Has Vladimir Putin thought this act of aggression through?

Andrew Wilson, reader in Ukrainian Studies at University College London, wonders what Russia has to gain from its preliminary invasion of Ukraine


This is nothing like the war between Russia and Georgia in 2008. Then the Georgians, by most accounts, were provoked into firing first.

In Crimea, nobody was firing at anybody.

Russia has intervened without even really bothering to construct a cover story. The key votes in the Crimean parliament were taken with masked militia watching on.

The man who has illegally taken over as Crimean Prime Minister was a gangster in the 1990s, whose nickname was ‘Goblin’.

He leads something called the ‘Russia Party’, but it only won 4% of the vote at the last Crimean elections.

Either way, this is the biggest crisis in Eastern Europe, maybe all of Europe, since the fall of the Berlin Wall.

There is a bit of paper called the Budapest Memorandum that the UK, USA and Russia signed with Ukraine in 1994.

To persuade Ukraine to sign off on the withdrawal of Soviet nuclear weapons, we offered security guarantees.

Will we now take these seriously? Will the USA send ships through the Turkish straights?

If Russia is allowed to grab Crimea, where will it stop?

The regular Ukrainian army is not the strongest in the world, but, having fought to depose their President, the guys in Kiev aren’t going to go home quietly.

And why would anyone ever give up nuclear weapons in the future? Obama’s nuclear reduction dreams would be dead.

If Russia now represses the Crimean Tatars, its relationship with the Muslim world will collapse, and it has millions of Muslims at home.

The Russian economy is weak - the Ukrainian economy even weaker.

The Russians have built a gas pipeline in the Baltic Sea, bypassing Ukraine, buy they haven’t finished the one through the Black Sea yet.

Most of Russian gas to Europe still goes through Ukraine.

Crimea is a peninsula. Ukraine can blockade it and it will run out of gas and water.

Has Putin really thought this through?

East and West back to brink

The Ukraine stand-off is the latest in a history of East-West confrontations.

  • September 2013: Five US destroyers with missiles aimed at Syria were faced in the Med by 11 Russian ships and more from China
  • June 1999: Russian troops occupied Pristina airport in defiance of Nato after the Kosovo War. British ­­­commanders refused a US general’s order to storm it.
  • October 1962: The 13-day Cuban Missile Crisis brought the world to the brink of a devastating nuclear conflict.

Mirror Casino  

Mirror Casino

100% Welcome Bonus

When you play roulette, blackjack and slots at Mirror Casino

Mirror Matches  

Meet your perfect match today!

Get one week free in your first month with code: MATCHWEEK