Russia annexed Crimea after a referendum supported by about 96% of the population. The population revolted after the US-fostered oligarch/neo-Nazi coup that deposed a legitimate government in Kiev that Crimeans had voted for 80% plus.
There is no evidence to support Western/exiled oligarch propaganda about murdered journalists, etc. Putin has always enjoyed high popularity ratings. Whatever you think of him, he is a smart man who knows any conceivable benefit that might accrue to him by such actions would be more than offset by the avalanche of propaganda that it would afford his opponents.
You must be living inside Russian propaganda bubble.
Right and its also a myth that Putin suspended elections and appointed party apparatchiks in an effort to further the Putinista notion of pluralism and democracy. I know you’re a Putin fanboy. You don’t have to prove it.
Look, it’s hard to get people whose brains ossified somewhere around 1979 to take into account changed circumstances and current facts. You are right about all of that, and I would add that the disputed areas of the eastern Ukraine are majority ethnic Russians who don’t also want to live under the government Obama installed by a coup.