........”The Ukrainian military was afraid to send troops against what Russia labeled as upset citizens, for fear of looking bad to the world and guilty of war crimes”.........
Actually when Ukraine lost Crimea they had zero ability to do anything.....Putin shut down all their military communications. They had no way of communicating. In fact our Leading Military Officers at Nato spoke about how impressed and astounded they were how Putin pulled it all off.....but that it also revealed Putins technical capability at that time.
Ukraine did not respond because the military was in complete disrepair. For instance the army didn't even have batteries for their trucks. Also, after 75 years of Slavic brothers crap propaganda, Ukraine couldn't believe their "brothers" would shoot at them.