The End of Peter the Great's Road?

[Превед]

Plebiscite, anyone?

[Превед]

Remember, the Treaty of Tsarskoe Selo did not prevent the Wars of Schleswig and probably paved the way for WW1. While the border established by the plebiscite in 1920 was not even altered during or after WW2.

[TimM]

Divide the country like Czechoslovakia in 1993.   Western Ukraine would stay an independent country.  As for the eastern half, it could be reabsorbed back into Russia (of the majority of folks there want that).

[edubs31]

I must confess that my sympathies lie with the Russian speakers of eastern Ukraine which, after all, was the motherland of Orthodox Russia going back to Prince Vladimir of Kiev. As was pointed out, the addition of eastern Ukraine to Ukraine by Khrushchev in 1954 was, most likely in his mind, a meaningless gesture to his fellow Ukrainians (perhaps trying to make up for all he had done to them as General Secretary of the Ukrainian Communist Party).  By the way, it should also be pointed out that his was the most anti-religious and anti-clerical reign since the early days of the Bolshevik Revolution. More churches were closed down while he was General Secretary of the CPSU than under Stalin.  Finally, I'm troubled by the apparent ultra right participation in the Maidan uprising and, in my view, the even more troubling support from the United States, which simply plays into Putin's hands. Just think what our reaction would be if Russia fomented an "Orange Revolution" in Mexico City. Remember the Zimmerman Telegram?      

Personally, I think Russia should "buy" the eastern Ukraine like we bought Alaska. It could pay with 100 years of free oil and gas (details to be worked out). If the Ukrainians would be leery of accepting such a deal (maybe rightfully so), the EU could guarantee it in return for the Ukraine accepting its governance and economic norms (note that most of the gas pipelines that supply Europe pass through the Ukraine so the Ukraine could tax the oil and gas).  Lviv would become the capital (it is defacto already) and Kiev would go to Russia (or could be split like Buda and Pest). The dividing line would be the Dniepr River.

In the interest of full disclosure, my family descends from 8 generations of Russians but we originated in the Melitopol area and my Grandfather ruled the Crimea for a short period in 1920.                  

Your impressive assessment Petr reminded me of a scene from the West Wing from several years ago...

Fortunately I was able to pull it up online. In the following clip the President and his Chief of Staff are shown speaking to the British Ambassador to the US (and Indian Ambassador to Britain) about a dangerous situation involving Indian, Pakistan and nuclear weapons. If you fill in Russia for Indian, Ukraine for Pakistan, and "computer industry infrastructure" for "oil & gas" you pretty much have the exact same conversation you're recommending here. "Buy them off" as the ambassador says.

Sometimes the best solution to a complex problem is the simplest one - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAnwYfEUtLw

[Превед]

Garanties? Sounds like Schleswig-Holstein or Belgium. They are either worthless or mean world wars.

Buying the country worked for the BRD with regard to DDR, though.

[Belochka]

The Crimea has special significance for my family as well Petr.

Many Russian families ended up in the Crimea following the event of 1917.

My paternal grandparents and great-grandparents are buried in Simferopol.

Margarita Nelipa

[Tsarfan]

Divide the country like Czechoslovakia in 1993.

This makes quite a bit of sense.

The Crimea has a population of little over 2 million, and trying to hang onto it will bring Ukraine nothing but headaches.  Of course, they would be abandoning the non-ethnic Russians -- and especially the Tatars who got their belly full of Russian treatment during Stalin's reign -- to their fates in a country that has shut down the free press, that is nursing xenophobia and hate-mongering as state policy, and that is in the throes of almost insuperable demographic and social problems.

But Ukraine, which has neither the economic nor military force to take on a Russia willing to play hardball, has a real chance of becoming a prosperous, progressive nation if it can align itself with western Europe.  If the price of that is losing the Crimean, then so be it.  A strong, stable, and democratic Ukraine without the Crimea is a much better deal (as least for those fortunate enough to live outside the Crimea) than an unstable, harried country trying to hang onto a region for misguided reasons of trying to protect an ethnic Ukrainian minority in the Crimea.

That may sound a bit cynical, but if we haven't learned by now the lessens almost two hundred years of Balkan history and pan-Slavism taught us about trying to build government policy around ethnic concerns, then there is really no hope for us.

[TimM]

As I said, let's hope they avoid a repeat of what happened to Yugoslavia in the 1990's, when it broke up.

If Russia wants the Crimea so badly, let them have it.  Anything is better than an ethnic civil war.

[agordon2000]

I would like to think that Russia has taken a temporary hitch on the road because of the glory days of communism when they were feared and respected as empire builders. It is much more important to me that the present ruler is corrupt and his daughter has 2 billion dollars and is a dancer. Peter the Great did not take a cent in bribes he lived in culture of corruption. The strides he made can not be turned around. He changed the alphabet, agriculture, socializing and the dress if Russians. He did not interfere in matters of sex except to say that prostitutes could not hang around the corners of St Petersburg when his special troops caught the clap from visiting them and could not show up for duty. At present Russians are confused but it seems that this is only going to last this generation. Russia may go in a different direction when the Putin genration dies and the younger generation start to demand more of their government.

[edubs31]

I would like to think that Russia has taken a temporary hitch on the road because of the glory days of communism when they were feared and respected as empire builders. It is much more important to me that the present ruler is corrupt and his daughter has 2 billion dollars and is a dancer. Peter the Great did not take a cent in bribes he lived in culture of corruption. The strides he made can not be turned around. He changed the alphabet, agriculture, socializing and the dress if Russians. He did not interfere in matters of sex except to say that prostitutes could not hang around the corners of St Petersburg when his special troops caught the clap from visiting them and could not show up for duty. At present Russians are confused but it seems that this is only going to last this generation. Russia may go in a different direction when the Putin genration dies and the younger generation start to demand more of their government.

This is an optimistic view and hopefully you will be proven correct in time. I've always seen Russia as being too obstinate for its own good however. There seems to be a constant internal struggle between upholding its nationalistic roots and embracing more progressive western culture. Peter the Great knew this and it was relevant then as it is today. The unique identities of the countries two largest cities (St. Petersburg and Moscow). How it straddles the continental (and cultural) divide of Europe and Asia. And how it struggles to define itself as equal parts modernist and traditionalist.

It's also difficult being a world power for so long and then being reduced to virtual second tier status. I can only imagine how people in my country, the US, would react to a similar deterioration in relevance after being the self-proclaimed "greatest country in the world" for so long. Americans are paranoid and jingoistic enough as it is, lol.

I think the best thing that can be said for present day Russia is that it's stuck in a neutral or a holding pattern of sorts. The Russians have always seemed to do democratic capitalism somewhat half-heartedly, and its easy to understand why given the whirlwind of change it experienced during the 20th century. Three separate and distinct political regimes in a less than a hundred years - Russian Empire, USSR, Russian Federation - and many of its citizens old enough (in the early-1990s) to have remembered living at least part of their lives in all three.

Peter the Great's road may not have ended, but it has reached a canyon or a lake and needs a good bridge builder or sea captain to guide it through...

[TimM]

It's also difficult being a world power for so long and then being reduced to virtual second tier status.

I think that's why Putin was so successful.  He put Russia back on the world stage, he made people sit up and take notice.  As for his later actions, like Crimea, I don't know if that was always his intentions, or did years of power just go to his head.

The Russians have always seemed to do democratic capitalism somewhat half-heartedly, and its easy to understand why given the whirlwind of change it experienced during the 20th century. Three separate and distinct political regimes in a less than a hundred years - Russian Empire, USSR, Russian Federation - and many of its citizens old enough (in the early-1990s) to have remembered living at least part of their lives in all three. 

I agree.  While there is no one left alive now that remembers the Tsarist era, there are lots who remember the USSR, including Putin.  When all that generation has died off, who knows what will happen.

Peter the Great's road may not have ended, but it has reached a canyon or a lake and needs a good bridge builder or sea captain to guide it through...

And one will come.  Russia made it through the horror story of the USSR (although at the cost of millions of lives), it can make it through this.