Thread: What Is Happening In Ukraine Is Far More Important Than Most People Realize

POLITICO OMITS REFERENCE TO THEIR EDITOR WHO DERIDED PALIN FOR UKRAINE WARNING



by TONY LEE 1 Mar 2014 188 POST A COMMENT
Politico reported on former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's Facebook post on Friday in which she mentioned that she had been "derided" by the "high-brow Foreign Policy magazine" for suggesting in 2008 that Russia's Vladimir Putin may invade Ukraine if then-Senator Barack Obama were elected President.

But the inside-the-beltway publication conveniently did not mention that the person who dismissed Palin in 2008 now works for them.
Palin said then:

After the Russian Army invaded the nation of Georgia, Senator Obama's reaction was one of indecision and moral equivalence, the kind of response that would only encourage Russia's Putin to invade Ukraine next.

As Breitbart News reported, Blake Hounshell, who wrote then at Foreign Policy and is now an editor for Politico magazine, wrote that Palin's comments were "strange" and "this is an extremely far-fetched scenario."
Politico wrote that Palin "said she was derided for her comments" but conveniently left out the reference to the Hounshell that Palin included in her post.
In her Facebook note on Friday, Palin wrote, "Yes, I could see this one from Alaska. I'm usually not one to Told-Ya-So, but I did, despite my accurate prediction being derided as 'an extremely far-fetched scenario' by the 'high-brow' Foreign Policy magazine."
As Breitbart News noted, Palin pointed out how so much of the ridicule she has received on the national stage stemmed from her comments that Alaska's proximity to Russia forced her to be familiar with a country she believed was less friendly than the conventional wisdom in Washington has believed.

Palin, as she wrote, rarely toots her own horn. In fact, she has frustrated many of her core supporters for not bragging about her considerable accomplishments, especially the reforms that both political parties hated, while she was Alaska's governor.
But she may have made an exception on Friday because Tina Fey's "I can see Russia from my House" line, which Palin herself never said, has been used to mock and deride her on the national stage. Even today, mainstream media reporters, Democrats, and establishment Republicans who have always been jealous of her appeal and influence mistake Fey's words for Palin's.
Since Palin emerged on the national scene in 2008, the mainstream press have given her none of the benefit of the doubt they have always given to Barack Obama, who Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) said was the most naive president on foreign policy issues during his lifetime.

Video at the Page Link:

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Journal...kraine-Warning

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http://drudgereport.com/

March 2, 2014

Russian troops surround 3 Ukraine military bases in the Crimea

Rick Moran

CNN is reporting that hundreds of troops wearing no insignia but arriving in trucks bearing Russian license plates, have surrounded 3 Ukrainian military bases in the Crimea.
So far, no shots have been fired.
Meanwhile, the Ukrainia government is mobilizing its army, calling up its reserves as the new Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk warned his country was "on the brink of disaster."

Ukraine's shaky new government mobilized troops and called up military reservists Sunday, even as the defense minister said Kiev stood no chance against Russian troops in a rapidly escalating crisis that has raised fears of a conflict.
Amid signs of Russian military intervention in Ukraine's Crimean peninsula, Russian generals led their troops to three bases in the region Sunday demanding Ukrainian forces surrender and hand over their weapons, Vladislav Seleznyov, spokesman for the Crimean Media Center of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry, told CNN.
Speaking by phone, he said Russian troops had blocked access to the bases, but added "there is no open confrontation between Russian and Ukrainian military forces in Crimea" and that Ukrainian troops continue to protect and serve Ukraine.
"This is a red alert. This is actually a declaration of war in ourcountry," Yatsenyuk said.
Speaking in a televised address from the parliament building in Kiev, Yatsenyuk called on Russian President Vladimir Putin to "pull back the military and stick to international obligations."
"We are on the brink of disaster," he said.
In Brussels, Belgium, NATO ambassadors were scheduled to hold an emergency meeting on Ukraine.
"What Russia is doing now in Ukraine violates the principles of the U.N. charter," NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen told reporters.
"Russia must stop its military activities and threats," Rasmussen said, adding, "we support Ukraine's territorial integrity and sovereignty. ... We support the rights of the people of Ukraine to determine their own future without outside interference."

I doubt whether those words are being heard in Moscow.
Putin is keeping his options open in Ukraine, not even formally acknowledging a Russian military presence in the country. He may feel like negotiating a Ukrainian pullout and recognition of Crimean independence. Or he may not. He might simply take what is easily taken and move on, leaving Ukraine to pick up the pieces.
Either way, its' clear that the decision about whether blood will be shed is entirely up to Vladimir Putin.

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/...he_crimea.html

Drudge Report shared Conservative Outfitters's photo.

Do you agree or disagree?

[Watch] Putin is Responding to Ukraine PM Hand-Picked, Inserted by U.S.

Posted on 2 March, 2014 by Rick Wells



On February 23rd Ukraine’s parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, voted to insert Arseniy Yatseniuk as its new prime minister. He has previously served as acting central bank chief, foreign minister, economy minister and chairman of parliament.
Other cabinet positions quickly followed, creating a new, western friendly government.
Vladimir Putin responded just as expected, in the self interest of not only his presidency but of his nation.
Yatseniuk’s appointment was not just a luck of the draw occurrence for the U.S. and Europe after having successfully driven the Russian figurehead from power. The prime minister was hand selected and inserted by the United States government. Evidence of the U.S. involvement was dramatically made public through the release of a tape in February in which Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt are heard clearly deciding who will be the new leadership. This was the infamous “F**k the EU” conversation, in the video below.



America’s government was clearly calculating and involved in the events now unfolding. The Chest-beating coming from all of the DC players is both disingenuous and dangerous and needs to stop.
It is also quite transparently a struggle between east and west, reminiscent of the cold war days. Putin won this round, as he has won many lately. It’s time to accept that as fact, American foreign policy has been a disaster since 2001. Our government acts in the interest of our government, not of our nation. They have their reasons for what they do.
The nuclear arsenal of Ukraine, 3rd largest in the world, under the control of Russia, is at least more secure than our recent track record would indicate it would be under a new Ukrainian regime.
Those who are rising up, demanding action on behalf of the central banksters installed by America are once again not the pure “freedom fighters” they are represented to the U.S. to be. Association with the EU will be no picnic for the Ukraine but the coup was not about the people. It was obviously about control, and that battle continues. The people are inconsequential.
Instead of threatening retaliation on behalf of the central banking government of the new Ukraine and Yatseniuk, the U.S. would do well to remember that we are not the bank guard of the world. That is Putin’s backyard, he’s acting as America would and does in regards to Cuba.

Rick Wells is a conservative Constitutionalist author who contributes to conservative media outlets. “Like” him on Facebook and “Follow” him on Twitter.


http://gopthedailydose.com/2014/03/0...-inserted-u-s/

Central banker appointed as Prime Minister of Ukraine

27 Feb 2014
arseniy yatsenyuk, central bank, imf, politics, revolution, tymoshenko, ukraine
by Clark Kent

Newly appointed Prime Minister of Ukraine and former central banker Arseniy Yatsenyuk

A reshuffled Ukrainian Parliament installed following a coup last week has voted to appoint Arseniy Yatsenyuk as the new prime minister of the country. Yats, as Victoria Nuland, the Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs at the U.S. State Department, called him, is a natural choice. He is a millionaire former banker who served as economy minister, foreign minister and parliamentary speaker before Yanukovych took office in 2010. He is a member of Yulie Tymoshenko’s Fatherland Party. Prior to the revolution cooked up by the State Department and executed by ultra-nationalist street thugs, Tymoshenko was incarcerated for embezzlement and other crimes against the people of Ukraine. Now she will be part of the installed government, same as she was after the last orchestrated coup, the Orange Revolution.



Yats will deliver Ukraine to the international bankers. “Ukraine is on the brink of bankruptcy and needs to be saved from collapse — Yatsenyuk has a strong economic background,” Ariel Cohen, senior fellow at the Washington-based Heritage Foundation, told Bloomberg on Wednesday. “Ukraine faces difficult reforms but without them there won’t be a successful future.”
Discussion with the IMF is crucial, US Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew said earlier this week. In order to cinch the deal, the U.S. government will sweeten the pot. Lew talked with the IMF boss, Christine Lagarde, about Ukraine as he headed back from a globalist confab, the G-20 meeting in Sydney, Australia.
“Secretary Lew informed Managing Director Lagarde that he had spoken earlier in the day with Ukrainian leader Arseniy Yatsenyuk and advised him of the broad support for an international assistance package centered on the IMF, as soon as the transitional Ukrainian government is fully established by the Parliament,” MNI News reported on Monday. “Secretary Lew also noted that he had communicated to Mr. Yatsenyuk the need to quickly begin implementing economic reforms and enter discussions with the IMF following the establishment of the transitional government.”
Ukraine’s story is right out of the IMF playbook. The nation’s corrupt leaders past and present – most notably Tymoshenko, who went to prison for corruption and wholesale thievery – have enriched themselves at the expensive of ordinary Ukrainians.
“Ukraine at the dawn of independence was among the ten most developed countries, and now it drags out a miserable existence,” Communist Party leader Petro Symonenko said last year. The nation’s leaders “signed a memorandum with the International Monetary Fund to meet the requirements of the oligarchs, but on the other hand — to timely pay the interest on the IMF loans and to raise the prices for gas and electricity,” Symonenko said.
The Orange Revolution – initiated by NED, IRI, Soros and the CIA – installed a rogue’s gallery of self-seeking sociopaths who further bankrupted a country already seriously debilitated by corruption.
For the IMF and the financial elite, Ukraine is nothing less than a tantalizing bounty. “Its fertile black soil generated more than one-fourth of Soviet agricultural output, and its farms provided substantial quantities of meat, milk, grain, and vegetables to other republics,” notes ABO, a website covering energy resources. “Likewise, its diversified heavy industry supplied the unique equipment (for example, large diameter pipes) and raw materials to industrial and mining sites (vertical drilling apparatus) in other regions of the former USSR.”
After breaking away from the Soviet Union and declaring independence, it was thought the country would “liberalize” its industry and resources, in other words open them up for privatization by transnational corporations and international banks, but this did not happen quickly enough for the financiers and the corporatists.



“The drop in steel prices and Ukraine’s exposure to the global financial crisis due to aggressive foreign borrowing lowered growth in 2008 and the economy contracted more than 15 percent in 2009, among the worst economic performances in the world,” ABO explains. “In August 2010, Ukraine, under the Yanukovych Administration, reached a new agreement with the IMF for a $15.1 billion Stand-By Agreement. Economic growth resumed in 2010 and 2011, buoyed by exports. After initial disbursements, the IMF program stalled in early 2011 due to the Ukrainian Government’s lack of progress in implementing key gas sector reforms, namely gas tariff increases. Economic growth slowed in the second half of 2012 with Ukraine finishing the year in technical recession following two consecutive quarters of negative growth.”
Now that Yanukovych is out of the picture, the banker minion Yats is lording over the Parliament, and thuggish fascists control the streets and guard against a counter revolution that my threaten Wall Street’s coup, the coast is clear for the IMF to pick up where it left off. Ukraine, now one of the poorest countries in Europe thanks to a kleptocracy supported by Washington and Wall Street, is wide open for further looting.



SEE ALSO:

- US spent $5 billion to destabilize Ukraine

- Ukrainian capital Kiev burning to the ground

Source: http://www.infowars.com/central-bank...er-of-ukraine/


http://www.hangthebankers.com/centra...er-of-ukraine/

US ‘Ukraine-gate’ Threatens to Blow Up Into Major Conflagration

Daniel McAdams

US Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and US Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt were caught in a phone conversation leaked yesterday actively plotting over which of the Ukrainian opposition figures should take which position in a post-coup Ukraine government. In the call, they were furious that the EU was not as quick to move from words to action as the US, and decided to bring in the UN to “glue” the “deal” together instead.
This is a major international scandal, and the implications of this clear evidence of direct US involvement in civil unrest in Ukraine are much more serious than most in the US and EU realize. As is to be expected, however, the US mainstream press is focused not on this evidence of extreme US recklessness and deception, but rather on whether the Russians leaked the call or not. They are ignoring the real core of the scandal to focus on salacious aspects, real or imagined.
Caught red-handed actively planning and manipulating internal politics and acting as if Ukrainian opposition politicians were literally US agents to be ordered into this position or that in a new government, the US State Department behaved as a child with his hand discovered in the cookie jar.
Witness the truly breathtaking performance by US State Department Spokesperson Jan Psaki today at a daily press briefing (and kudos to some of the journalists there who seem to be tuned in to the seriousness of this affair):

Q. Does not the fact that U.S. diplomats purportedly are discussing who should and should not be in the Ukrainian government hint at some possibility of U.S. interference here?
MS. PSAKI: Absolutely not… It’s up to the people of Ukraine, including officials from both sides, to determine the path forward. But it shouldn’t be a surprise that there are discussions about events on the ground.
Q. This is more than discussions, though. This was two top U.S. officials that are on the ground discussing a plan that they have to broker a future government and bringing officials from the U.N. to kind of seal the deal. This is more than the U.S. trying to make suggestions. This is the U.S. midwifing the process.
PSAKI: Well, Elise, you’re talking about a private diplomatic conversation…. Of course these things are being discussed. It doesn’t change the fact that it’s up to the people on the ground. It is up to the people of Ukraine to determine what the path forward it.
…
Q: But I’m sorry, if you’re saying privately behind the scenes that you’re cooking up a deal, and then you’re saying publicly that this is up for Ukrainians to decide, those are two totally different things. I understand that diplomatic discussions are sensitive and you don’t want everything to come out, but those are two totally different — totally different positions.

The entire exchange must be watched to be believed. Even then the brazenness of the lies is unbelievable.
The US government has repeatedly denied and even ridiculed Russian suggestions that the US is playing an active role in the unrest in Ukraine. The tape erases any excuse they might have been able to field.
Here is where things get serious. Sergei Glazyev, advisor to Russian president Putin claimed today that the US was spending $20 million per week on the Ukrainian opposition, including supplying opposition with training and weapons. It is clear from recent photographs that street gangs are more organized and better equipped each day.
As Glazyev pointed out, this direct US involvement would be in violation of theMemorandum on Security Assurances, signed by both Russia and the United States in 1994. In the document, both sides agreed “to respect the Independence and Sovereignty and the existing borders of Ukraine.”
Glazyev suggested that this evidence of US violation of the Memorandum may induce Russia to also intervene in the situation.
If it was in fact Russia that acquired this recording and decided to leak it, this is likely the most direct public warning to the United States government that it is treading on a serious red line, risking a conflict of perhaps unimaginable seriousness over what is on the surface a relatively minor trade agreement between Kiev and Brussels.
The US government is far too used to giving the orders and demanding they be heeded to listen to this carefully timed, carefully crafted warning. This is not another example of Putin offering a face-saving solution to the near-disaster of a US attack on Syria this past summer.
We do not make predictions here, but let us not rule out the possibility of some very quick and significant happenings on Ukraine. February 6, 2014 may be a date for the history books.

I am on RPI, Facebook, and Twitter.

10:48 pm on February 6, 2014 Email Daniel McAdams


http://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/...conflagration/

Russians strike Ukraine army post in Crimea. Kiev fears Ukraine army putsch. US warships on standby

DEBKAfile Special Report March 1, 2014, 1:49 PM (IST)
Tags: Ukraine, Crimea, Russian military, Kiev government, Barack Obama, US warships,

Russian armored forces build up for Ukraine

As Moscow’s master plan for Ukraine continued to unfold, Russian forces Saturday, March 1, staged their first attack on a Ukraine military installation in Crimea, while completing their takeover of the region and its severance from Ukraine. Interfax reported from a Ukrainian source that 20 soldiers had entered an anti-aircraft missile command post in western Crimea and that negotiations rather than a clash were under way.
Earlier Saturday, Crimea's new pro-Moscow prime minister Serhiy Aksyonov asked President Vladimir Putin for help in “maintaining peace in the region,” saying he was in control of the region’s interior ministry, armed forces, fleet and border guards.
The invitation set the scene for Russian military intervention in Crimea at the request of its government. Moscow said the appeal would not go “unnoticed," while the Russian foreign ministry declared itself “extremely concerned” by developments in Crimea – cynically echoing US President Barack Obama’s expression Friday of “deep concern” about Russian military movements inside Ukraine and his warning of “costs.”
The Crimean premier, appointed Thursday by parliament in Simferopol, later announced that a referendum would be held on March 30 to determine the peninsula’s status. Meanwhile, he said, Russian Black Sea fleet servicemen were guarding important buildings.
In Kiev, interim defense minister Igor Tenyukh, addressing the first new cabinet’s first meeting, accused Russia of an armed invasion of Ukraine and pouring an additional 6,000 troops into the peninsula. Western correspondents reported that Crimea is now cut off from the rest of Ukraine after “unidentified troops” in combat fatigues, armed with automatic rifles, machine guns or RPGs, seized control of Crimea’s sea and air ports and its main road network in the last 24 hours.
Interim Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk told the Kiev cabinet that Ukraine forces were on alert, but he would not be ”drawn into a military conflict by Russian provocations in the Crimea region.”
DEBKAfile’s military sources report that this announcement was hollow.
The 160,000-strong Ukrainian army is no match for the Russian army’s operational capabilities and fire power, although it too is equipped with Russian weapons and trained in Russian military tactics.
But above all, it is far from certain that the new authorities in Kiev control the Ukraine army. No one knows where the loyalties of its officers lie, whether with the new pro-European regime or the absconding pro-Russian president, Viktor Yanukovych.
This confronts the troubled country with a fresh peril, a possible army putsch to oust the interim regime set up by the Ukraine opposition in Kiev, and its replacement with a military government for containing continuing Russian expansion beyond the borders of Crimea. The former Independence Square protesters would have no answer to this.
Moscow, while insisting that its military actions were not an invasion but a legal bid to protect its interests, has also moved to offset any financial assistance the West may offer Kiev. Russia's energy giant Gazprom bluntly warned Kiev that it had accumulated a "huge" debt of $1.5 billion for natural gas that needed to be urgently paid if the supply is to continue.
This is the exact amount of the loan guarantees the US and EU propose to offer the stony-broke Kiev authorities.
Along with US warnings to Moscow, a high alert was secretly declared Saturday by the US Mediterranean Sixth Fleet. Two US warships which had been deployed in the Black Sea to back up Russian security for the Olympic Winter Games in Sochi - the USS Taylor Frigate and the USS Mount Whitney Blue Ridge-class command ship - have moved over to the western side of the Black Sea opposite Crimea and facing the Russian navy base of Sevastopol.
The Mount Whitney is outfitted with sophisticated intelligence-gathering systems. Its current location means that ongoing Russian military movements across central, southern and western Russia, around its borders with Ukraine and inside the Crimean peninsula, are being monitored and beamed to the White House and the Pentagon. Obama’s response is anyone’s guess. So far, the only hints thrown out are that Western leaders are planning a boycott of the G8 summit Putin plans to host in Sochi this summer, in protest against Russia’s takeover of Crimea.


http://www.debka.com/article/23720/R...ips-on-standby

Video: Russian attack helicopters entering Ukraine

Jesus Diaz



This is pretty damn scary but, according to local media, this video allegedly shows about ten Russian attack Mi- 24 Hind helicopters entering Ukrainian air space through Crimea, the autonomous Ukrainian republic where 58.5-percent of the population are ethnic Russians.



Ukraine's government says that 2,000 Russian soldiers have already invaded their territory as the tension keeps increasing.

Update: The Daily Beast claims that the 2,000 Russian soldiers are part of a Russian "private military force," not actual soldiers from the Russian Army. Other people are saying that these are disguised Russian special forces.


http://sploid.gizmodo.com/russian-at...ium=socialflow

Russian troops take over Ukraine's Crimea region

By TIM SULLIVAN and VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV
March 1, 2014 7:38 PM

Russia executes de facto takeover of Ukraine's Crimea region

SIMFEROPOL, Ukraine (AP) — Russian troops took over the strategic Crimean peninsula Saturday without firing a shot. The newly installed government in Kiev was powerless to react, and despite calls by U.S. President Barack Obama for Russia to pull back its forces, Western governments had few options to counter Russia's military moves.
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• Russian troop convoy on road to Crimea's capital Associated Press
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• Ukraine leader urges Putin to pull back military Associated Press
• Ukraine asks UN council: Stop Russian 'aggression' Associated Press
• US calls on Russia to withdraw forces from Ukraine Associated Press

Russian President Vladimir Putin sought and quickly got his parliament's approval to use its military to protect Russia's interests across Ukraine. But while sometimes-violent pro-Russian protests broke out Saturday in a number of Russian-speaking regions of eastern Ukraine, Moscow's immediate focus appeared to be Crimea.
Tensions increased when Ukraine's acting president, Oleksandr Turchynov, made a late night announcement that he had ordered the country's armed forces to be at full readiness because of the threat of "potential aggression."
Speaking live on Ukrainian TV, Turchynov said he had also ordered stepped up security at nuclear power plants, airports and other strategic infrastructure.
Ignoring President Barack Obama's warning Friday that "there will be costs" if Russia intervenes militarily, Putin sharply raised the stakes in the conflict over Ukraine's future evoking memories of Cold War brinkmanship.
After Russia's parliament approved Putin's motion, U.S. officials held a high-level meeting at the White House to review Russia's military moves in Ukraine. The White House said Obama spoke with Putin by telephone for 90 minutes and expressed his "deep concern" about "Russia's clear violation of Ukrainian sovereignty and territorial integrity."

Crisis Deepens in Ukraine Play video

The White House said Obama told Putin that the United States is calling on Russia "to de-escalate tensions by withdrawing its forces back to bases in Crimea and to refrain from any interference elsewhere in Ukraine."
A statement from the Kremlin said Putin emphasized to Obama the existence of "real threats" to the life and health of Russian citizens and compatriots who are in Ukrainian territory. The statement indicated that Russia might send its troops not only to the Crimea but also to predominantly ethnic Russian regions of eastern Ukraine.
"Vladimir Putin emphasized that, in the case of a further spread in violence in eastern regions (of Ukraine) and Crimea, Russia maintains the right to protect its interests and the Russian-speaking population that lives there," the Kremlin statement said.
Obama told Putin that he would support sending international monitors to Ukraine to help protect ethnic Russians. He said the U.S. will suspend its participation in preparatory meetings for June's G-8 summit in Sochi, Russia, the site of the recently concluded Winter Olympics, warning that Russia's "continued violation of international law will lead to greater political and economic isolation."
NATO announced a meeting for Sunday of the North Atlantic Council, the alliance's political decision-making body, as well as a meeting of the NATO-Ukraine Commission. NATO secretary general Anders Fogh Rasmussen said the allies will "coordinate closely" on the situation in Ukraine, which he termed "grave."

Raw: Pro-Russia Protest in Ukraine Turns Bloody Play video

The U.N. Security Council met in an open, televised session for about a half hour on Saturday afternoon after closed-door consultations, despite initial objections from Russia to an open session. The council heard speeches from a U.N. deputy secretary-general and several ambassadors, but did not take any action.
Ukraine's Ambassador to the U.N. Yuriy Sergeyev asked the Security Council "to do everything possible now" to stop what he called Russian "aggression." Russia's U.N. ambassador, Vitaly Churkin, said the government in Kiev needs to get away from "radicals" and warned, "such actions they're taking could lead to very difficult developments, which the Russian Federation is trying to avoid." He said Russia was intervening at the request of pro-Russian authorities in the autonomous Crimea region that is part of Ukraine.
Calling the situation in Ukraine "as dangerous as it is destabilizing," U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Samantha Power said, "It is time for the Russian military intervention in Ukraine to end." She warned that "Russia's provocative actions could easily push the situation beyond the breaking point." She asked that Russia directly engage the Ukraine government and called for international monitors to be sent to Ukraine to observe the situation.
"Russia and the West find themselves on the brink of a confrontation far worse than in 2008 over Georgia," Dmitri Trenin, the director of Carnegie Moscow Center, said in a commentary posted on its website. In Georgia, Russian troops quickly routed the Georgian military after they tried to regain control over the separatist province of South Ossetia that has close ties with Moscow.
The latest moves followed days of scripted, bloodless turmoil on the peninsula, the scene of centuries of wars and seen by Moscow as a crown jewel of the Russian and Soviet empires. What began Thursday with the early-morning takeover of the regional parliament building by mysterious troops continued Saturday afternoon as dozens of those soldiers — almost certainly Russian — moved into the streets around the parliamentary complex and seized control of regional airports, amid street protests by pro-Russian Crimeans calling for Moscow's protection from the new government in Kiev.

View gallery

Troops in unmarked uniforms stand guard in Balaklava on the outskirts of Sevastopol, Ukraine, Saturd …

That government came to power last week in the wake of months of pro-democracy protests against the now-fugitive president, Viktor Yanukovych, and his decision to turn Ukraine toward Russia, its longtime patron, instead of the European Union. Despite the calls for Moscow's help, there has been no sign of ethnic Russians facing attacks in Crimea or elsewhere in Ukraine.
Obama on Friday called on Russia to respect the independence and territory of Ukraine and not try to take advantage of its neighbor's political upheaval.
He said such action by Russia would represent a "profound interference" in matters he said should be decided by the Ukrainian people. He has not said, however, how the U.S. could pressure Moscow to step back from its intervention.
The Russian parliament urged that Moscow recall its ambassador in Washington in response to Obama's speech.
On Friday, Ukraine accused Russia of a "military invasion and occupation" in the Crimea, where Russia's Black Sea fleet is based. Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseny Yatsenyuk called on Moscow "to recall their forces, and to return them to their stations," according to the Interfax news agency. "Russian partners, stop provoking civil and military resistance in Ukraine."

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Local residents carry Russian flags and shout slogans rallying through the streets of Crimean capita …

Ukraine's population of 46 million is divided in loyalties between Russia and Europe, with much of western Ukraine advocating closer ties with the European Union while eastern and southern regions look to Russia for support. Crimea, a semi-autonomous region that Russia gave to Ukraine in the 1950s, is mainly Russian-speaking.
In his address to parliament, Putin said the "extraordinary situation in Ukraine" was putting at risk the lives of Russian citizens and military personnel stationed at the Crimean naval base that Moscow has maintained since the Soviet collapse.
Despite Putin's sharp move, there were possible signs Saturday that the Russian leader could soften his approach. Former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, who was freed a week ago after more than 2 ½ years in prison, was reported to be heading to Moscow for a meeting with Putin on Monday, though her spokeswoman denied that. Putin has had good ties with Tymoshenko in the past, and he may look to her for a possible compromise.
In a statement posted on her party's web site, Tymoshenko urged the U.N. Security Council to meet in Kiev and asked the EU leaders to convene a meeting in Crimea. She urged the West to help protect Ukraine's territorial integrity, asked Ukrainians to remain calm and voiced hope that diplomacy will succeed.
Putin's parliamentary motion loosely refers to the "territory of Ukraine" rather than specifically to Crimea, raising the possibility that Moscow could use military force in other Russian-speaking areas in eastern and southern Ukraine, where many detest the new authorities in Kiev.

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A gunman in unmarked uniform stands guard as troops take control the the Coast Guard offices in Bala …

But in a note of restraint, Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin said the motion doesn't mean the president would immediately send additional troops to Ukraine. "There is no talk about it yet," he said.
Pro-Russian protests were reported Saturday in the eastern cities of Kharkiv, Donetsk and Luhansk and the southern port of Odessa. In Kharkiv, 97 people were injured in clashes between pro-Russia demonstrators who flushed supporters of the new Ukrainian government out of the regional government building and hoisted the Russian flag on top of it, according to the Interfax news agency.
Trenin, of Moscow's Carnegie office, said that Putin could be seeking to "include Crimea within the Russian Federation and eastern and southern regions of Ukraine forming a separate entity integrated with Russia economically and aligned with it politically."
"It is not clear at this point whether Kiev will be left to build a rump Ukraine with the western regions or whether it will be swayed to join the eastern regions," he wrote.
In Crimea, the new pro-Russian prime minister — who came to power after the gunmen swept into parliament on Thursday — claimed control of the military and police and asked Putin for help in keeping peace. There was no visible presence of Ukrainian troops Saturday.

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An unidentified man guards the entrance to a local government building in Simferopol, Ukraine, on Sa …

The deputy premier in the Crimean government told Russian news agency RIA Novsti that Ukrainian troops were disarmed and others joined the Crimean people to help patrol the territory. The report couldn't immediately be confirmed.
Crimean Tatars, the historic hosts of the land who make up 12 percent of the island's population and stand strongly for Crimea remaining part of Ukraine, didn't put up any visible resistance Saturday.
"The last two or three days have turned around the life of all the people in Crimea," said Refat Chubarov, a Crimean Tatar leader. "They've taken over military bases and civil institutions. That's why Crimean society is filled with fear. People are afraid of everyone and everything."
Crimea only became part of Ukraine in 1954 when Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev transferred jurisdiction from Russia, a move that was a mere formality when both Ukraine and Russia were part of the Soviet Union. The Soviet breakup in 1991 meant Crimea landed in an independent Ukraine.
Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt summed the situation up simply: "What's happening in Crimea is a Russian takeover. There is no doubt about that," he told Swedish Radio. "Russian military forces are involved and there has been a local takeover of power."

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A man is stretchered out of a military transport aircraft carrying wounded Ukrainian protesters at t …

Russia put pressure on Ukraine from another direction when a spokesman for state gas company Gazprom said that Ukraine owed $1.59 billion in overdue bills for imported gas. Sergei Kuprianov said in a statement carried by Russian news wires that the gas arrears would endanger a recent discount granted by Russia.
The Russian payment demand and loss of the discount would accelerate Ukraine's financial crisis. The country is almost broke and seeking emergency credit from the International Monetary Fund.
The tensions barely touched everyday life in Simferopol, the regional capital of Crimea, or anywhere on the peninsula. Children played on swings a few blocks from the parliament building, and most of the city's stores were open. Couples walked hand-in-hand through parks. Crimea's airports — civilian and military — were closed to air traffic, but trains and cars were moving to and from the Ukrainian mainland. The civilian airport in Simferopol was reopened late Saturday night.
"Things are normal," said Olga Saldovskaia, who was walking through town with her son and grandson. While she doesn't like having gunmen in the streets, like many people in this overwhelmingly ethnic Russian city, she also found their presence reassuring.
"If anyone tries to hurt the people here, they will protect us," said Saldovskaia. She said she sympathized with the pro-democracy protesters in Kiev, but also worries that turmoil in the capital could lead to violence against ethnic Russians. She added, though, that she definitely doesn't want Crimea to become part of Russia.

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Troops in unmarked uniforms stand guard as they take control the Coast Guard offices in Balaklava on …

"Russia is not just all flowers and candy," she said.
Moscow has remained silent on claims that Russian troops are already in control of much of the peninsula, saying any troop movements are within agreed-upon rules governing the semi-autonomous Ukrainian region.
Meanwhile, flights remained halted at Simferopol's airport. Dozens of armed men in military uniforms without markings patrolled the area. They didn't stop or search people leaving or entering the airport, and refused to talk to journalists.
AP journalists crossing into Crimea from mainland Ukraine were briefly stopped at a checkpoint manned by troops in unmarked camouflage uniforms as well as officers in uniforms of the Berkut, the feared riot police that cracked down on anti-Yanukovych protesters before he fled the capital a week ago.
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Vladimir Isachenkov reported from Moscow. AP reporters Karl Ritter and David McHugh in Kiev, Julia Subbotovska in Simferopol, and Cara Anna at the United Nations contributed to this report.

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