It looks Russia has sent special forces into Crimea. The situation there is a mess and now Russia seems to want to go back to the Cold War. Putin is sure an evil bastard.

Krem,

Do you have any insights into this? It seems to me a lot of bad people on all sides but I tend to side against Russia. Maybe Ukraine could sell the Russian region to Russia or split-up like the Velvet Revolution.

Russia is just keeping itself in position to protect it's interest such as ethnic Russians who may be threatened in Ukraine and it's naval base. Stay out of Ukraine and Russia's sphere of influence/neighbor state.

So this is what will start World War 3!

Ethnic Russians aren't being threatened, Russia just wants a puppet in Ukraine because Putin is dreaming of going back to the old soviet map.

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If only

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I got that right?

Russian soldiers are walking armed outside the Russian base and take control of civil non russian infrastructure?

Thats normally called an attack.

No because Russia lost those counties. And most of them don't want to go back. Putin is a dictator and evil man At the same time there isn't much we can do besides economic sanctions and not going to the G8 summit in June. I don't want to start WW3 over Ukraine.

Most do not but some do and those who do not are weak.

The west wouldn't allow Russia to just gobble them up. Western Ukraine sure doesn't want to go back nor to the Baltic states. The Baltic States are now part of the EU so there is no way they will go back. And more than likely I could see the west putting Ukraine in NATO and the EU to prevent them from being absorbed.

Look the old Soviet empire is not coming back.

However in certain former soviet countries there are Russian friendly areas.

So what will happen is Russia will absorb such areas over time and then weaken it opponents nearby.

All those alliances and such did Georgia Zero Favours.

Probably what will happen is East Ukraine will become independent, and be Russia's puppet like Belarus. West Ukraine will then become part of the EU.

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Mr. R, that sounds very imperial and paternalistic of you--things the West was constantly accused of by The Soviets.

Have you heard of the Holodomor and forced deportations of "Kulaks" and others?

All I know is they are members of the opposition. I googled them and see they are considered nationalists, but they sound like many of the same people who started revolutions in Eastern Europe during they 1990s. Yanukovich might have been the elected president (I suspect it was a rigged election, but have no proof of that). He seems like a scumbag though who was ripping off the people. Look at his mansion, it would have made the kings of France and the Czars proud. It was just a matter of time before he was kicked out since he was corrupt. I don't know their constitution, but I would imagine it allows the parliament to impeach a president. If not then it is a very corrupt system. Russia should have allowed elections, they are being stupid invading. And they will pay for it through economic sanctions, and they might even get kicked out of the G8. Finally, not sure how you can be proud of Putin. I wouldn't want to live in a country where you can be thrown in jail or killed for speaking out against the government. Not to mention the human right abuses against gays and probably other minorities.

And do you want to go back to the Soviet era? With Russia getting back many of it provinces? And also getting back its influence over the Eastern block? Hate to break it to you but that will never happen and thank god for that.

Thanks Obama

I don't think this is Obama's fault. Bush was president when Russia invaded Georgia, and he did almost nothing. The only thing Obama could do is economic sanctions. We can't threaten military action because it could lead to WW 3. Putin isn't Khrushchev, I don't see him backing down. We are kind of screwed and will have to hope that we can use economic sanctions to convince Russia to leave Ukraine.

Biden needs to call Putin.

FIFA needs to call Putin. This invasion might not be so popular with the Russian people if they thought they were going to lose the World Cup in 2018.

HOW CONVICENT!

So much stupid in this thread

The only villain right now is Putin. He is abusing the weak position Ukraine found itself in order to promote his delusional dream of restoring USSR. The people who live in Russia are being lied to daily by the state-controlled media - they are being told that the people who overthrew Yanukovich are Nazis, anti-semites, etc. They are being told that that Russian speaking population is threatened all across Ukraine. They are being told that what happened in Ukraine is anti-constitutional and is a military coup. They are being told that the snipers that shot the protesters were other protesters. They are incredibly being told that there are no Russian boots on the ground in Crimea.

None of it is true, but it is all the average Russian sees thanks to the fact that there are virtually no non-government controlled TV channels anymore - the only one that is still sort of afloat, Dozhd', has been conveniently taken off air by most major cable TV providers about a month ago and is about to go bankrupt in a month.

Yay Russia!