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What Happens After Sunday's Crimea Referendum Vote?
Given this morning's UN vote declaring the Crimea referendum invalid (and Russia's obvious veto - along with China's abstention), and on the heels of Lavrov's words Friday that Russia would decide how to respond to the Crimean vote after the referendum had been held, it is thought-provoking to consider Putin's options given the vote's outcome is a near-certainty voting in favor of accession to the Russian Federation (especially in light of this morning's images across Crimea). Europe's Council on Foreign Relations notes "not knowing Vladimir Putin’s strategy makes it hard for Europe and the West to come up with meaningful and workable responses. In a way, we are all speculating and trying to get a glimpse into Putin’s soul. The five points below attempt to reinforce or refute some aspects of the conventional wisdom that has emerged from all this speculation."
1. Has Putin always wanted to invade Crimea?
Russian diplomats (who probably hate their jobs these days) have made elaborate attempts to demonstrate that no international law has been broken in Crimea. But the breach is blatant and the pretext used to justify invasion is thinner than thin – and Moscow knows it.
It is true that some hawkish groups in Moscow probably could not care less about international law. They would approve of any means to reunify Slavic lands. However, the bulk of the establishment has in fact always maintained a different position. For example, the Russian foreign ministry has traditionally adhered to a rigidly legalistic view of world affairs: in effect, post-1945 international law, with its strict emphasis on state sovereignty, non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries, and the inviolability of borders. Newer and softer concepts, such as the responsibility to protect, are alien to them.
Putin himself has always passionately belonged to that legalistic camp, as evidenced by his positions on Libya, on Syria, and on multiple other issues. Therefore, deciding to invade Crimea cannot have been easy for him. He must consider that something extremely important is at stake. The corollary is that in defending his conception of what is at stake, he may well be ready to go further than many of us assume.
2. Is Putin out of touch with reality?
Angela Merkel’s statement that Putin is out of touch with reality, which was leaked to the New York Times, gave rise to a considerable amount of conjecture and comment. Some people concluded that Putin has gone mad. In fact, while he may be living in his own version of reality, it looks like Putin’s world has actually been around for a long time.
Putin seems to sincerely believe that dangerous extremist groups have taken power in Kiev. He may genuinely not realise that the events in Kiev represented a classic popular revolution. As pointed out by Fiona Hill, it is possible that the whole concept of popular revolutions is alien to Putin. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, when Russia was having its own revolution, Putin was not there – he was serving the KGB in Dresden. He did not personally witness the fact that a massive number of people were involved in the overthrow of the Soviet Union. His being abroad for these pivotal events, as well as his KGB schooling and worldview, may have made it easy for him to see the collapse of the Soviet Union as the result of a conspiracy by a few combined with betrayal by others.
Similarly, Putin may see current events in Ukraine as a conspiracy by the West, which was definitely his view of the Orange revolution of 2004. Or he may see the situation as the result of recklessness: actions along the same lines as Western involvement in Libya and Syria. As Putin sees it, in both places the West has supported marginal and extremist groups against legitimate leaders, in a naïve hope that democracy will somehow take root in the ruins of the old regimes. It may well be that he saw the West applying the same logic to Ukraine and decided that he could not allow anything of the kind to happen in Ukraine.
Added to this, he likely feels a sense of betrayal over the West’s (as he sees it) geopolitical incursion into Ukraine, and over the West’s failure (as he sees it) to support Viktor Yanukovych after the agreement of February 21. All this comes together to form the reality in which Putin lives.
This means that what we are seeing as Putin’s revisionism may still be inspired largely by his conservatism. Also, much of his reality is indeed based on false premises. But understanding this does not make it easier to set the record straight and make Putin see sense – as multiple Western interlocutors have by now discovered.
3. Does Putin want to use Crimea as leverage over Ukraine?
Some analysts assume that Russia will stop short of incorporating Crimea, but will instead keep it in a Transnistria-style legal limbo in order to use it as leverage over Kiev. It seems likely that obtaining leverage over all of Ukraine, as opposed to just Crimea, is Moscow’s real goal. But it is hard to predict exactly what Moscow will see as sufficient and reliable leverage.
The government that came to power in Kiev in late February is weak. Contrary to Moscow’s claims, it is not illegitimate – it is as legitimate as it can be under the circumstances. However, it still does not represent the whole of society in the ways that a government should. In theory, it would have been easy for Moscow to gain leverage over the new government by using a mixture of legitimate and more shady means. But Moscow did not even make the attempt.
By now, it is unclear just how much the “Transnistrianisation” of Crimea would add to Moscow’s leverage. Kiev is now considerably less amenable to making a deal with Moscow than it would have been less than a month ago. Many in the nationalist camp may be secretly relieved to see Crimea go, taking with it its two million Russian voters and Russian base.
As recently as a week or so ago, Russia could probably have counted on the West to put pressure on Kiev. The West is terrified by what Moscow is doing and it does not know how to respond. So, many would have been relieved if, instead of annexing Crimea, Russia stopped at “Transnistrianisation”. The West would have been ready to put pressure on Kiev to accept Moscow’s conditions – thereby, of course, contributing to prolonged bad governance in Ukraine and, consequently, to more trouble down the road. But Moscow did not try to use the West either – and now it could be too late for that as well. The build-up of Russian troops at Ukraine’s borders has probably made the West more determined to counter Russia and less likely to go for unholy compromises. And, likewise, the massing of troops could indicate that Moscow is not interested in making use of Western pressure. The sort of control over Kiev that the Kremlin has in mind may be of a much harder sort than mere co-option and coercion.
4. Is Putin acting only in response to domestic pressures?
Some analysts claim that the whole Crimea affair was begun in order to impress the domestic public, who have increasingly fallen out of love with Putin. Others, even those who do not share that interpretation, claim that Putin cannot back down because of domestic pressures. It is true that the invasion has boosted Putin’s ratings. And the domestic media-propaganda machine has created a powerful momentum for annexation, which has the support of many in Russian society. But it is still hard to believe that any of this constitutes serious limitations of action for Putin, especially given that he does not have to face the ballot box any time soon.
Russian society has no capacity for an informed and critical discussion about foreign policy. The state-controlled media is masterful in justifying the regime’s actions, whatever they may be. Portraying a climb-down as a victory would be easy. (This kind of method is described well in an old Soviet joke about a 100-metre race between Ronald Reagan and Leonid Brezhnev: after Reagan’s win, the Soviet news agency reported that “in yesterday’s race between the heads of state the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the USSR achieved a precious second place. The president of the Imperialist United States finished second-last.”)
In short, for the moment at least, Putin is in no way hostage to his domestic constituency. But that does not mean that he will want to de-escalate or back down.
5. Will sanctions stop Putin?
Different people see different logic behind Western sanctions on Russia. Some hope that sanctions, or the threat of them, will force Moscow to back down. Others hope that sanctions will alienate Russian elites from Putin and leave him with little domestic support. Others simply believe that people who were instrumental in acting against sovereignty and territorial integrity deserve to be punished. And some look at the situation from a long-term perspective and think that sanctions should be applied to erode the economic foundations of an increasingly aggressive regime.
Much of this reasoning seems accurate and justified. But even so, the calculation that sanctions will make Putin reverse course does not ring true. Ever since the domestic protests of 2011-2012, Putin has lost trust in the members of his elite who keep their money in the West and so are vulnerable to Western pressures. Losing their support, therefore, does not really matter to him. They have no leverage over him. In any case, “repatriating money” has been an unofficial policy for quite a while.
Sanctions, as well as Putin’s growing alienation from Russian elites, may well have effects in the medium term. But they will not stop Putin on Sunday or in the days ahead. Even so, this does not mean that sanctions are futile or unnecessary – especially because it seems more and more likely that we are now facing a longer-term battle between Russia and the West.
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This article was presented out of the ZH confides. It involves thought and measurement to how things may end up. Might want to double down on your red pill dosage. Welcome to the fight club! Bitch..
they have to be "balance" just like those small nations who vote against Russia. Survival is the basic instint for everyone. Nobody want ZH attack or put out.
personally I think it's a pretty simple motivation.
Putin no longer feels he can work with anybody in the west, not that he necessarily trusted previous administrations but I think he at least felt he could work with them on some common issues.
and who could blame him? I live here and I sure as shit don't trust anybody who resides in Washington.
Libya, Syria, Egypt...now the Ukraine, dirty deeds from DC and I'm not so sure that he might not feel himself in the cross hairs if he sits back and simply lets the power players in the west have there way unchallenged in this matter.
regardless, it's long past time somebody pushed back.
As I see it, you americans should be responsible for your government. It's a sad state when you are counting on foreign leaders to counter your criminal government because you are not up to self-govern even though you still have the constitution, at least formally. Soon you'll be rid of it all.
"Putin seems to sincerely believe that dangerous extremist groups have taken power in Kiev."
Uh, maybe because dangerous extremist groups have taken power in Kiev?
Having not been seriously challenged for well over a generation, the West is clueless and completely outmatched. Coasting on past success and relying on dollar dominance and 'sanctions' to win whatever they desire is no longer an option - they just don't know it yet.
George Kennan, why couldst thou not be living at this hour? The world hath need of thee!
Analysis like the OP falls into that category of unaccountable think-tank effluent that David Goldman criticized as "McStrategy." In his article by the same name he applied his criticism specifically to Stratfor, but he ventured that much the same could be said about the so-called varsity teams at the CIA and the State Department.
http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/25811/mcstrategy
The first point in the OP is particularly mindboggling. Putin a legalist? To insist on this assessment would be to make the capital mistake of believing that when Putin invites the international community to adhere to its own standards, he announces his intention to abide by them himself. RANDians take notice: No one familiar with your game-theoretical conflict model should have fallen for that one. Putin will do what he thinks he needs to do, full stop. If that means playing by the rules, he will play by them; if it means breaking the rules, he will break them; if it means shaming his opponents before the world for breaking the rules while he tacitly breaks them himself, so much the better. He is not bound by any stiffened ideology of international law. We, on the other hand, cannot escape looking either hypocritical or guilty: Hypocritical if we reject the Crimean referendum and thereby reject popular sovereignty; guilty if we persist in denying that the Ukrainian revolt was astroturfed by Western intelligence agencies when everybody knows that it was. Methinks the State Department and the EU are doubling down precisely to avoid admitting just how much the deep state has botched international affairs.
This whole thing was a black-op gone bad, just like Egypt, Libya, and Syria before it, adding one more to the list of failures that have crowned the malfeasance of our CIA and State Department. This was inevitable given the general decline of education and competence that this country has engendered for itself. Gone are the days when polyglot, deep-thinking statesmen like Kennan played the game. Now we have "Reset"-Rodham Clinton and Heinz "Hound-dog" Kerry to stand between us and a world increasingly hostile and more unified in its opposition to us than ever before. You can win elections with idiots, but you cannot run a country with them. Thus democracy always sows the seeds of its own destruction. Foreign policy is the real test of statesmanly competence, and we obviously cannot field a team worthy of the match.
And let us not neglect to mention that we are fundamentally on the wrong side in all this. Good sense and prudence dictate that Russia should control its own near abroad. The bureaucrats in Brussels know that this will inevitably prove fatal for their preposterous EU social experiment, since it will mean European nations must take responsibility for their own governance. No longer able to rely on cheap gas from Russia and a security umbrella from the US, Europeans will have to develop realistic defense, energy. and industrial policies. They will have to check their plummeting birthrates through pro-natalist policies. They will have to mollify nationalist sentiment by strictly limiting immigration. They will have to dismantle their suffocating tax code so that national economies can recover. All this is anathema to Socialist-utopian cosmopolitan eco-nuts now in charge. Therefore the fantasy must be maintained at any cost. The last bit of social and physical capital possessed by the Western world is being incontinently poured into the EU, merely to bolster it up a while. That is the real significance of the Crimean referendum.
The statesmenly qualities—one might say simply the manly qualities—of political economy and national defense must return to Europe, or Europe will die. It's that simple. The world cannot afford the EU, but the entangling alliances, failed social models and unrealistic paradigms of the decision makers is rendering impossible that realization. World War One (Part 2) has started over some damn fool thing in the Crimea.
@GooseShtep...
Great points. And this line just made my day "You can win elections with idiots, but you cannot run a country with them."
On the positive side of things I see all this as a great opportunity to identify who the ignorant fucktards are in our spheres based on their thoughts/comments regarding this imperial clusterfuck as it unfolds.
>>>unaccountable think-tank effluent that David Goldman criticized as "McStrategy."
For those few ZH's who may be unaware, Mr. Goldman writes as "Spengler" at Asia Times, and is no mean intellect.
He's on my pompous poodle douche list. I'll take Pepe any day over "Spengler".
Spengler's also an NeoCon Jewish guy from the world of NYC high finance, but at least he's clear in his thoughts, and tries to take the long-term view.
Kudos, of course, to all Pepe boosters.
Europe's CEFR is nothing more than a bunch of unelected, illegitimate, unaccountable, nameless, faceless sycophants who will write whatever they are told by equally illegitimate slimeballs like Barroso. Not even London takes any notice of it.
The very notion that this bunch of has-beens seek to pontificate and speculate about Crimea and Russia's aims there is enough to make me sick.
Answer: Avoiding the obvious trap of blaming it all on the central figure in the Country when it is nationalism, desire and will of the Russian people collectively speaking through their "Leadership"
1. Has "Russia" always wanted to invade Crimea? No
2. Is "Russia" out of touch with reality? No.
3. Does "Russia" want to use Crimea as leverage over Ukraine? No.
4. Is "Russia" acting only in response to domestic pressures?. No.
5. Will sanctions stop "Russia"?. No.
And the question(s) this article should be answering but is "not"? Replace "Russia" with "United States" who is instigating a potential war 4,880 miles from it's own borders using subterfuge, in the form of political and economic coercion to control that spirit and nationalism of the Country's neighbor as a means to contain "it" and "it's" long term stability and growth as an economic superpower in question and you get....
1. Has the U.S. always wanted to invade Crimea? Yes.
2. Is the U.S. out of touch with reality? Yes.
3. Does the U.S. want to use Crimea as leverage over Ukraine. Yes.
4. Is the U.S. acting in response to domestic pressure (on it's own faltering economy) Yes.
5. Will santions stop Russia? No.
6) Can we sell a hyjacked aircraft to start a new petrodollar currency war?
http://vietnam.craigslist.org/for/4372477162.html
Probably. But the guy you need to get in touch with to make that happen is actually somewhere in Kiev but probably us heading back stateside after some unforeseen circumstances.
His contact information -http://ua.linkedin.com/pub/jason-p-gresh/41/211/715
If you can't reach him the next best point of contact would be his supervisor - http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/biog/214343.htm
+100
You are the very few who understands the marble strategy. God bless you.
You are so right, son of Captain Nemo, there should be analysis of the behind the scene financial involvement and maneuvering; you know, follow the money.
The globalists have been doing the same kind of thing to the US Citizen. They are clearly the enemy to all that lives and breaths.
'was just about to trash this article, then I realized it was from the CEFR.
No leader would put this much firepower and troops in strike positions if there was not an intent to conquer. Remember, he is and has always been allowed to keep up to 25,000 troops in Crimea alone. That is more than enough troops to insure a somewhat smooth take over of Crimea. Putin's actions clearly indicate that he is going to move and he is still, as we speak, moving troops and equipment! Why the hell the US hasn't moved equipment into Poland and Romania is somewhat troubling. Although with that said this is cut from an atricle from the Global Reasearch web site:
Even more incendiary proposals are circulating in the US media. In a piece titled “How to Put Military Pressure on Russia,” the Wall Street Journal called for arming Polish Air Force F-16 fighters with nuclear weapons and stationing powerful detachments of US ground troops in Poland, Romania and the Baltics.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/driving-the-ukrainian-crisis-closer-to-the-...
Your move Putin!
There is no way that Polish Air Force jets would be armed with NATO alliance nuclear weapons.
If any NATO alliance nuclear weapons are positioned in or near Ukraine,
those weapons would remain under the control of the NATO nuclear powers,
US, UK, France.
I'll take another down arrow for $100.00.
I bet not a single person has listened to the Russian UN representative's speech on the 15th wherein he laid out Russia's justifications for their actions. It is clear that Russia, Putin, feel that they are "OWED" the region of crimea because it was "unlawfully" given away. No doubt about it. Does that justify the US meddling that has occurred? No, but Putin is seizing this opportunity to re-capture territory that he feels was wrongfully taken from Russia. He is on the wrong side of the argument on this. Every country in existence ha shad territory taken and they have taken another countries territory at some point in History. It is impossible to pick a date in time and demand that your countries borders be re-drawn to reflect that date and time.
Putin is as wrong about this as is the US. That is why we need to both step outside and settle this little issue, hopefully diplomatically. The question is which side has erred the furthest? The answer is Russia. Never once has the US interjected with anything remotely resembling force. Are we guilty of meddling? Yes, but to have opinion that the US caused this entire quagmire is just wrong. The people of the Ukraine have had their rights abused for sometime. They have endured two of the most crooked regimes ever. A society eventually decides to bite back at the repression and crookedness. Putin clearly understands that he must not let a confusing time slip by without capitalizing on his desires. Now Putin is telling Germany's Merkel that he is concerned with the safety of people oin the South East Ukraine. Wake up people! Putin is clearly on the march!
Just in case you would like to listen to the UN meeting.
http://webtv.un.org/meetings-events/watch/ukraine-security-council-7138t...
ECFR=Council on foreign relations-European version.
The fckers running these stupid, impotent "think tanks" remind me of Mini-Me and Dr. Evil.
CEFR, is that a new Belgian video game?
Brussels
EU, U.S. to commit to remove all duties on transatlantic trade
1) How is international law is broken in Crimea?
Nuland's leaked tape clearly says US is orchestrating the coup and appointing the government - and Russia is to blame?
And it is a coup, Ashton leaked tape clearl says it was opposition hired snipers killng both protesters and police, i.e. Yankovich is the only legitimate power.
Putin is going to bring this war to our shores. Its our own fault, we should have stormed D.C. long ago.
He is smart, so will likely hit us with conventional (non-nuclear) missiles fired from the subs that are already lurking. If we retaliate nuclear, its game over.
Its going to bring the price of our complacency home.
Reasoning is, we have grown comfortable separated from the blood shed our tax dollars support. He understands we will not wake up to the horrors of war, when most americans only experience has been watching it on youtube.
I hope we don't retaliate with nukes.
If you want to know what's in Putin's soul ask George Bush he saw it.
popular revolution? lol...
prime minister is the exact person named by Nuland in her leaked tape... All the government figures are old well known corruptionists from pro-western government before Yanukovich.
Ukrainuan oligarkhs being appointed as governors of Eastern regions - this is what american-style "popular" revolution means?
the author is a US State department propagandist..
Here Tyler.
Send this to the CEFR propaganda arm that more than likely works in Merkel's front office.
Too bad they didn't take this survey last week, but more than likely maybe they were the ones that were instrumental in "pulling it" as quickly as it was released. Can't put thoughtful information into the indigenous peoples heads that might just want to run a foreign army out of it's own Country that still occupies it' 69 years later that wants to start another one again that will involve them (like it or not)?...
Tell the folks that write this shit that if they keep this up, they won't have a Country to live in if they continue to let the U.S., U.K. and Israeli foreign interests run the show for them.
Worst of all if they thought 69 years ago was bad, they ain't seen nothin yet!
Sure, whatever.
But what happens after the vote?
Zeig Heil!
"Given this morning's UN vote declaring the Crimea referendum invalid (and Russia's obvious veto - along with China's abstention)"
This line only reflect a lack of knowledge of History or worse, pure propaganda. In a power play by the big boys in every time frame of History, the small states have to play alone, if not, for them is reserve the fate of Milos.
So the only votes that count are those of USA, Russia and China. Even that of France count little. Remember what Hollande said after Obama diverse the decision to bomb Syria to Senate?
1.) How can any informed, reasonable person call the post-coup government in Kiev, having seized and maintained power through armed force, a "legitimate" government?
2.) Given the fact that Crimea has been a semi-autonomous republic (with its own Rada or parliament) since 2004, how can anyone claim that a popular REFERENDUM is "illegitimate"?
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The U.S. has long espoused the right of self-determination. Indeed, under U.S. Codes, the U.S. government is forbidden to gice financial support to any nation's government created through an armed coup. (NOT that Obama obeys this law! He has still sent aid to Egypt.) The UN's International Court of Justice affirmed (in the cases of Kosovo and Serbia) the right of the people in one part of a nation to secede from that nation and form their own nation.
Especially in America, the right of the people to determine their own forms and jurisdictions of government is the foundational basis of the governments of the STATES and the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
In fact, governments are CORPORATIONS created by the people to conduct certain limited functions - and nothing more. Our own Constitution created a legal TRUST among the various states. The United States government was the corporation (with a president, VP, treasurer, secretray, and board of directors - the Congress) created to manage that trust of which the states were the grantors and the people were the beneficiaries. (Just a few years after the U.S. was created, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed in numerous cases that the U.S. government was a corporation; and that each of the individual states was its own sovereign country; and that each state was a "foreign nation" with respect to the other states and to the federal government.
If the owners of a condominium complex (containing 50 separate condos) decide to create or hire a maintenance company to take care of a certain limited number of tasks (such as mowing the lawn, cleaning the pool, cleaning the lobby and maintaining the elevators), do they NOT have the right to fire that company for whatever reason and contract with a different company? The individiual condo owners are SOVEREIGN within their respective condos, which they alone own. No one can intrude into another man's condo, especially NOT the maintenance company they hired or created! And no one, specially the maintenance company, can tell any condo owner what he can or cannot do in his own condo.Certainly the maintenance company (i.e., government) may create POLICIES for its OWN EMPLOYEES, and it may POLICE those employees to insure that they follow its policies. BUT the company's policies do NOT and can NOT be applied to the condo owners, unless each individual condo owner agrees by CONTRACT that these policies will apply to him - thereby giving the maintenance company jurisdiction over him in certain activities in certain areas within the condo complex.
Those people who think that any government somehow has greater authority than the PEOPLE do NOT understand the legal basis of most governments as TRUSTS under international maritime-admiralty law.
Maxim of Law: “Contract makes the Law.”
The Neocons were behind Regan's military buildout, which forced the Soviets to try and keep up in spending, which they could not.
Just as the US "pivots" to Asia, with the last US tanks and US A-10 aircraft having left Germany last spring, Putin springs this.
The US and Nato are now scrambling around.
Putin HAD the Crimean naval base. It's more likely that this is a play to throw the global hegemon off balance. Putin is after all, a student of judo.
By having to redirect energies back to Europe again, the US stretches resourses. Americans are war weary, and social discontent against the Military Industrial Complex at home is growing.
After two wars of encircling Iran, and a mild set back in Syria, there are now myriad fronts where Pax Americana is being challenged. Will this embolden the Iranians? Throw the Israelis into a tizzy? Embolden the Chinese with the Senkakus? (yes, I'm using the Japanese name).
Perfect timing, really.
Who in the fuck is running the US imperial throne wanker? Barack Hussein Obama. Get off your high horse and acccept responsibility for this Mao Afro-American figure head pimping communism.
BO couldn't run a car wash by himself.
The symbolic heads come and go, they make suggestions, power backers shift.
But if you think this guy is calling the shots ... good luck buddy.
stopped reading after
He may genuinely not realise that the events in Kiev represented a classic popular revolution. As pointed out by Fiona Hill,
fuck off you cunt
no disrespect intended.
Terrible piece here written with complete disregard for truth.
who wrote this junk?
It is intended to bolster the "thoughts" of morons, who are indeed many, but may yet waver in their faith.
"Putin seems to sincerely believe that dangerous extremist groups have taken power in Kiev. He may genuinely not realise that the events in Kiev represented a classic popular revolution."
Pure bullshit. How do you spell "shill"?
What happens is Russia sends the army to Kiev to remove the technically illegal regime there and re-install the technically legitimate, but deeply unpopular, puppet president.
This thing needs something to really stir it up and reveal Putin's desire.
So, there are 4 key hubs in the gas distribution line system going through the Uk. Using covert ops, blow those 4 hubs and the infrastructure around them so that the lines are rendered useless. Also, using undercover operatives, blow the connections from the mainland Ru to Crimea and isolate it, even temporarily. Every time progress is made in any restoration of these components, blow it again.
The Uk will get gas from the west, as will Eu.
The west would need to embargo Ru oil, and disrupt all attempts to produce or distribute oil, including pipelines to the east.
Ru revenues go to shit and the people will start to hurt economically in a year. These people will demand Putin back off, maybe it will take 2 years.
Add a feature to vote for the article.
This article is bogus propaganda written by interns.
Garbage article.
<i>not knowing Vladimir Putin’s strategy makes it hard for Europe and the West to come up with meaningful and workable responses</i>
A clear statement of Putin mastery! And, BTW, Russia did not invade Crimea any more than the US invaded Guantanamo.
BTWBTW Why isn't the US concerned so much about Venzuela? (jus a rhetorical point thrown as a hand-grenade.
Why is ZeroHedge posting this trash? We all know this viewpoint is completely false.
Who wrote this shallow piece of shit? Has Zero Hedge been taken over by neocons? Tyler, you embarrass yourself by putting your name on this. A few more of these and you will have lost all credibility... and one faithful reader.
Who wrote this drivel? Gotta be a State Dept hack to be this clueless and obviously biased.
This site is oozing with spooky, from all quarters.
Communication Blunders on both sides. The problem is that few world leaders believe that BO has the guts to back anything he says or threatens to do on a concrete condition. That is, the problem is: the credibility of the USA is very low and no one feels that there are real limits that Russia must observe (NO time certain when scantions/deprivations must be coped with in the future.)
At this point in an esculation things can go out of the control. A clear statement of scantions that BO will apply are required to allow both sides to weigh the value of the planned actions of the parties. Both sides have little or no idea wheather they are committed to do anything over a given time horizon. Is Crimea -Ukraine worth the "possible costs to Russia?" (the Ukraine is broke - but Russia needs its food grains)" Do planned Russian actions, plus success, buy what the Russion needs/want? Can the USA justify an armed engagment over a seaport- That can be made useless with a Carrier battle group in the Med? Is the EU really interested in the outcomes? The EU is a bloc which has no policy anyone can count upon. It is doubtful they can agree upon their vital interests.
Alternatives: Never tell your adversary what you are going to do, but name the date for action, OR tell your adversary what you are going to do, but give no time for action. Of the two choices I suspect that the last one is almost forced on the USA. We have gotten that far with the US Secty of State's stumbling around like a mad man giving no clear statements. that he and the President can enforce. No one is sure the USA will pursue any firm policy.
Oh yes, if the USA has a policy considered worth a fight, Bring the boomers to launch depth and make sure the Russians know that right or wrong the USA is serious because the Americans are willing to pay for the costs implied in their actions which may inpact Russia and EU woefully. Easy or sure? NO, but very much needed to move events to commitments that can be negotiated , Executed or abandoned.
The CEFR is obviously in the pocket of the US State Department. This is a piece of propaganda.