Posted on 03/10/2014 11:10:50 AM PDT by McGruff
Nato is to deploy reconnaissance planes in Poland and Romania to monitor the Ukrainian crisis.
It gave the go-ahead for the flights on Monday, a Nato spokesman said.
"All Awacs [Airborne Warning and Control System] reconnaissance flights will take place solely over alliance territory," the official said.
It comes as Russia cements its control of Ukraine's Crimea ahead of Sunday's referendum to join Russia. Ukraine and the West say this is illegal.
In the latest move on Monday, armed men - said to be Russian troops and local militias - seized a military hospital in Crimea.
The attackers marched into the hospital in the regional capital Simferopol, threatening staff and some 30 patients.
Pro-Russian troops are also blockading Ukrainian troops across Crimea.
Moscow has officially denied that its troops are taking part in the blockades, describing the armed men with no insignia as Crimea's "self-defence" forces.
The government in Kiev - as well as the US and EU - accuse Russia of invading Ukraine, in violation of international law.
Nato said the surveillance flights would "enhance the alliance's situational awareness".
Last week, the organisation said it was reviewing all co-operation with Russia and stepping up its engagement with the government in Kiev.
Unrest in Ukraine erupted in November after former President Viktor Yanukovych's last-minute rejection of a landmark EU deal in favour of a bailout from Russia.
Mr Yanukovych was ousted last month, and a new government has been voted in by the Ukrainian parliament which Russia says was a "coup".
If it were that simple then none of this constitutional usurping would be going on here at home...since they are bound by respective Constitutional powers.
Of course they never seem to let THAT stop them so I don’t forsee a foreign treaty making a lot of difference, do you? Really?
Agreed. This is the European Union’s gig.
Clever way to take over a mass of land. Look like you’re going to take over 2, then give one back. Everyone breathes a sigh of relief and you get the area (Crimea) that you wanted.
Well, one of the first things that would have to happen is they would have to pledge and perform a huge firing/turnover and reduction in all bureaucracy.
A decertification of the unions would be nice .
Healthcare in Crimea as such:
If ill and sent to hospital, your family must bring linens, food, medicines for patient. Hospital provides only bed.
Many are writing it was Pro-Russian activists who forced their way into a military hospital in Crimea.
Journalists should be asking Brussels about the French flights to/from NATO bases in Turkey, over Crimea, & into/out of Ukraine.
Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said a group of about 20 pro-’Russian activists’ from the so-called ‘Crimea self-defense squads’ had broken into the military hospital in the region’s main administrative city, Simferopol, and thrown out its chief.
In a later statement, it said the hospital chief was back at work after negotiations but added the premises were being blockaded ‘by the activists’.
However a CNN team that traveled to the hospital found it very quiet, with no one around. A guard on duty said he had not heard or seen anything unusual and that there was no senior official to speak with as Monday was a public holiday.
Russia, meanwhile, accused far-right groups Monday of “conniving” with the new authorities in Ukraine.
In a statement, the Russian Foreign Ministry condemned “lawlessness” in eastern Ukraine and accused the West of being silent over violence and detentions taking place against Russian citizens,
http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/10/world/europe/ukraine-crisis/index.html
“Im sure the appearance of NATO AWACS has Putin absolutely terrified.”
He has more important business to attend to, like welcoming the cosmonauts who landed in Kazakhstan after a stay of more than six months aboard the International Space Station.
Russians Oleg Kotov, Sergei Ryazansky and NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins touched down in their Soyuz capsule at 32:4 GMT outside Dzhezkazgan in Kazakhstan.
Would Obama, in retaliation for Crimea, forbid NASA to participate to ISS missions? That will show him, Putin, who’s the “boss”! I remind you that the US manned and unmanned missions to ISS rely exclusively on Russian rocketry.
The problem from the get go is Journalists and citizens alike cannot tell one group from the other....and there are many active in Ukraine...they just assume it's Putins Russian Military or The Ukranian Military when in fact it's often neither..
Above is Crimea’s Prime Minister’s Army taking their oath.
Another American, Richard Mastracchio, is now manning the ISS with the Russian Mikhail Tyurin and the Japanese Koichi Wakata.
Reminds me of the movie PLATOON. Elias: “We’ve been kickin’ asses for so long I figure it’s time we got ours kicked.” (Or something like that.)
We seem to think we’re unbeatable. That was true at one time. I’m not so sure about today.
Kennedy gave up a lot of Kruschev. Obama has already given up so much there’s nothing left to give up.
“This is a civil war. We would be wise to stay out of it.”
BINGO....
“Fly into Russian air space and we could be at war. Stupid...just stupid...”
It’s not really the Russians that would be a worry here, but what Belarus would do, should one of these birds stray too close.
“In my opinion, we are doing this solely for Poland and NATO, not for Ukraine.”
I think you are right on target. This gives Poland a “tripwire”, and calms their nerves. They have tried for years to get US Forces based in Poland, offering us free ex-soviet airbases, and the sites for the Missile Shield.
Losing the Missile Shield was a huge blow to the Poles, from this spineless President, thinking it would antagonize Putin, if you recall. Part of the “reset”.
So he sticks naval and Air Force assets right up to putin’s nose at a war zone. And a plane or ship gets hit. Then what does he think he will do? Bomb Moscow?
According to eye witness reports and local media in Crimea, Russia deployed the Bastion mobile missile system to Sevastopol in the night of 8 March.
The system is equipped with Yakhont SS-N-26 anti-ship cruise missiles and has a maximum range of 300 km.
President Obama (as well as the EU) seems to suppose that Vladimir Putin fetishizes “international law”; and, if only he had a lawyer who was advising him correctly, he would quickly see the error of his ways, and change course...
So in your estimation Obama and the American government is a friend to Christians and Christianity??
Freerepublic has zero Putin supporters as you put in (at least from any topic I have read here). So keep trying to scare away these boogeymen that you imagine really exist.
It’s funny when an obvious neocon attacks others for being a “pseudo conservative”
Do you mind if I ask you what your first language is?
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