Of course the US has that choice. And since the Ukraine is not a US ally nor in the vital security interest of the US the choice is clear.
And if the Russians decide to expand their interests into attacking the Balkan states? Who ARE U.S. allies and members of NATO?
Should the U.S. go to war to protect them? Because allowing the Russians to have Ukraine will lead to that. Most confrontations are perception based. Not on a cold blooded analysis of interests.
extension of reality TV to the point where it takes over 100% of publicly available programming?
I presume you are confusing the Baltic states with the Balkan states. They are NATO allies and Ukraine is not, there is a reason for that. Furthermore, these countries are Stable democraties, not failed states like Ukraine. And the Idea that Russia Will in any way invade a NATO member state is fanciful.
Thanks for the correction.
what about to protect ethnic Russian minorities there?
The Baltic states and the Russian minorities living there are pretty insignificant to Russia compared with Ukraine. And again, the Baltic states are Stanley and firmly anchored in the EU and NATO.
They are also undefendable geographically.
do you think the U.S. should risk nuclear war for Estonia, Latvia or Lithuania?
How would you do that?Agreed that nuclear weapons must be eliminated.
My criticism hasn't been that the US was courting Ukraine in an attempt to pull them into western influence, all along, Russia was doing the same. My problem begins when Ukraine moves the direction that the US was attempting to block, and the subsequent US/EU response which has given a measure of credibility to Putins action.
Exactly. The thing is this, if the U.S. is going to promote democracy, we need to be able to live with the results, if we don't it becomes a sham. That is likely why Putin felt he had to make a move on Crimea. Russia was willing to play the democracy game in Ukraine. But when it saw that the U.S. was perfectly willing to help facilitate the demise of a democratically elected government because things did not go it's way, Russia felt that there interests in Crimea were to vital to be left to such foolishness. As a result we are were we are today.
This is a conflict in which only one side (Russia) has nuclear weapons. The US and its allies Will never go to war with Russia over Ukraine.
That heart quit beating 25 years ago.
The Russians are not going to go nuclear over a peninsula in the Black Sea.
No it did not. Obama declared that Russia was a regional power. .
Obama an ill informed idiot. What is your point.
Bingo!! You've got it dude. As a matter of fact, Russia had every reasonable expectation that NATO would wind up with its only viable warm water ports in Crimea, and that was not going to happen, so absolutely, Putins move was deliberate and in response to US/EU manipulation in Kiev.
I don't think that is an absolute at all. If the U.S. escalates by sending arms to Ukraine, Russia will likely escalate. It could very well escalate to the extent that Russia decides to invade Ukraine and occupy western Ukraine. Then what? Then the voices will loudly proclaim that Russia cannot be allowed to redraw the map, Putin is Hitler and must be stopped, and the U.S. is weak because it is not doing anything. Air power would then be on the table, and then we would surely be walking down the road to nuclear confrontation.
No it did not. Obama declared that Russia was a regional power. That is likely because Russia can project regional power in the Black Sea area from it's base at Sevastopol. Indeed it can control Ukraine from this position. Its strategic significance is very important to Russia and should not be underestimated.
Even if the US starts to ship arms to Ukraine this Will not make the Ukrainian military a match for Russia. It Will be more diffficult for the Ukranian military to learn to use this materiël ( which they are unfamiliar with) than for Russia to destroy it ( or capture Some of it). Putin doesn't need to invade and conquer all of Ukraine to actieve His aims. But even if he does, the US is not going to send in an army to fight him and start a war over Ukraine.
Finally, Putin is NOT Hitler. Trying to turn every authoritarian and unfriendly leader into Hitler is completely ahistorical and not very smart. Putin's goals are limited, very Unlike Hitler's.
And its importance and strategie significance to the US is exactly zero.
I think that everything you have said here is correct with the exception that you rule out the possibility that this conflict could lead to Putin occupying all of Ukraine and your assertion that the U.S. would not under those conditions use some sort of military force against Russia. I don't think those things are likely but I don't think the the probability that they could happen is so remote as to say that it is impossible. While you are correct that arming Ukraine would not make it a match for Russia, it would make it considerably more difficult for Russia to bring the situation to a point in which their concerns are implemented into the final solution. Depending on how difficult the situation became for them, they might indeed feel the need to topple the government in Kiev. Then the calculus of the situation would change drastically because at that point it would be clear that Russia would have used military force against a government that had made it's intentions clear that it wanted to be more closely associated with the West. That would indeed pose some difficult problems for the U.S. There would be some serious questions raised as to whether regimes in the future could count on U.S. protection if they wanted to make such a move. The voices would become very loud that the U.S. is weak and therefore something needed to be done about Russian aggression. Although Putin is not Hitler, he would be demonized as Hitler and I think that it is likely that we would be off to war. That's how I see it.
I don't agree. While I think it is of secondary importance, it is important because if Russia controls Ukraine they can project power into Europe. And Russia can certainly control Ukraine from it's base in Crimea.