| CNN | - |
(CNN)
-- It's time for the United States and its European allies to raise or
fold. Russian President Vladimir Putin clearly called their bluff on
Tuesday, announcing steps for his country to annex the Crimean Peninsula
from neighboring Ukraine.
U.S. warns Russia: More sanctions coming due to Ukraine crisis
updated 2:25 PM EDT, Tue March 18, 2014
Ukraine: Robbery on international scale
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- NEW: President Obama seeks a G7 meeting meet next week about Ukraine
- Joe Biden calls Crimea situation "a blatant, blatant violation of international law"
- Moscow's isolation will only grow if Vladimir Putin does not back down, he says
- "We already live with these limits to our survival," Putin says
Russian President
Vladimir Putin clearly called their bluff on Tuesday, announcing steps
for his country to annex the Crimean Peninsula from neighboring Ukraine.
President Barack Obama
and European allies had warned such a move would bring tougher sanctions
and diplomatic isolation, but there was little immediate response
Tuesday to Putin's bold pronouncement in the Russian parliament.
The White House announced
that Obama invited leaders of the G7 industrial powers to meet next
week on the sidelines of a nuclear security summit in the Netherlands to
discuss the Ukraine crisis.
G7 sideline summit
Inside Politics: U.S. options on Ukraine
Ukraine: Crimea still Ukrainian territory
Presumably, such a
gathering by Obama and his counterparts from Britain, France, Germany,
Italy, Japan and Canada would consider scrapping their annual summit
with Russia planned for July in Sochi, and perhaps kicking Putin out of
the G8 club altogether.
Both moves have been threatened, with the G7 nations already halting preparations for the Sochi meeting.
White House spokesman Jay
Carney strongly hinted Tuesday that it would get scrapped, telling
reporters that "preparations for that summit have been suspended,
summits don't occur without preparations" and "those preparations look
unlikely to resume any time soon."
On Monday, Obama and the
European Union imposed sanctions on specific Russian and Crimean
officials as part of steps intended to be easily expanded if necessary.
Carney said the moves already hurt the Russian economy and the ruble currency, and he indicated further actions were coming.
"You have seen some designations already and there are more to come," he said of individuals cited for sanctions.
"I wouldn't, if I were
you, invest in Russian equities right now unless you were going short,"
Carney advised, in reference to investors speculating on a losing
venture.
However, Carney made clear that the U.S. approach focused for now on isolating Russia diplomatically and economically.
"This action -- the
results of the referendum and the attempts to annex a region of Ukraine
illegally -- will never be recognized by the United States" and the
international community, he said, with "further actions, further
provocations" by Russia leading to "higher costs."
Biden: Crimea was a "land grab"
Meanwhile, Vice
President Joe Biden began a tour of former Soviet bloc nations now NATO
allies by pledging the full support of the strategic alliance against
any Russian aggression similar to what has occurred in Ukraine.
"Our intent is that NATO
emerge from this crisis stronger and more unified than ever," Biden
said at his first stop in Warsaw. "Our commitment is absolutely
unwavering and unshakeable."
He noted the United
States deployed more jet fighters in the region to bolster NATO air
policing, and he called Putin's moves to add Crimea to the Russian
Federation a "blatant, blatant violation of international law" and
"nothing more than a land grab."
Speaking to reporters at
a joint news conference with Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, Biden
said Russia responded to Ukraine's efforts to realize a more democratic
future "with a brazen, brazen military incursion, with a purposeful
ratcheting up of ethnic tensions inside Ukraine, with a rushed and
illegal referendum in Crimea that was, not surprisingly, rejected by
virtually the entire world."
Biden also warned Moscow
that its political and economic isolation will increase if it continues
such aggression, and he reiterated support for Ukraine in the form of a
billion-dollar loan guarantee as well as technical assistance to
prepare for elections and support for reforms that will allow the
International Monetary Fund to provide a stabilization package to the
cash-strapped country.
The vice president's
visit comes two days before European Union leaders will meet in Brussels
for talks certain to include the Ukraine crisis.
Putin unfazed so far
For his part, Putin
appeared unfazed by the initial U.S. and EU steps, telling the
parliament on Tuesday that Russia already races lingering sanctions from
the Cold War that still exist in practice.
He called the events
that led to last month's ouster of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych
a "state coup" carried out through "terror and murders and pogroms" by
"Russiaphobes and anti-Semites."
The United States
rejects Putin's characterization of the Ukraine political upheaval,
instead calling it a demonstration of democratic aspirations by the
Ukrainian people.
Underlying the conflict
was Yanukovych's moves prior to his ouster to align more closely with
Moscow instead of proceeding with a shift toward closer association with
the EU.
GOP critics at home
At home, Obama has come
under criticism from Republicans, including conservative Sen. John
McCain of Arizona and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney -- the two
GOP nominees defeated by the President in 2008 and 2012.
In an op-ed in the Wall
Street Journal, Romney blamed the current situation in Ukraine on a
"failure" by Obama and his former secretary of state, Hillary Clinton,
to lead when they had the chance.
"If possession is
nine-tenths of the law, Russia owns Crimea and all we can do is sanction
and disinvite -- and wring our hands," Romney wrote.
Including Clinton in the
criticism hewed to a Republican effort to attack the overwhelming
frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016 if she
decides to run.
end quote from:
US warns Russia: More sanctions coming due to Ukraine crisis
partial repeat quote of note:
"I wouldn't, if I were
you, invest in Russian equities right now unless you were going short,"
Carney advised, in reference to investors speculating on a losing
venture.
However, Carney made clear that the U.S. approach focused for now on isolating Russia diplomatically and economically.
end partial repeat quote.
However, it may be that the way things are often done in Russia, Putin might have felt he had no choice but to annex (at the very least) his ports for his military and civilian ships as it and the one in Syria are Russia's only two warmwater ports for shipping that usually don't freeze over in winters. So, this is something to think about too.
It was obvious to Putin that once Ukraine moved economically towards the EU that he would lose this warmwater port for good. So, he just took what Russia needed. However, the International community doesn't see things this way.
It would be sort of like the U.S. taking Cuba because we felt we needed it. something like that.
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