Ukraine: Creeping Annexation - What Comes Next? - Institute for War and Peace Reporting
I dont nec. agree - but, nuance is important:
First of all, the main issue - external policy matters. This is not war. War is when two or more countries engage one another in combat. When one country conducts armed operations on another’s territory unhindered, and the other responds with appeals to the international community, that is annexation.
It so happens that at one time I worked with the Kremlin as a political analyst, and I continue to follow its “points of reference”. That was during the time of “Putin the Moderate”, but the main approaches still apply. So it’s with some sense of responsibility that I agree with the argument that “Putin is not the monster you think he is. He’s a monster, of course, but of a quite different kind.”
In that sense, Putin is like a terrorist with a hand-grenade who demands that the plane change course, except that he is holding the world hostage
More @ The Institute for War and Peace Reporting
for some reason i cannot get the link to the source to work - so try this one:
pravda.com.ua
it is in russian - or google the english version at iwpr.net