Russia ships troops into Ukraine, repeats invasion threat

[okaawhatever]

Source: Reuters

(Reuters) - Russia shipped more troops and armor into Crimea on Friday and repeated its threat to invade other parts of Ukraine, showing no sign of listening to Western pleas to back off from the worst confrontation since the Cold War.

Russia's stock markets tumbled and the cost of insuring its debt soared on the last day of trading before pro-Moscow authorities in Crimea hold a vote to join Russia, a move all but certain to lead to U.S. and EU sanctions on Monday.

The Russian Foreign Ministry, responding to the death of at least one protester in Ukraine's eastern city of Donetsk, repeated President Vladimir Putin's declaration of the right to invade to protect Russian citizens and "compatriots". "Russia is aware of its responsibility for the lives of compatriots and fellow citizens in Ukraine and reserves the right to take people under its protection," it said.

SNIP

Moscow denies that its forces are intervening in Crimea, an assertion Washington ridicules as "Putin's fiction". Journalists have seen Russian forces operating openly in their thousands over the past two weeks, driving in armored columns of vehicles with Russian license plates and identifying themselves to besieged Ukrainian troops as members of Russia's armed forces.

A Reuters reporting team watched a Russian warship unload trucks, troops and at least one armored personnel carrier at Kazachaya bay near Sevastopol on Friday morning. Trucks drove off a ramp from the Yamal 156, a large landing ship that can carry more than 300 troops and up to a dozen APCs.

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/14/us-ukraine-crisis-idUSBREA1Q1E820140314

[Cha]

1. Bookmarking.. thanks, okaawhatever

[blackspade]

2. This is not an invasion threat...

It is an invasion fact.
Compatriots and fellow citizens? That is so preposterous as to be laughable.

[gordianot]

3. This is so 1950's and 60's.

Who really wants a pissed off population in the age of the internet and electronic commerce. Even the Koch brothers get a little blow back.

[geek tragedy]

4. Putin is borrowing liberally from the Bush playbook. To support Russia

in its actions is to be a supporter of fascism and imperialism and aggressive war.

[gordianot]

5. Kinda wonder if that warm water port is worth it in the long run while your economy gets flushed?

KGB schools must not have prepared Vladamir for a market economy.

[geek tragedy]

6. it's about making the ultranationalists in Russia happy

the only way Russia can command respect is to frighten people with its military

[gordianot]

7. There is still Stalinist thinking.

In response to starvation in 1930's Ukraine Stalin was reported as saying "one person starving is a tragedy large numbers are a statistic". Probably unintentional that is also the standard operating principle of Fox News.

[november3rd]

8. Distraction

Putin is distracting his own population from their dire circumstances. They have people working for $1 a day -- nurses, teachers, local public officials. Plus, 40% of their revenue comes from fossil fuel sales. NATO was just getting ready to promote a big fracking campaign in Ukraine before this blew up. But if this conflict escalates, Russia's economy won't bear the strain. It ends with Russia in chaos and the eventual overthrow of Putin, or the reestablishment of a gulag-style police state locked in a cold war with the West.