The plight of Ukraine and especially of Crimea has been much in the news this month.
That concern was heightened when on March 16 the people of Crimea voted to
become a part of Russia and when on March 21 Russian President Putin signed the
bill of accession, making Crimea a part of Russia (again).
There are legitimate concerns about the Crimean vote to
secede. Were the people really free to vote as they wished? Or did many vote,
and vote as they did, because of the nearby Russian military presence?
And then there is the question of how the minorities in
Crimea, the ethnic Ukrainians and the Tatars, will be treated under Russian
rather than Ukrainian rule.
This is the main concern, though: is Russia’s accession of
Crimea just the first of further attempts of Putin and Russia to acquire
additional territory, incorporating more land and people under Russian rule?
Some U.S. politicians have used the secession/accession of
Crimea to criticize the President for being “weak”—just as some of the same
people accused him of being weak for not taking military action against Iran
and/or Syria.
Earlier this month according to CBS News “John McCain blames Obama’s ‘feckless’ foreign policy for
Ukraine crisis.” At that same time, Marc A. Thiessen, an opinion writer for
the Washington Post penned
an article
titled “Obama’s Weakness Emboldens Putin.”
In the March 16 referendum, though, an overwhelming majority
voted in favor of independence of Crimea from Ukraine and of joining Russia as
a federal subject. After
the referendum, Crimean lawmakers formally voted both to secede from Ukraine
and ask for membership in the Russian Federation.
Since we in this
country generally praise democracy, deciding matters by majority vote, why is
there such widespread opposition to Crimea becoming a part of Russia again?
Actually, Russia
claims that in 1654 the Council of Pereyaslav approved the unification of
Ukraine with Russia. Then in 1783 under the rule of Empress Catherine the Great,
Crimea was annexed by the Russian Empire.
It was on the 300th
anniversary of the 1654 event that Nikita
Khrushchev, head of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to
1964 (and whose wife was Ukrainian), transferred Crimea to the Ukrainian Soviet
Socialist Republic.
Of course, Ukraine
was still within the Soviet Union. That changed in 1991, though. With the
dissolving of the USSR, Ukraine became an independent state. Since 1992 Crimea
has officially been the Autonomous
Republic of Crimea within Ukraine.
But when the referendum on the Act of Declaration of Independence was held in Ukraine
in December 1991, only 37% of the electorate in Crimea voted for independence
from Russia, compared to 76% for all of Ukraine (including Crimea).
After all, a large
majority of the people who lived in Crimea then were ethnic Russians who spoke
the Russian language. And that is even more so now: according to an
article in the March 21 Washington Post, nearly 80% of the Crimeans now are
ethnic Russians.
So in spite of all
the worry in the West, and all of the criticism of the President in the U.S.,
perhaps the “loss” of Crimea is not such a serious issue—and being a part of
Russian again likely seems to be a good thing to the majority of the people who
live there.
Certainly it is a
matter of concern that the accession of Crimea may be just the first step in
Russia’s (Putin’s) annexing other lands and people. That is not likely to
happen, though. At least I certainly pray that it won’t.
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