Crimea: A rose by any other name

In this anniversary period, remembering World War I, the Great War, the War to End All Wars ... it is perhaps fitting (and not really a surprise) that we should be staring down the same barrel of threat and potential for conflict once again. Crimea is a region that has been, strategically and ethnically, as critical to southeast Europe as Palestine is in the Middle East. And no solution appears any more likely either.An important doctrine is at play. “We should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety. With existing [countries] we have not interfered and shall not interfere. But with the governments that have declared their independence and maintained it, and whose independence we have, on great consideration and ... acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them, or controlling in any other manner their destiny, by any ... power in any other light than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition.” Meaning war.Russia openly takes the position that Crimea is under their protection. And they will back that up with arms and warfare, if necessary. After all, since the time of Catherine the Great, Russia has considered Crimea as theirs and has ruled accordingly. Last time there was a battle for control of Crimea was during the war of 1853-1856, fought between the Russian Empire and, well, basically everyone else around at the time (British, French, Turks and so on). Why? Because there is a port in Crimea at Sebastopol (now renamed phonetically more accurately as Sevastopol) that has been the largest and one of the most important naval posts of the Russian Empire Navy and, since the Russian Revolution in 1917, the major port for the Russian Fleet in the Black Sea. If you want a comparison, imagine being asked to put Pearl Harbor at risk before World War II, when Hawaii was just a protectorate. If Hawaii had decided to become autonomous — in an election or by decree — do you seriously imagine we’d just sail the Pearl Harbor fleet away? Have we done so in Okinawa when asked? Nope.To add to the confusion here, there is the plight of the Tartars as an ethnic people. They used to be 90 percent of the population, but since the USSR ran the place, and allowed the beautiful and subtropical Crimea to become the retirement home for 80 percent of the Russian Navy, the Crimean population of Tartars has dwindled to 10 percent (and given that Russia accused Tartars with siding with the Nazis they are mostly hated to boot). So, after WWII, as part of the Yalta Agreement signed by our president, Russia was formally granted Crimea. Then the unthinkable happened. Premier Khrushchev decided, in 1954, that since Crimea was connected by land to the Ukraine, it was administratively easier to turn it over for government paperwork to the Ukraine, providing of course, the USSR could carry on doing their retirement and Navy thing as before.And that’s how it was. Until a corrupt Ukrainian president, properly elected who then turned rogue, was forced to flee. Where to? Russia, of course. Interesting they have prevented him from appearing in Moscow, he’s marginalized, seen as either a crook or incompetent. And the new government? They cannot recognize a new government because Russia has not secured world approval for what they think is their responsibility anyway. And Russia has a doctrine that allows them to protect Russians no matter where they are on the globe. The fact that they also have a Navy port in Crimea is just a happy coincidence (well, not really, but that’s their argument).And just one little thought here ... the doctrine quoted above? It is called the Monroe Doctrine, ours, put in place by President Monroe. It is how we police the whole of all the Americas. It is the basis for our opposition to Castro and, lately, Venezuela’s policy-makers. It is different simply because our intentions and action are not so easily enacted with violence or the threat of war, but as an edict it is just as strict as Russia’s toward what they see as their protectable charges. Remember, Kennedy used the Monroe Doctrine to threaten and force the Russians to take their missiles off of Cuba. Perhaps Putin is simply following the adage, “What’s good for the goose...”Peter Riva, a former resident of Amenia Union, now lives in New Mexico.