All In The Family

Russia has secured Sevastopol and perhaps the Crimea as well, to consolidate its interests, and without firing a shot. What need is there for that kind of action when the very appearance of intimidating numbers of grim-faced men in uniform, with tanks and helicopters along the contiguous borders, are present and well accounted for? Ukraine's new temporary prime minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk, has done what he could, issuing a "red alert", warning Russia if it continues to move forward into Ukrainian territory he would take it as "a declaration of war against my country".

REUTERS/GETTY IMAGES/New York Daily News   Clockwise from right: Defiant Ukrainian soldiers guard a gate of an army base in Privolnoye, Crimea, as Russian groups surround the post. Crimea, a peninsula, is on the north coast of the Black Sea. People watch a Russian navy ship enter the port city of Sevastopol. Soldiers with no identifying insignia take up positions around a Ukrainian military base. A truck and soldiers block the road leading to Babek Airport near Sevastopol. 

 

Of course the trouble is that Moscow considers and has always considered Ukraine to be their country, too. Mr. Yatsenyuk also appealed, as he would be bound to do, to the West for help. Not too likely. Any 'kinetic' move by Western sources would most certainly inflame the situation far beyond what it currently represents; a larger, better armed, belligerent neighbour reminding the smaller, dependent neighbour of their traditional heritage status, turning into a no-holds-barred East-West conflagration.

Western leaders and their diplomats, in a state of shock that matters would have accelerated to this wild-and-woolly extent, have sputtered their indignant responses on behalf of Ukraine. Somewhat like outsiders interfering in a family argument, hesitant to become too deeply involved, knowing that families argue amongst themselves, but woe betide the outsider who takes one side over the other; when reconciliation occurs each side will detest the stranger among them.

Of course that isn't likely to happen, quite in that manner. Even adolescents expect that they will be given the respect of some level of independence from their elders. As it is Vlad The Impulsive is so ticked off at Broken Obama's lectures on civility -- effectively taking his cue from Mr. Putin's calm, smiling demeanour when he turned the U.S. away from a military assault on Syria, but without the smile -- that he threatened incursion into Donetsk, Luhansk, Kharkiv in northeastern Ukraine.

Russia's fundamental duty is "to protect its own interests and those of Russian speakers", reported the official RIA/Novosti news agency from Moscow. Russia doesn't lack support in the region: "The people of western Ukraine are the grandchildren of those who betrayed us by collaborating with the Nazis", charged Yuri Kovalenko, with the Organization for the Defence of Crimea, a new group responding to the ouster of Viktor Yanukovych.

Outside the self-defence headquarters on Sevastopol's Sovietskaya Street (how more symbolic can one get?) men gathered in large groups to grumble angrily over "the fascists" now operating in Kyiv. "Russia has come to defend us and it makes us happy", said Yuri Stupin who had formerly worked in Toronto as a truck driver. Crimeans are not separatists, said Stanislav Nagoril, "We are citizens of Ukraine and what we want is the return of our democratically elected government", he said standing under a Russian flag.

"That isn't the flag of another country", he said. "It is the flag of Russian-speaking people everywhere."

Russia has the right to moor its Black Sea Fleet and to base about 6,000 sailors and marines at or near Sevastopol until 2042, through the terms of a treaty with Ukraine signed post-Soviet Union collapse. It is a lease agreement which forbids Russia from deploying forces elsewhere in Crimea. And without the express consent of the Ukrainian government, Russia is legally forbidden from bringing in more troops from Russia.

Details are often quite inconvenient. At Balaclava 300 Russian marines with armoured personnel carriers backing them, took possession of the port. The Russian troops wore black balaclavas, familiar during the Crimean War, worn by British troops. They repeated that little enterprise a day later at Perevalnoye. And Denis Berezovsky, Admiral of the Ukraine fleet took one day after his appointment to declare himself for Russia and be charged with treason.

"The Ukrainian navy and coast guard are still under Kyiv's control and have told us that they will not take orders from Sevastopol. But they have agreed to not put any of their vessels to sea", explained Sergei Napran, on the city council where town residents had greeted the Russian soldiers with the enthusiasm usually reserved for home-coming conquering heroes.