While many see Russia’s movement to admit Crimea as an attempt recreate a communist USSR-like ‘supercountry’ and the Russian government and their Pro-Russian Ukrainian counterparts have committed multiple crimes against humanity, the United States should not intervene in the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Tight sanctions risk severing ties with Russia and military intervention may very well ignite World War III. This may be seen as even more democratic imperialism, which the United States has been trying to avoid recently.
Up until 1954, Ukraine was a crucial and highly profitable member of the USSR. Strategically placed between Russia and the rest of Europe, Ukraine contains many valuable natural gas pipelines. Crimea is autonomously governed peninsula owned by Ukraine, about two and a half time the sizes of the Island of Hawaii. There are roughly twice as many ethnic Russians as there are Ukrainians and the majority feel closer ties to Russia [1]. Anti-government protests turned violent and in late February, the Ukrainian government fired on protestors, killing dozens and wounding hundreds [2]. On March 6th, the leaders of Crimea stated that they intended to join Russia and are planning a vote on March 16th [3].
Vladimir Putin is the elected president of the Russian Federation. The former member of the KGB is known to some as a torturer, a tyrant, and a murderer and is known to have plans to recreate the Soviet Union. While saying that letting Crimea become a part of Russia is giving in to Putin’s communist ideals, Crimea is largely Russian, and is not strategically important to the European Union’s goals. Yanukovich’s (The former Prime Minister of Ukraine) security forces fired upon and killed dozens of protestors. He was ousted ...
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[2] Weaver, Matthew. "Ukraine Crisis." The Guardian. N.p., 20 Feb. 2014. Web. 7 Mar. 2014. .
[3] Carbonnel, Alissa, and Luke Baker. "Crimea votes to join Russia, Obama orders sanctions." Reuters. Thomson Reuters, 6 Mar. 2014. Web. 6 Mar. 2014. .
[4] "A Quick Guide: What's Happening in Ukraine." The Wall Street Journal. Dow Jones & Company, 23 Feb. 2014. Web. 13 Mar. 2014.
Gordon, Michael. "Crimea Approves a Secession Vote as Tensions Rise." The New York Times. The New York Times, 6 Mar. 2014. Web. 13 Mar. 2014. .
Milanova, Boriana, and Victoria Eastwood. "Ukraine Orders Crimea Troop Withdrawal as Russia Seizes Naval Base." CNN. Cable News Network, 5 Mar. 2014. Web. 23 Apr. 2014.
International politics as one may imagine includes foreign affairs. This is why the topic and focus of this paper revolves around the current event within Eastern Europe. It will focus on both Russia, Ukraine, and the world, and from it, it will be analyzed by using the resources provided within class. After all it is a International Politics course, and one of the best ways to effectively put the skills and knowledge to use is to focus on an event or current event. The paper will attempt to go over in a chronological order of the events that has happened, and what is happening currently over in Ukraine. Afterwards, an analyzed input will be implemented providing reasoning behind Russia's actions, and actions of the world, and potentially some solutions.
SUMMARY: The Syrian Civil War between the Syrian government, and the insurgents, as well as the Free Syrian Army has been escalating since early 2011. The United States, and our allies have faced difficulty in sending aid to Syria, and continue to deal with obstacles in sending even basic medications to Syrian civilians. However, the United States and its allies have also contributed to the lack of organization and the disparity in Syria by sending aid and artillery to individuals based only on political connection, and ignoring organization, local alliances, and without a true understanding of the reality of the Syrian localities to best protect the Syrian protestors. The question addressed in this memo will be defining the viable options to be pursued in Syria, how to pursue them, and assessing the most beneficial path of least resistance when offering aid, funds, and artillery to specific groups in the country. The recommendation will be that although the best alternative action item would be to choose a Syrian group with the least oppositional values comparative to the United States to fund, supply with arms, and train; that the United States should do nothing for the time being. Given the physical and financial risk involved with the Syrian Civil War, it would be prudent for the United States to simply observe how the war progresses over the next several months, as well as complete some research to truly understand the state of affairs in local areas of Syria to determine the extent to which the United States could identify a group to provide aid to, as well as the extent to which the United States involvement would be within Syria.
The big crisis in Ukraine is starting to get out of hand. The government cannot even figure out what to do, and is getting kicked out of office. There are street protests happening all over Ukraine especially at Kyiv’s Independence Square. There is civil unrest against Yanukovych because he did not do what the people wanted to have. After everything is starting to cool down, Russian troops start to enter the country. The crisis was getting so far out of hand that the US and the EU had to figure out how to help, so they got involved in the crisis. The Ukraine conflict was triggered by Yanukovych declining the EU deal, and when everything was getting settled down in Ukraine, Russia invades Ukraine.
In 2012, the total population of Luhansk comprised approximately 426,000 people. The majority of city´s industrial companies have established connections with the Donbas coal and steel complex (Gentile, 2015). Generally, almost everyone in Ukraine is able to fluently speak and understand Russian, however, a vast number of people are not able to speak Ukrainian. They have an even problem to understand the language (Himka, 2015). In addition, the eastern part of Ukraine is largely urbanized and for this reason, the region more easily assimilated to use of Russian language (Himka, 2015). From the past, it is known that in the 1990s, approximately one-third of the population of Donetsk proclaimed not to support the addition of the Donbas to Ukraine (Shulman, 1998 as quoted in Gentile, 2015). Especially the Russian minority, people from the east, the retired and the poorest tend to be more pro-Russian oriented. They are even willing to follow stronger bonds with Russia (Kubicek, 2000 as quoted in Gentile, 2015). In one of his speeches, Putin mentioned the gone areas of “Novorossiya” including areas of Donbas and Luhansk, that were ceded to the Ukrainian SSR by the Soviet administration in the 1920s (Allison, 2014). This political situation resulted
I believe that there is no clear-cut position as to whether we should be Interventionist or Isolationist. It all comes down to circumstances. Almost every conflict the United States had been involved in has been about economics and what our country can gain. We have been one of the world’s greatest powers since the early 1900’s, mainly because of colonialization and domination of world economy.
Russia, a vast country with a wealth of natural resources, a well, educated population, and diverse industrial base, continues to experience, formidable difficulties in moving from its old centrally planned economy to a modern market economy. President Yeltsin's government has made substantial strides in converting to a market economy since launching its economic reform program in January 1992 by freeing nearly all prices, slashing defense spending, eliminating the old centralized distribution system, completing an ambitious voucher privatization program, establishing private financial institutions, and decentralizing trade. Russia, however, has made little progress in a number of key areas that are needed to provide a solid foundation for the transition to a market economy.
"Russian military action is not a human rights protection mission, It is a violation of international law." said U.S. ambassador Samantha Power(1). The Russian Ukraine crisis is happening now, Russia has invaded Ukraine trying to take back what they gave up years ago. If fighting started in the Ukraine country's like the U.S.A. would have to decide if and who they would side with. If country's decide to fight it could start another world war. Clearly things can take a wrong turn with the Russian Ukraine crisis and could result in the creation of a dystopia. First I will describe what is happening in Ukraine and how WW3 could start, next I will tell how Ukraine armed forces are ready to fight, then what could happen if nukes and EMP's are used.
This essay will discuss Crimea’s recent annexation to Russia, which has caused much international discourse. The annexation and subsequent occurrences reveal key actors’ political motivations and policies. This essay notes that the Crimean annexation is a multifaceted issue that involves many actors, including the United States and many non-state actors. However, this essay will focus on the European region.
Crimea’s history with Russia begins in 1783, when it became an annexed state (Taylor). However, to most of those within the western sphere of schooling most commonly learn about Crimea from the Crimean war. It occurred from 1853 to 1856 and involved Russia, Sardinia, France, Britain, and the Ottoman Empire. After three years of arduous fighting Russia eventually lost the war, but it did manage the keep the treasured peninsula. After the fall of the Russian Empire, in 1921 Crimea became “ The Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic” and unquestionably part of the Soviet Union. In the following decades, Crimea much like the rest of Europe endured the strain of the Second World War, but surprisingly in 1945 it was gifted from Russia to the Ukraine. According to Taylor, there are a couple of possi...
Before beginning with why the U.S shouldn’t enter the Ukraine and Russia conflict, the history and facts about Ukraine and Russia and why Russia is occupying the country must come to light. People know of or at least heard of a collective of countries called the USSR, or the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics formed December 30, 1922. This collective consisted of 15 closely clustered countries, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, and Uzbekistan. The conflict at hand only refers to the countries Russia and Ukraine, most of the history between the countries involves several others as well. (Matt Rosenberg)
In order to realize the United States’ role in both provoking and pacifying the Ukrainian conflict, we will first look at the contemporary contextual circumstances leading to Ukraine’s status quo woes. Then, we will look at how our government’s doctrine of “Diplomacy, Development,
The cause of this crisis is complicated. First of all, the country has been struggling with its identity sin the independence. Ukraine only has a population of 45 million people but it has been struggled to deal with its internal conflicts. It fails to build a strong political party, to overcome corruption or complete some kinds of economic reform. All of its president tend to allow oligarchs and to seek for more control over economy. By the end of 2010, the government has controlled half of the country’s GDP. Therefore, the political opponents intensified and the protest is urged. The attempt to overthrow the government started in 2004, which is called the orange revolution. This revolution was cause by the cogged presidential election which elected Viktor Yushchenko the president. President Yushchenko continued to severe the political and economic trouble since his presidency. Almost secretly, Ukraine has been divided into three parts; the north and central are oriented by western countries in Europe while the southern and eastern Ukraine is oriented by Russia. Fighting the close ties with Russia, President Yanukovich was able to win the election of 2010. However, the corruption did not stop while he in power. He won the election by accusing Tymoshenko, a highly regarded reformist, of abuse of power. It is reported that Yanukovich’s family embezzled over 8 million a year for 3 years as the president. Yanukovich made another mistake in late 2013. When he almost came to the agreement with the European Union on a trade association contract, he overturned his decision under the pressure of Russia. He exp...
The conflict between the Ukraine and Russia is the Ukraine's most long-standing and deadly crisis; since its post-Soviet independence began as a protest against the government dropping plans to forge closer trade ties with the European Union. The conflict between Russia and the Ukraine stems from more than twenty years of weak governance, the government’s inability to promote a coherent executive branch policy, an economy dominated by oligarchs and rife with corruption, heavy reliance on Russia, and distinct differences between Ukraine's population from both Eastern and Western regions in terms of linguistics, religion and ethnicity (Lucas 2009).
That being said, the Ukrainian crisis is playing a greater role on a global scale, as power is in play that enables the balance of the economy to change. This can be comprehended by the notion of Russia’s ability to promptly demand a referendum in Crimea that is against the constitution. The president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych, has triggered the uprising of social movements, as he diverted and did not hold his promises to assure and guarantee a stronger relationship with the European Union to further develop Ukraine’s stability. Thus, Ukraine did not achieve its key foreign policy goal. In contrast, President Yanukkovchy has joined the Russian trade bloc by accepting a gas contract that had not been favorable towards Ukraine, upsetting the majority of the public citizens in Ukraine.