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   From: acoustic@panix.com   
      
   After Seumas Milne's January 29, 2014 article entitled:   
      
     In Ukraine, fascists, oligarchs and western expansion are at the   
     heart of the crisis   
      
     The story we're told about the protests gripping Kiev bears only the   
     sketchiest relationship with reality   
      
   UK journalist Jonathan Steele has also written about NATO's unbridled   
   expansionist ambition as the underlying cause of the current turmoil   
   in Ukraine.   
      
   lo yeeOn   
      
   The Ukraine crisis: John Kerry and Nato must calm down and back off   
      
   The hysterical reaction to Russian military movements in Crimea won't   
   help. Only Kiev can stop this crisis becoming a catastrophe   
      
   Jonathan Steele   
      
   Sunday 2 March 2014 14.29 EST   
      
   2624 comments   
      
   Simferopol, Crimea, on 2 March   
      
   `Underlying the crisis in Crimea and Russia's fierce resistance to   
   potential changes is Nato's undisguised ambition to continue two   
   decades of expansion.' Photograph: Ivan Sekretarev/AP   
      
   Both John Kerry's threats to expel Russia from the G8 and the   
   Ukrainian government's plea for Nato aid mark a dangerous escalation   
   of a crisis that can easily be contained if cool heads   
   prevail. Hysteria seems to be the mood in Washington and Kiev, with   
   the new Ukrainian prime minister claiming, "We are on the brink of   
   disaster" as he calls up army reserves in response to Russian military   
   movements in Crimea.   
      
   Were he talking about the country's economic plight he would have a   
   point. Instead, along with much of the US and European media, he was   
   over-dramatising developments in the east, where Russian speakers are   
   understandably alarmed after the new Kiev authorities scrapped a law   
   allowing Russian as an official language in their areas. They see it   
   as proof that the anti-Russian ultra-nationalists from western Ukraine   
   who were the dominant force in last month's insurrection still control   
   it.  Eastern Ukrainians fear similar tactics of storming public   
   buildings could be used against their elected officials.   
      
   Kerry's rush to punish Russia and Nato's decision to respond to Kiev's   
   call by holding a meeting of member states' ambassadors in Brussels   
   today were mistakes. Ukraine is not part of the alliance, so none of   
   the obligations of common defence come into play. Nato should refrain   
   from interfering in Ukraine by word or deed. The fact that it insists   
   on getting engaged reveals the elephant in the room: underlying the   
   crisis in Crimea and Russia's fierce resistance to potential changes   
   is Nato's undisguised ambition to continue two decades of expansion   
   into what used to be called "post-Soviet space", led by Bill Clinton   
   and taken up by successive administrations in Washington. At the back   
   of Pentagon minds, no doubt, is the dream that a US navy will one day   
   replace the Russian Black Sea fleet in the Crimean ports of Sevastopol   
   and Balaclava.   
      
   Since independence, every poll in Ukraine has shown a majority against   
   Nato membership, yet one after another the elites who ran the country   
   until 2010 and who are now back in charge ignored the popular   
   will. Seduced by Nato's largesse and the feeling of being part of a   
   hi-tech global club, they took part in joint military exercises and   
   even sent Ukrainian troops to Iraq and Afghanistan.   
      
   The deposed Viktor Yanukovych, for all his incompetence, corruption   
   and abuse of power, was the first president to oppose Nato membership   
   in his election campaign and then persuade parliament to make   
   non-alignment the cornerstone of the country's security strategy, on   
   the pattern of Finland, Ireland and Sweden. Nato refused to accept   
   it. As recently as 1 February, before the latest crisis, Anders Fogh   
   Rasmussen, the empire-building secretary general, told a security   
   conference in Munich: "Ukraine must have the freedom to choose its own   
   path without external pressure." The implication was clear: if only it   
   were not for those beastly Russians, Ukraine would be one of us. Had   
   Rasmussen said: "Ukraine has chosen nonalignment and we respect that   
   choice," he would have been wiser.   
      
   It is not too late to show some wisdom now. Vladimir Putin's troop   
   movements in Crimea, which are supported by most Russians, are of   
   questionable legality under the terms of the peace and friendship   
   treaty that Russia signed with Ukraine in 1997. But their illegality   
   is considerably less clear-cut than that of the US-led invasion of   
   Iraq, or of Afghanistan, where the UN security council only authorised   
   the intervention several weeks after it had happened. And Russia's   
   troop movements can be reversed if the crisis abates. That would   
   require the restoration of the language law in eastern Ukraine and   
   firm action to prevent armed groups of anti-Russian nationalists   
   threatening public buildings there.   
      
   The Russian-speaking majority in the region is as angry with elite   
   corruption, unemployment and economic inequality as people in western   
   Ukraine. But it also feels beleaguered and provoked, with its cultural   
   heritage under existential threat. Responsibility for eliminating   
   those concerns lies not in Washington, Brussels or Moscow, but solely   
   in Kiev.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)