But it is okay for the Russians to seize Crimea and send train loads of weapons to the so called insurgents in Eastern Ukraine? One could easily make the comparison with what the Russians are doing in Ukraine to what Hitler did in Sudetenland. The Russians are claiming they are protecting ethnic Russians.
Throughout history Russia has been invaded through Ukraine,
Really? What about the invasion of Russia by Napoleon and during the two World Wars. Should the same logic you are using for Ukraine, i.e., Russia's strategic concerns, be also used for Poland, which is a member of NATO?
Crimea has been Russian for a very long time, and was only given to the Ukrainian SSR by Khrushchev at a time when the Soviet breakup was unthinkable. Russia never gave up its naval base at Sevastopol or the airfields that protect it, and its annexation of the Crimean peninsula was a logical defensive step to prevent those strategic bases from falling to NATO's hands -- especially in light of the West's role in this February's overthrow of Ukraine's democratically elected leader who was allied with Russia.
We can draw all the Hitler parallels we want, but Russia's real concern is NATO's expanding military presence all along its borders. That is a legitimate for any nation, and is the reason why we have enforced the Monroe Doctrine since 1823 throughout our hemisphere. Just imagine if a hostile power signed a mutual defense treaty with Mexico or British Columbia and stationed its troops, planes and ships there.
[Throughout history Russia has been invaded through Ukraine... -AAM]
Really? What about the invasion of Russia by Napoleon and during the two World Wars. Should the same logic you are using for Ukraine, i.e., Russia's strategic concerns, be also used for Poland, which is a member of NATO?
Yes, really. The Germans invaded through Ukraine before being stopped at Stalingrad (now Volgograd), which is only about 200 miles east of Ukraine. And Poland is definitely a concern to Russia, as it has always served as a strategic buffer between Germany and Russia to the defensive benefit of both larger powers. NATO promised the post-Soviet CIS that we would not expand eastward if Russia pulled its troops out of the former SSRs, and then added 12 new member countries in Central and Eastern Europe in 1999 and 2004. Russia has to wonder why NATO is pressing all the way to its borders -- a legitimate question to ask of an alliance that was chartered as a defensive shield. Borderlands serve as strategic buffers to prevent wars, while their absence increases the likelihood of small conflicts escalating into major wars. Almost all of those buffers have vanished.
As far as I am concerned, this is a matter to be settled between Russia and Ukraine and is not our business. What occurs on Russia's border does not affect our national security, but is of vital, existential interest to Russia. Why in the world do we want to stick our nose into such a mess that is infinitely more important to Russia than to us?