West wasting breath huffing and puffing over Crimea
This week’s Crimean crisis is more than a storm in a teacup, but it won’t threaten world peace. In a tense and diplomatically fascinating week, Russian, US and EU statements have so far been carefully measured to stay well short of any danger zone, and Putin’s de facto re-incorporation of Crimea back into Russia is now pretty much complete. The new Ukrainian government and its Western supporters will huff and puff, but they can forget about Crimea: it is Russian again now.
The mountainous Crimean peninsula is virtually an island in the Black Sea. It is joined to the mainland by a narrow swampy neck of land. It is about half the size of Tasmania with a population of around 2 million mostly living in several large coastal cities and resort towns. Its warm climate and beautiful scenery attracted many Russians to visit and live during the 19th century. Crimea (‘Krim’) became Russia’s Riviera. Its original Tartar population is now a 12 per cent minority. Ethnic Russians are 58 per cent and ethnic Ukrainians 24 per cent. The local language is Russian.
Crimea, originally part of the declining Turkish Empire, was annexed by expansionist Tsarist Russia in 1783. It has been of huge military significance to Russia ever since.
The ice-free port of Sevastopol soon became Russia’s main naval base and strategic window into the Mediterranean. Britain’s disastrous attack on Russia in 1854 was through Crimea. The White Russian forces’ final capitulation to the Red Army in the Civil War was in Crimea. It was the scene of bitter fighting in WW2. Armed resistance continued in the Crimean mountains throughout that war. Yalta was the site of Stalin’s dacha, and the crucial 1945 conference that decided the boundaries of postwar Europe.
In 1954, at a time when Ukraine was firmly part of the seemingly permanent Soviet Union, Khrushchev rashly redrew Soviet internal boundaries to make Crimea part of Ukraine. When the SU broke up and Ukraine became independent, a special status was negotiated for Crimea as an autonomous republic within Ukraine, with special protections for its Russian majority and unimpeded shared occupancy of the naval base: an uneasy compromise that lasted as long as pro-Russian governments ruled in the Ukraine.
Now, with the forced removal of pro-Russian President Yanukovich in Kyiv in what Moscow has condemned as an illegal coup, and with anti-Russian elements now in the ascendant in Kyiv, Putin moved quickly to reassert Russian control of Crimea. With overwhelming local public support in Crimea, small Ukrainian army and naval units were confined to quarters and Russian forces quickly dug in across the peninsula. Russians are now talking of building a new bridge across the Strait of Kerch to join Crimea to the nearest Russian mainland region.
The West has given strong diplomatic support to Kyiv, penalising Putin by boycotting a forthcoming G8 meeting in Russia. There is talk of trade sanctions, but high-level exchanges continue. At worst, Russia’s continued membership of the G8 may be a casualty. There is a UN Security Council meeting on Tuesday. But outside the circle of loyal Western allies, global reaction is muted to say the least. Crimea’s history and strongly Russian character are well understood.
Could Russia use Crimean events as a beach-head to try and break up Ukraine, reincorporating the historically Russian-leaning eastern half (with its major Russian-speaking industrial cities like Kharkov and Donetsk) and leaving Kyiv with the historically Polish-leaning Western half?
Possible, but unlikely. Putin is not reckless, however much this radical agenda might appeal to some Russian geo-politicians. He would prefer to try to keep Ukraine united, with whatever government it elects, as long as that government retains good-neighbourly relations and strong economic links with Russia.
Russia has learned to live with the three fully independent Baltic nations. Its relations with Poland are cautiously cordial. Russia has accepted that these four nations are now firmly in the EU. But it won’t be happy if Ukraine tries to join the EU, because of that country’s proximity, huge size and natural resources, and substantial Russian-speaking populations in the East. Post-Soviet Union Russian-Ukrainian relations will always require careful handling, and outsiders also need to tread carefully here.
Tony Abbott’s ‘We warn the Czar’ statements were ludicrously over-the-top. Clearly he was responding to a Washington appeal to friendly allies to say something; he said far more than was necessary. I hope Australia will not continue to overplay its hand in the Security Council: there is no point in gratuitously offending Moscow on an issue that is outside our strategic area of interest and raises no human rights concerns whatsoever.
Tony Kevin served as an Australian diplomat in Moscow 1969-71 and in Poland 1991-94. He has visited Kharkov and Poltava the scene of a decisive Russian defeat of Swedish invaders in 1709: sadly, he never got to Kyiv, the cradle of Russian civilisation.