Ukraine and the Thin Varnish of Civilization

Ukraine's government is struggling to control its eastern regions as pro-Russian "separatists" try to hold on to positions seized in three cities. The Ukraine government recaptured its regional headquarters and detained dozens of pro-Russian protesters in Kharkiv, the country's second-largest city. In Donetsk, 250 km (155 miles) further south, protesters dug in for a third day at the 11-story regional administration headquarters they captured on Sunday and then began to declare their own parallel government. Nothing on Tuesday suggested that government forces had an immediate plan to retake the regional administration building. Donetsk has been the scene of weekly marches on government offices, but on Sunday masked men carrying batons burst through police lines to take over the building. Today, lines of car tires wrapped in razor wire were erected to deter any attempt by police to storm the building, a tactic copied from the anti-government protests in the capital, Kiev, which led to pro-Russian President Yanukovych's overthrow. And, as in Kiev, food stations have been set up inside the Donetsk building, supplied by volunteers and residents. No clear leader or agenda has emerged from Donetsk activists, but they are demanding a referendum to be held no later than May 11, on declaring Donetsk a free, independent area. While none of them have said they necessarily want the region to join Russia, they have also declined to rule out the option. Despite claims by the separatists groups to represent all of Donetsk, a region of more than 4 million people, weekend rallies outside the regional building drew crowds only in the low thousands. In addition, Kiev says unknown "separatists" with weapons and explosives are keeping 60 people hostage and threatening them inside a security service branch in the city of Luhansk. In a statement today, the Ukrainian Security Service said it is not clear who the hostages are or if they are security service employees. The building was seized Sunday by armed pro-Russian protesters. Reuters reported that the protesters occupying the building denied that they had wired the building with explosives and were holding people against their will. "There are no explosives, no hostages. We do not need hostages to get what we want," said Anton one of the protesters who described himself as a coordinator of the action, according to Reuters. ~~~~~ Although Ukraine authorities have had some success in controlling the unrest that swept across eastern provinces Sunday, discontent may threaten Kiev's plans to hold a presidential election on May 25. US Secretary of State John Kerry on Tuesday threatened Russia with tougher economic sanctions if it fails to back down from its involvement in Ukraine. "What we see from Russia is an illegal and illegitimate effort to destabilize a sovereign state and create a contrived crisis with paid operatives across an international boundary," Kerry told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Kerry called the demonstrations in eastern Ukraine a "contrived pretext for military intervention just as we saw in Crimea." The Ukrainian parliament has voted to toughen the punishment for undermining Ukraine's national security, imposing jail terms of up to 5 years for separatism. Clearly, the seizures of buildings and calls for local votes on secession are an echo of the events that led to Russia's annexation of Ukraine's Crimean peninsula last month. After Yanukovych fled to Moscow, Russian troops took control of Crimea and the region voted to join Russia in a hastily called referendum. The White House announced today a high-level meeting among US, EU, Ukrainian and Russian diplomats to be held in the coming days to try to solve the crisis. In Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said today that the date and format of the four-way talks haven't yet been agreed. He suggested that Ukraine's presidential candidates could be invited to join the negotiations. The Kiev Post reported today that Russia also warned Ukraine to stop its military preparations in eastern Ukraine or risk civil war, quoting Russian state-owned ITAR-TASS news agency. The Kiev Post also said that Ukraine has been trying to shore up its defenses in case of a Russian attack. In other action, NATO warned Russia not to encroach further into the region, saying it would represent a "serious escalation" of the crisis : "We call on Russia to pull back the tens of thousands of troops it has massed on Ukraine's borders, engage in a genuine dialogue, and live up to its international commitments." Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov appeared to answer the US and NATO by meeting today in Moscow with Angola's foreign minister, thanking Angola for "understanding Russia's stance" in Ukraine." One is tempted to say "Birds of a feather flock together." ~~~~~ It seems useless to say yet again that the Ukraine crisis is extremely dangerous. But, a dear friend recently wrote to me about Vladimir Putin : "It must be considered that Putin is a student of Stalin and Khrushchev. He was, is, and always will be the poster child for the inhumanities that the KGB is well know for. To have women and children be a shield against advancing  forces or as a protector of his own advancing forces would not bother him at all. He is ruthless to the core. So if I were he, what would I do - exactly what he is prepared to do - win a war if that is what it comes to. Putin I think only fears personal defeat. He played the US and some of the EU in Syria and won the confrontation. He has measured the will of Obama and finds there is none there, and little in the EU except for the strength of Chancellor Merkel. I really believe that he is fully ready to risk it all to have his Motherland back in total under his control. And isn't it ironic that what stands in his way of a re-unified Russia is Merkel's strength. I'm concerned with what happens....after the US and EU decide on their next move(s). He holds the instant power via the oil and natural gas that goes to Europe....Reagan told us to beware, that Russia was not to be taken lightly or ignored. And that is what has exactly happened - 'out of sight, out of mind.'" ~~~~~ Dear readers, perhaps the enormity of the possible outcomes in Ukraine is a reminder, as Will Rogers so succinctly put it, that "We will never have true civilization until we have learned to recognize the rights of others." The trouble with this is that what is happening now in Ukraine is being caused by one player, Russian President Putin, who gives no indication that he cares about civilization, at least not in the Greco-Roman sense. Former US Secretary of State Madeleine Allbright once said that in the long term democracy is the most stable form of government, but in the short term it is very fragile. If the West has been called upon to defend democracy-based civilization by forcing Putin to stop his aggression on Ukraine and then eastern Europe, then the West's leaders must accept that the defense may require much more than they had thought necessary. Sanctions thus far have done nothing to stop Putin. What should follow the sanctions? Troop movements. Military support for Ukraine's army. A naval blockade of the Black Sea. One's instinctive reaction is to say - 'Stop. No war over Ukraine.' But, as Reinhold Neibuhr said : "There are historic situations in which refusal to defend the inheritance of a civilization however imperfect, against tyranny and aggression may result in consequences even worse than war." The consequence here is a Putin-led Russian creeping takeover of eastern Europe - until western civilization is looking across a new "wall" at the non-democratic soviet-socialist hegemony reconstructed by an unopposed Vladimir Putin. Ironically, American comedian Carrie Snow reminds us how easy it is to lose civilization and fall into a dark age of brutality led by inhuman tyrants : "Civilization is hideously fragile and there's not much between us and the horrors underneath, just about a coat of varnish."