Ukraine and the West Feel the Effects of Russia's Post-Soviet Humiliation

The UN Security Council is again meeting to discuss the Ukraine crisis, and the Ukrainian ambassador to the UN has spoken directly to the Russian people in Russian to tell them that their president's allegation that the Russian military needs to be in Crimea to protect Russian-heritage Ukrainians is simply false. Earlier today, Russia called for a national unity deal in Ukraine - from the vantage point of its operational control and military stranglehold in Crimea, in Vladimir Putin's bald combination of diplomacy and escalating military pressure. The US and European Union still scramble for solutions while former Ukraine prime minister Iulia Timoshenko told CNN that America and the EU have undertaken by treaty to protect Ukraine's territorial integrity and that a failure to do so now will put the world at the mercy of a lawless dictator. Global markets are in a semi-panic over the prospect of violent upheaval in the heart of Europe, partly caused by growing fears that the Kremlin might carry out more land grabs in pro-Russian eastern Ukraine, adding urgency to Western efforts to calm the crisis. European markets fell between 1% and 2% on Monday, while the Moscow market dropped about 12% and its currency fell to its lowest point ever against the US Dollar. Gold prices rose. Oil prices also rose on fears that Russia, a major oil exporter, might face EU sanctions. What is clear is that Russia is calling the shots and setting the agenda over Ukraine. Russian soldiers control all Crimean border posts and military facilities. Troops also control a ferry terminal in the Crimean city of Kerch, just 20 kilometers (12 miles) across the water from Russia, intensifying fears in Kiev that Moscow would send even more troops into the peninsula via that route, already begun with Russian troop trucks crossing into Kerch according to unverified reports. US President Barack Obama is sending his Secretary of State John Kerry to Kiev in an expression of support for Ukraine's sovereignty, and the EU is threatening to implement a long list of punitive measures and has called an emergency summit on Ukraine for Thursday. But Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at a UN Human Rights Council session in Geneva that Ukraine should return to an agreement signed last month by pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovich - but not Moscow - to hold early elections and give up some powers to Russia. Yanukovich later fled the country after massive street protests, called the Maidan, rejected his deal with Russia instead of accepting the EU economic offer. Timoshenko said Ukraine would never take back Yanukovich, an apparent Russian demand, or agree to the terms of the Yanukovich-Russia agreement. Meanwhile, Ukrainian authorities said that Russian troops had issued an ultimatum for two Ukrainian warships to surrender or be seized - prompting the country's acting president to accuse Russia of "piracy." Ukraine's corvette ship Ternopil and the command ship Slavutych were being blocked by four Russian naval vessels in Sevastopol's harbor, according to a Ukrainian military spokesman. Acting Ukraine president Oleksandr Turchynov said commanders and crew were "ready to defend their ships : "They are defending Ukraine." A Russian spokesman dismissed the report of a Russian ultimatum as nonsense, but refused to elaborate. Russia is "on the wrong side of history" in Ukraine, President Obama said, adding that continued military action would be "a costly proposition for Russia." Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, Obama said the US was considering economic and diplomatic options that will isolate Russia and called on Congress to work on an aid package for Ukraine. Still, it was not clear what the West could do to make Russia back down. They have ruled out military action, leaving only economic sanctions that would freeze Russian assets and pull the plug on multi-billion dollar deals. Late Monday, the EU threatened to freeze visa liberalization and economic cooperation talks and boycott the G8 summit in Russia if Moscow does not back down. But the economic consequences of an EU economic thrust against Russia would be acute for Western Europe because the EU relies heavily on Russian natural gas flowing through a network of Ukrainian and other pipelines. For its part, Ukraine has "no military options on the table" to reverse Russia's military moves into Crimea, according to Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk, who, along with Iulia Timoshenko, has appealed for outside help and said Crimea remained part of his country. British Foreign Secretary William Hague agreed. He said his country was "urgently" asking for economic and political support from other countries, expressing the fear that Russia might seek to expand its control by seizing other parts of Ukraine in the pro-Russian east of the country, the country's industrial powerhouse and agricultural breadbasket. Hague said "the world cannot just allow this to happen." Faced with fears of more Russian aggression, Ukraine's new government has moved to consolidate its authority, naming new regional governors in the pro-Russia east picked among the country's wealthy businessmen. By putting influential oligarchs in control of key eastern provinces, Kiev appears to be hoping that Russian-leaning citizens will be more willing to remain within the Ukrainian fold. Putin's confidence in his Ukraine strategy is underpinned by the knowledge that Ukraine's 46 million people have divided loyalties. While much of western Ukraine wants closer ties with the 28-nation European Union, its eastern and southern regions look to Russia for support. ~~~~~ Dear readers, there is no coherence in the EU-US response to Putin's occupation of Ukraine. While sanctions and expulsion from the G8 and G20 would perhaps over time pinch Russians into rejecting their president's agenda, it is not sure. It is difficult to appreciate the nationalist underpinnings of the Russian national personality - a nationalism perfectly reflected in its leader. While Gorbachev and Yeltsin were anxious to lean toward the West, it was largely an economic decision. One had to have been in Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union and have had Russian colleagues express their surreal mix of joy at being free of Communisn combined with their mystified anger and classic Russian "depression" at being destroyed as a world power. Putin both feels this and plays on it. His agenda - to restore the Russian hegemony, to become again the second superpower, to buffer its western and southern borders against NATO and the West - is a real reflection of the Russian post-Soviet humiliation. Westerners may say Russia deserved what it got...and may not see how Crimea is part of that history. But Putin sees it. The Russian parliament sees it as they draft an annexation decree to take back Crimea. Until the US and the EU accept these historical antecedents and address them in a way that saves face for Putin and Russia, there will exist every possibility that Ukraine will be menaced with being run over and annexed by Russia. Terrible as it is, unacceptable as it may be to democratic nations, Russia and its ambitious President Putin must be cajoled - not threatened - into joining today's world. It is possible but it will take both words and actions more at home in an 18th century king's court than in a vociferous 21st century parliamentary debate.