Last edited Mon Mar 3, 2014, 02:32 PM - Edit history (2)
Time waits for no one, but apparently will wait for Crimea. The speaker of the Crimean parliament, Vladimir Konstantinov, has confirmed there will be a referendum on greater autonomy from Ukraine on May 25.
Until then, Crimea will be as hot and steamy as carnival in Rio - because Crimea is all about Sevastopol, the port of call for the Russian Black Sea fleet.
If the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is a bull, this is the red flag to end all red flags. Even if you're deep in alcohol nirvana
dancin' your troubles away at carnival in Rio - or New Orleans, or Venice, or Trinidad and Tobago - your brain will have registered that NATO's ultimate wet dream is to command a Western puppet Ukrainian government to kick the Russian navy out of its base in Sevastopol. The negotiated lease applies until 2042. Threats and rumors of reneging it have already emerged.
The absolute majority of the Crimean peninsula is populated by Russian speakers. Very few Ukrainians live there. In 1954, it took only 15 minutes for Ukrainian Nikita Krushchev - he of the banging shoe at the UN floor - to give Crimea as a free gift to Ukraine (then part of the USSR). In Russia, Crimea is perceived as Russian. Nothing will change that fact.
We're not facing a new Crimean War - yet. Only up to a point. NATO's wet dream is one thing; it is quite another to pull it off - as in ending the Russian fleet routinely leaving Sevastopol across the Black Sea through the Bosphorus and then reaching Tartus, Syria's Mediterranean port. So yes, this is as much about Syria as about Crimea.
in full: http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/CEN-05-280214.html
Inside The New Cold War: Washington Sets Its Sights On Ukraine
February 17, 2014 |
Meet the new (cold) war, same as the old (cold) war. Same same, but different. One day, it's the myriad implications of Washington's "pivoting" to Asia - as in the containment of China. The next day, it's the perennial attempt to box Russia in. Never a dull moment in the New Great Game in Eurasia.
On Russia, the denigration of all things Sochi - attributable to the inherent stupidity of Western corporate media "standards" - was just a subplot of the main show, which always gets personal; the relentless demonization of Russian President Vladimir Putin. [1]
Yet Nulandgate - as in US Assistant Secretary of State Victoria "neo-con" Nuland uttering her famous "F**k the EU" - was way more serious. Not because of the "profanity" (praise the Lord!), but for providing what US Think Tankland hailed as "an indicator of American strategic thinking".
http://www.alternet.org/world/new-us-russia-cold-war
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