To avoid running afoul of the limitations on embedded quotes, I will reply to Zakharra in a stand alone thread.
The biggest point to consider is that there are two sides to every conflict. Everyone has certain interests and aspirations that are legitimate as well as demands that are not. More often than not, even the legitimate interests of peoples involved in a situation conflict. Either compromises are negotiated or people go to war.
The current situation in Ukraine is a direct result of President Obama disrupting the compromise on the status of Ukraine that had been negotiated as the Soviet Union imploded. Ukraine became independent but nonaligned. That compromise was vitally needed to enable a "soft landing" for Russia to avert a nuclear war. Everyone understood that ethnic Russians had migrated to Ukraine under the Tzars as well as Stalin to displace ethnic Ukrainians as well as Crimean Tartars. An independent but nonaligned Ukraine was a reasonable compromise that could protect the interests of ethnic Russians in Crimea and Eastern areas.
The coup that Obama and Victoria Nuland incited and supported was supported by diverse interests that included some genuine advocates for freedom. Among those groups were Crimean Tartars who had been exiled to Siberia by Stalin. They wanted to return home which is reasonable, but their return home would inevitably dilute the political power of ethnic Russians. Given the fact that the Tartars are Muslims and various experiences such as the Breslan school massacre, the Russians are reasonably alarmed. I know that it is not politically correct, particularly in Europe, to take notice of the indisputable fact that Muslims have become incredibly aggressive in committing ethnic cleansing. The fall of Saddam has resulted in the devastation of Christian and remnant Jewish communities in Iraq. The same has occurred in the Balkans where the Serbs and other Slavic peoples have been devastated thanks to air support from Nato.
I am taking such a hard line, insensitive attitude because this "Duty to Protect" philosophy that has gotten the US needlessly involved in wars is mostly about protecting the economic and political power of the EU. It is unlikely that the 9-11 attacks would have occurred if the Balkans jihad had not sustained and inflamed Islamic radicalism.
Now that the EU has provoked a needless confrontation with Russia by manipulating Obama into engineering the coup in Ukraine, I am content to have the United States sit on the sidelines rather than become militarily involved.
BTW, it is an indisputable fact that American liberals are easily manipulated by European special interests because they suffer from an inferiority complex and view Europeans as culturally and politically more sophisticated. The many criticisms of the US on this forum that are prefaced with "every civilized country" simply confirm this. Given the Europeans penchant for starting wars that the US has to finish for them, I am unimpressed by European sophistication. The US treaty with NATO does not obligate the US to intervene in Ukraine. Watching the EU get it's ass kicked by Putin's Russia would be amusing to me.
