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Well... there is so much controversy surrounding the crisis.. I can only serve my personal opinion, so please add the missing "IMHO" wherever missing.Originally Posted by Hanna
First, if asked with whom I side: Ukraine of Russia, I would say I side with both or neither, since I believe there is no fundamental issue between Russia and Ukraine. How come? I believe there is a fundamental economical issue between Russia and EU and there is a fundamental military issue between Russia and NATO. And Ukraine has accidently become a battlefield. Military-wise, Russia cannot afford Ukraine becoming a NATO member. It is rightly assumed by Russia that after Ukraine becoming a EU member, the next very logical step for Ukraine would be joining NATO.
Here's why. Ukraine consists of three major regions: the Western Ukraine, the Eastern Ukraine, and the Crimea. Each of those regions are geographically, historically, culturally, economically, and to some extent ethnically are distinct entities. Among the three, the Crimea is the least influential and virtually has no say in Ukrainian affairs. The Eastern and the Western regions like each other like a cat and a dog. The only reason they are together is the strong common fear of Russia - the political, cultural, and economical fear to become yet again just a province or a dominion of Russia. Today Ukrainians feel like they're the first-class citizens of their own country, and they felt they were second-class citizens when they were part of Russia. As a result, a typical fight between the Western and the Eastern regions would sum up in something like: "[...] and it is so great we are not in Russia where there is no A, B, and C, so we can freely do X, Y, and Z; something that Russian citizens are being deprived of! Poor Russians.. they must be envying us right now.. they just can't admit it because of their unfulfilled imperial ambitions!"
And now about the imperial ambitions. Both Western and Eastern Ukraine unite when it comes to theirimperialrelationship with Crimea. On a paper, Crimea has a proud status of "Autonomous Republic", so Crimea has their own Parliament, Government, flag, and anthem. In reality, the power of all those proud Parliament and Government is just enough to elect, say, a teacher of the year, or make a decision whether to improve the plumbing between two cities this year or next year.. At most, they have a power of a municipality. And, obviously, they would very much be delighted to get more power. What for?
For example, to sort out the legal issues related to the illegitimate seizures of the public real estate and converting it to the private property by some Crimean Tatars. Everybody agrees it is illegal, however neither the Crimean courts, nor the proud Parliament and Government could do anything about that. Only the power of Kiev could enforce the law in Crimea. The issue remains in active status for decades and Kiev deliberately does not want to take any legal actions against the Crimean Tatars. Why?
Because, the Crimea is mostly populated by Russians and Russian-speaking Ukrainians. Crimean Tatars, once the native people of Crimea, were deported en mass in 1944 and were only allowed to come back in 1991. Only about half of the Crimean Tatars repatriated from the Central Asia, and those were politically active individuals determined to resettle and fight all the obstacles [in the form of the aforementioned Russian and Ukrainians]. The central power in Kiev deliberately dimishes the power of Crimeans by the old 'divide and conquer' principle: the Crimean Tatars are minority and are no danger to the Ukrainians affairs, and the Tatars are excellent tool of battling any 'Russian' in Crimea.
For example, if a couple of Russians collect some money and build a memorial cross, immediately thousands of Crimean Tatars gather to demolish that cross and engage in the physical fight with Russians. Eventually, the [now ill-famed] Berkut groups are called to beat Russians [and restore the order].
Another reason Crimeans en mass are not happy to be with Ukraine is the so-called 'Ukrainization' - the enforcement of Ukrainian language as the only official language. The only rationale given to the Russian-speaking communities is something like: "What a shame! You can't learn a language of the country you live in? If you're living in France, study French," totally ingoring the fact that people were born here and never left their homeland to start with, and the new state with the new rules fell upon them forcefully. Why is that a problem to recognize Russian as a second official language of Ukraine is a mystery to me. There are many countries in the world where more than one official language is recognized and that promotes the tolerance between the various ethnic groups. No explanation is given except for the cultural fear of Russia: it is assumed that people would stop speaking Ukrainian if Russian becomes the second language.
That was a background which is necessary to understand the recent events.
So, recently there has been two rude attempts to interfere in the interior Ukrainian politics.
First, the sudden financial sanctions imposed by the EU against the selected individuals (whom the EU unilaterally made responsible for the bloodshed in Kiev) caused the technicall collapse of the Ukrainian government and enforced locally by the 'self-defence forces'. Among the rest, the temporary government declared the legitimacy of the ideological purges and the legal prosecution of whoever was involved with the previous 'criminal' power. And the roster of those 'whoever' was kindly supplied by the 'self-defence forces' - it was peacefully floating near the vacated President residence. Alas, not all documents were saved, some were burned and could not be recovered. Obviously, some pages of the saved documents were missing (=drowned or destroyed by water), but the other documents were perfectly intact and the roster of criminals to be purged was ready. Obviously, if that roster was, by a pure accident, incomplete, theoretically a dozen or more pages could be added (but they should have been put into water for a couple of minutes first, just to become more authentic) with little effort. Victoria to the Western Ukraine and the EU (and NATO just a few year later)! And whilst the country was unsure what is going on and what is going to happen next, the Crimean Tatars turned (thousands of them!) to be very supportive of the 'new government' right away. Right away were they demanding the dissmissal of the present Crimean Government and the Parliament (and demostrating their determination to use the force if necessary), asking only one small thing in return for their selfless democratic support - a better represenation of Crimean Tatars in the Crimean Parliament. (SURPRIZE!) The first and obvious consequence of that, should that better representation happen, would obviously be the legalization of the illegal land seizures. (O_o..)
Then, the second rude attempt to interfere in the interior Ukrainian politics had occured - the occupation of Crimea by the untagged uniformed armed forces. The order was restored right away in Crimea and the Tatars became as peaceful and as politically unengaged as possible. And it was obvious right from the start those armed forces are Russian, so why the masquarade? Because, there is HUGE difference between the OCCUPATION and the ANNEXATION according to the international law. (Say 'Hi' to Israel and their practices.) Russian forces in Crimea are not there to stay, but to leave restoring the previous balance of power between the Eastern and the Western regions, keeping the EU and NATO away, and not letting the bloodshed in Crimea. Yes, the potential bloodshed is not from the legendary Bandera forces, but from the very real Crimean Tatars with the approval from the 'renewed and cleansed' central power from Kiev. Where would be Berkut to stop the violence in Crimea?
Now, both Russia and EU/US are throwing as many pieces as they can on the negotiation table. There should be as many as possible just to be able to exchange piece for piece and hopefully gain something in the end.. Strong negotiation skills, yay!
So, I think for an extra week or so there would be more pieces put on the table and in the subsequent two weeks the balance of power would be restored to what it was.
Hmm.. how was I able to put down so many letters?
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