The Telegraph (London)
In an April 10 opinion, Volodymyr Khandogiy, Ukraine’s ambassador to the United Kingdom writes:
“The ‘lessons’ outlined by (Alexander Yakovenko, Russia’s ambassador to the United Kingdom) are nothing but interference in the internal affairs of Ukraine. But in truth, only the Ukrainian people have the right to decide on the form of government to choose, on the language to speak, on the military-political stance to take. And these issues will be resolved in the national constitution.”
Forbes
Mark Adomanis on April 8:
“At this point it unfortunately would not shock me if the Russians sent in troops (if you’re still shocked by anything the Russians do you haven’t been paying attention) but there’s still a real possibility that things don’t devolve into an all-out war. But even if the situation in eastern Ukraine doesn’t entirely spin out of control, the country’s economy has already unraveled to the point that a substantial default is now essentially unavoidable.”
Washington Post
In an April 9 editorial:
“It’s not too late to prevent Russia from destroying Ukraine, but this time the West must act quickly. A presidential election scheduled for May 25 is vital to stabilizing the country, by creating a new government with a clear mandate. Predictably, Russia has been demanding that the election be called off. The provocations in eastern Ukraine, if they do not presage an invasion by the Russian troops still massed on the border, are likely the beginning of an effort to disrupt the vote and make the country ungovernable.”
The New York Times
Thomas L. Friedman on April 9:
“Shortly before the Sochi Olympics, Russian President Vladimir Putin played in an exhibition hockey game there. In retrospect, he was clearly warming up for his takeover of Crimea. Putin doesn’t strike me as a chess player, in geopolitical terms. He prefers hockey, without a referee, so elbowing, tripping and cross-checking are all permitted. Never go to a hockey game with Putin and expect to play by the rules of touch football. The struggle over Ukraine is a hockey game, with no referee. If we’re going to play — we, the Europeans and the pro-Western Ukrainians need to be serious. If we’re not, we need to tell the Ukrainians now: Cut the best deal with Putin that you can.”
Robert Service on April 6:
“By snatching 4.5 percent of Ukrainian territory, Mr. Putin has performed the unlikely feat of wrecking his own dream of forming a “Eurasian Union” under Russia’s leadership. He once planned to keep President Viktor F. Yanukovych as his puppet ruler in Kiev. Now Mr. Yanukovych is a refugee somewhere in Russia, and Ukraine’s government is strengthening cooperation with the European Union.
This is a disaster for Mr. Putin’s foreign policy. Although he is concealing this from the public through his control of TV channels, he will not be able to fool all the people all of the time.”
Foreign Policy
Daniel Altman on April 8:
“Recently Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, suggested that Russian President Vladimir Putin was living in a world of his own, divorced from reality. The opposite is true. Putin is a rational actor who steadily pursues his interests, which are well known to the world at large. Appealing to morality, international law, or any other arbiter of behavior other than pure pragmatism is unlikely to succeed with him. Yet by the same token, his straightforward approach makes him the easiest sort of opponent for a similarly minded strategist. He must be surprised that the West still performs so badly against him.”
Mikheil Saakashvili, former Georgian president, on April 4:
“In Chechnya, tens of thousands of people were killed just to make Putin president and consolidate his power. Then, when the Colored Revolutions — and their successful reforms — became a menace to his rule, he invaded Georgia in order to kill this contagious model and again reconfirm his power. Now, as before, faced with eroding popularity in Russia, a shale gas revolution in North America, and the need for consistent port access to equip his allies in the Middle East, Putin attacked Ukraine and seized Crimea.
And yet, even with these myriad examples, the West continues to misunderstand or excuse Putin’s aggression.”
Wall Street Journal
In an April 8 editorial
“Russia has seized Crimea and has 50,000 troops as a potential invasion force on the border with eastern Ukraine. The Kremlin is also abrogating the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, in which Kyiv agreed to give up its nuclear arsenal—at the time the third largest in the world—in exchange for guarantees of its territorial integrity from Russia, the U.S. and U.K. That memorandum has now proved to be as much of a scrap of paper to the Kremlin as Belgium’s neutrality was to Berlin in the summer of 1914.”
Financial Times
Stefan Wagstyl on April 8
“Vladimir Putin is providing an object lesson in how to destroy a state.
The Russian president has four principal levers at his disposal: internal political interference, economic pressure, diplomacy and the threat of war. At times, he acts as if he is driving a bulldozer straight at Kiev’s Golden Gates; at other times, he is more subtle, like the pilot of a precision drone tasked with hitting one street lamp at a time.
But the ultimate aim is the same – the end of Ukraine as a genuinely independent sovereign country.”
Carnegie Europe
Judy Dempsey writes on April 7:
“Both NATO and the European Union are now witnessing Russia’s carving up of their big eastern neighbor. The EU will be slow to impose tough sanctions. NATO will protect its borders, but that’s about all. Meanwhile, the post–Cold War dividing lines will be redrawn—indeed, they already are. European countries are not coming together to stop this because they don’t think it’s worth the effort. That is shameful. Europe, and later Russia, will pay a high price.
