Control over oil and natural gas reserves is real power.
Why do you think Hillary Clinton was so interested in Libya in 2011? Oil.
Interesting how both Egypt/Libya and Ukraine had astro-turfed revolutions previous to “western aligned” governments being installed.
So far, Egypt’s and Libya’s “western aligned” governments have failed.
Russia is working on bringing down Ukraine’s “western aligned” government now.
I think the situation for potential success is much greater for Ukraine. Ukraine has the resources for success, and the location and ethnicity to mesh nicely with the rest of Europe. “
Kevmo, I’m glad you have picked up on my original posts regarding the importance of oil in Putin’s outrages. An occasional quotation mark would be nice. I think changing the popular thinking from the concept “Putin is afraid of the danger of NATO for his country” to the real motive “Ukraine has all this oil, and I still want to get even richer than I already am”, plus “I don’t care how many cities I destroy, and how many women and children are crushed, the oil is still safe underground and ready for pumping.” What a total totalitrian bastid!!
The Crimea is also important for the import of bauxite for aluminum and who knows how many other important products. Some kind of compromise that allows the disputed regions to have internationally supervised plebecites and semi-autonomous governance if they choose that would be good.
As I wrote before, some kind of corridor that allows Russia to use some of the port facilities and transport the goods
to the heartland would help satisfy one of Russia’s historic goals. Always the quest for a warm water port, Helping Russia achieve that old goal, without crushing the rights of other people might be a significant decision to maintain long term world peace. I think Trump instinctively picked up on that concept, but did not give enough thought to encouraging change away from totalitarianism. Cheers