Soviet times). This should explain their paranoia about security... all about these strategic points/access gaps.