Quote:
Originally Posted by nik-
We're dealing with a borderline third world country, a country that totally would be third world if it wasn't for an abundance of gas, with a good military and nuclear bombs.
They'll respond by replacing Putin and backing down or sliding further. They won't win their economic stability back be increasing military expenditures or starting a war.
Of course it will have worldwide repercussions, but so is letting Russia chip away at parts of countries where their diaspora moved. Pancake their economy, and then see how popular the shirtless mouth breather is.
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Canada would be a third world country if not for our abundance of oil and gas and raw materials. If you pancake their economy (which I'm not certain would be so easy), they react by turning off the energy taps to the rest of Europe and plunge the region into recession again, possibly dragging the world with it.
Crimea is gone, there is nothing anyone can do about it and frankly it seems that it wanted it join Russia anyway. It was Russian for centuries before being handed over ceremoniously in the 50's after all.
The main thing now is to strengthen NATO presence in the region and wait. Personally I think Putin is done with his land grabs. He wanted the Black Sea naval base secured. He's got that now, he can now brag up national pride to his citizens. He may be crazy, but I don't think he's crazy enough to start a war with NATO. He'll ride out the sanctions(they'll end eventually), he'll miss out on the G-8 for a year or so bad then everything will return if the status quo.