Quote Originally Posted by JMA View Post
Have mentioned the Russian approach of 'two steps forward and one step back' before. They threatened the whole of Georgia and settled for South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The US (Bush) claimed victory in saving the rest of Georgia. Russia are hoping to take Crimea and maybe more and let Obama claim vistory when they step back from taking the whole of Ukraine.
While some similarities exist between the operations in Georgia and those in the Crimea, I think what the US was hoping to attain is very different from what Russia suspected was going on.
In my opinion, getting Georgia as a NATO partner was not really about NATO. Rather it was about getting US foreign bases. to be prepared for Iran. I believe US operations in Afghanistan and Iraq had a similar goal. Georgia in NATO has positives that are lacking in Uzbekistan (site of former US used Karshi-Khanabad AB) and Kyrgyzstan (site of currently used Manas AB), Unlike the recent and current arrangements in these two very tenuously available locations, having Georgia in NATO would have provided a treaty tie as well as seaborne access for forward basing. However, the pieces retained by Russia after its incursion into Georgia placed Russian control in such a way as to easily cut off forward-based Western forces in Georgia that might seek to invade Russia.
With the loss of Georgia as a meaningful US foreign basing option, the Russians perhaps looked at the next place the US could forward base in preparation for an invasion of Russia. Lo and behold, the Ukraine, and particularly Sebastopol in the Crimea popped up. What other meaningful combinations of sea- and airport capabilities exist on the Black Sea? Putin mentioned this issue in the post from Kaur
Needless to say, first and foremost we wanted to support the residents of Crimea, but we also followed certain logic: If we don’t do anything, Ukraine will be drawn into NATO sometime in the future. We’ll be told: “This doesn’t concern you,” and NATO ships will dock in Sevastopol, the city of Russia’s naval glory.

But it isn’t even the emotional side of the issue. The point is that Crimea protrudes into the Black Sea, being in its centre, as it were. However, in military terms, it doesn’t have the importance it used to have in the 18th and 19th centuries – I’m referring to modern strike forces, including coastal ones.

But if NATO troops walk in, they will immediately deploy these forces there. Such a move would be geopolitically sensitive for us because, in this case, Russia would be practically ousted from the Black Sea area. We’d be left with just a small coastline of 450 or 600km, and that’s it!
It may be the case that the Russians and Americans are both thinking along the same lines: trying to win the 21st century version of The Great Game, with Russia viewing occupation of selected parts of Georgia and the Ukraine as necessary steps to pre-empt US options. However, I don't think so.
I'm inclined to believe instead that the two nations are actually operating from different places and with different goals. For Russia, that goal is protection of Mother Russia by building out its control over buffer states (a return to Warsaw Pact-like thinking). For the US, the goal is putting itself in a position to take down Iran if/when that becomes necessary (a forward basing strategy similar to its 1950-90s efforts in Germany).

Since neither side is likely to believe the other, the problem will continue.