Crimea - self-determination or annexation?

The first round of Russo-Ukrainian conflict has ended in the detachment of Crimea from Ukraine and its incorporation into Russia. It looks so simple: Crimea held a referendum which turned overwhelmingly pro-Russian, hence goodbye to Ukraine, welcome into Russia, and all of them lived happily afterwards. And for those worrying about scruples there is a nice precedent to refer to: the detachment of Kosovo from Serbia, which was upheld by western democracies in spite of the opposition of the Serbian government. So why worry about Crimea and what is the reason that American, European, and homegrown liberals are so concerned? Let’s consider whether Russia’s position in this crisis is as clean-handed as it may seem.

Crimea and Kosovo are by no means comparable. The difference is obvious: the presence of an self-interested motive. Russia had a strong motive to acquire Crimea, while western democracies apparently had no material motive in the Kosovo case. Even Albania (and Albanians are by far the largest ethnic group in Kosovo) made no move to incorporate Kosovo. (Come to think of it, Kosovo may not mean much to anybody - except people living there, of course.)

The distinction between having a self-interested motive for a particular action and not having any is very great indeed. In law, for instance, one and the same action performed with or without a motive will be judged completely differently. To give an example, if a city administration officer awards a contract without holding a bidding, his actions may be judged either as violation of business procedures (in case he has no self-interested motive), or as a criminal offence (in case a motive is there).

In the case of Kosovo the international community might have been rash to uphold its independence in violation of international practices. However, since nobody had a motive in this case, one can only decry the rashness of the action. In the case of Crimea, on the other hand, Russia had a clear motive to wrench it from Ukraine and incorporate it, and this is the reason for the international outcry. It simply does not look like self-determination, it very much looks like an annexation.

This impression gets all the stronger once you consider that Russia has never officially questioned the Ukrainian sovereignity over Crimea for the past twenty-odd years. To be sure, now and then one could hear grumbling about Crimea being a part of Ukraine by chance only, but there were never any state-level discussions about returning it to Russia. Of course no one could expect Ukraine to hand Crimea back at the first request, but even so Russia has never made any official claims to it. By virtue of this, Russia has acknowledged that Crimea is a part of Ukraine.

But suddenly Russia has caught a break: the Ukrainian government has toppled, creating a cause for an intervention and there you are: Crimea is now a piece of native Russian soil and we have to get it back without delay! And why there was never any talk about this for the past twenty-odd years? Just because there was never a chance for substantiating this claim. But given an opportunity we used it to the full!

This looks like an opportunistic annexation, and this is the reason for the international panic. After all, there are plenty of examples of countries consistently laying claim to a territory under a different sovereignty. Here is one: for the last 65 years China has considered Taiwan a “breakaway province” and does not recognize its independence. It matters nothing that for the time being there is no chance to bring this province back under Chinese control. One day China will get its chance to do that; it will use it, of course, and its position will be unassailable: Taiwan was a part of China, China has never acknowledged its separation and therefore it can claim Taiwan legally. Of course there will be a lot of talk about the right for self-determination, etc. but China will simply ignore it, and from the point of view of international law China will have some right on its side.

The Russian claim to Crimea is much less than China’s claim to Taiwan.  China has consistently and emphatically claimed its sovereignty over this and other offshore islands, while Russia made no complaint about the status of Crimea until an opportunity arose.

Of course one can claim that Russia has had no hand in the annexation at all, and all that happened is a will of Crimean people. I consider this a clumsy cover-up. The very speed that drove the referendum in Crimea betrays careful planning on the part of local officials. Consider that any out-of-turn elections in Russia are scheduled months in advance. Crimea is much smaller than Russia, and the scope of preparation is correspondingly smaller, but then the local officials have correspondingly less resources to leverage - and they also had to do their preparations obliquely, since this had to happen before the escalation. There is no chance this preparation could have been completed in less than a month, but in fact it was done in a week. The conclusion is simple: it was a well-rehearsed impromptu.

To be sure, there is no way one can prove this, just as one cannot prove the presence of Russian military in Crimea. The official Russian position is that all the military men whom we have seen in the news are local volunteers. Some of these military men even offered interviews and confessed to being locals. Sort of a volunteer militia, a landsturm. Could be, but have you ever seen real militia? You might have had, if you have seen Soviet or German war chronicles.  Volunteer militia is composed, first and foremost, of people belonging to different age groups. In contrast to this, all of the Crimean military men were obviously of the prime military age: between 20 and 40, and very strongly built too, which is not at all typical of militiamen. Their very well fitting uniforms were also very conspicuous. Have you ever seen a civilian  when first fitted into uniform? He looks like a scarecrow. The military men in Crimea looked anything but scarecrows: they were strongly-built, young men, wearing uniforms naturally. I have been to the army and I can give you my word that no newly drafted military unit looks so solid, and passing off those Crimean military people as volunteer militia is sheer mockery. I am convinced that the military we’ve seen in Crimea were professionals, and they could only be Russian military professionals.

If I can see these details, and make these conjectures, then so can anyone capable of considering the situation without a preconceived opinion. Invariably, such people are asking how to account for the appearance of professional military in Crimea, which obviously do not belong to Ukrainian forces? Remember that they started to show up even before the Russian Federation Council had approved using Russian military in Ukraine! What is happening here: self-determination or annexation?

And there is nothing conjectural about the seizure of Ukrainian navy ships by pro-Russian forces - Russian media is gloating over it. Let me ask you this: does the fleet, which is a military unit, also have a right for self-determination these days? Are there any precendents for this? How has it happened that the Crimean autonomy has voted for joining Russia, and has taken Ukrainian navy ships along with it - where is the connection? What should have Russia done if only Crimean self-determination were on the agenda? Apologise for the incident, of course, and return the ships back to Ukraine - perhaps offering a political refuge to the crews. There is a precedent for this, by the way: the case of the “Potemkin” battleship in 1905, taken to Romania by a rebellious crew and promptly returned to Russia. But the very point is that the Russian  story is not about self-determination. It is about picking up misplaced things. Crimea was certainly misplaced by being in Ukraine - go get it (self-determination will do for a cover-up). The fleet suddenly appeared misplaced - pick it up (nobody will notice in the turmoil). Are we done yet or there is something else to be had?

The Crimean situation has obviously served a dual purpose for Russia: to round up the territory and to even the scores with the US and EU for the Kosovo case - the latter has certainly wounded the politicians deep. Though achieving this goal required transgressing international law or mere decency, this does not seem to mean much to Russian politicians. After all, it is only the result that counts.