And Just Incidentally....

Just incidental to nothing particular, Moscow announced large-scale military exercises including airborne troops and tank squadrons and artillery regiments across a broad geography near the Russian-Ukrainian border. Just military exercises, nothing out of the ordinary. But wouldn't you know it, the international community always sees dragons when there are only mice scurrying about.

These spur-of-the-moment manoeuvres to take place, as it happens while Crimea takes its historic vote.

Ukraine has responded in a way, as much as it is capable of doing. And seeing a sinister motivation where obviously, none is intended, but then some groups are more prone to hysterics than other, as the Kremlin would have it. So the Ukrainian armed forces are standing by.

That they are horrendously outnumbered and outgunned by their Russian counterparts both in and near the border is another incidental.

An Ukrainian tank takes part in the military exercise near Kharkiv March 14, 2014. REUTERS/Stringer

Gloom prevails. Crimea is penned in, cut off from the outside world. Oh well, not from Russia. From elsewhere where anyone in Crimea might wish to travel to or from. Not even rail, let alone flights can now get through. Local authorities have cancelled flights and most trains to Crimea from the rest of Ukraine, although the Russian connections remain active.

Three daily non-stop flights to Moscow, no problem. Ferry service to the mainland, sure, plan to proceed.

UDAR (Punch) party head Vitaly Klitschko speaks to Ukrainian soldiers during a military exercise near Zhytomyr March 14, 2014. REUTERS/Andrii Skakodub/Pool

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, in constant contact with President Vladimir Putin, informed the Bundestag that Ukraine is on stage to face "a catastrophe" should Russia continue its current trajectory from which one might surmise that those conversations did not go well. She warned that the West would consider Russia's annexation of Crimea "as a threat", fundamentally altering the EU's relations with Moscow.

Ukrainian army MI-24 military helicopter takes part in the military exercise near village of Goncharivske

"Russia does not want war", emphasized Russian ambassador to the UN, Vitaly Churkin. He informed Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk at the UN that very fact. Yet the Crimeans have the right to vote on secession, he also said. And if a problem exists it is because it has been created by the West's support for those criminals who removed Viktor Yanukovych from the presidency.

Bank ATMs and exchange offices have seen a run on the Ukrainian hryvnya. People have been trying to convert rubles into hryvnya. Even greater numbers of checkpoints have appeared on roads to Sevastopol and Simferopol. Increasingly rigorous vehicle searches take place by men wearing paramilitary uniforms. Serbian nationalists man some of those checkpoints in solidarity with "our Russian brothers".

Police officers swarm to meet the few trains managing to come in from the Ukrainian mainland, scrutinizing passengers and luggage. Foreign journalists in both Simferopol and Sevastopol are being threatened by rough looking men, refusing to identify themselves. Billboards and posters pop up around Sevastopol describing the new Ukrainian government as "fascists" directly linked to NATO.

A Ukrainian serviceman takes part in a military drill near the city of Mykolaiv, also known as Nikolayev, in southern Ukraine, northwest of the Crimean peninsula March 14, 2014. REUTERS/Valentyn Ogirenko