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I don't even know where to begin with this ...

The referendum — whoever called it — was illegal on its premise: only the entire country can decide on territorial changes. It was called by a tiny sliver of the "democratically elected" legislature — without there being a quorum. Mere two weeks were given for campaigning — and the invaders promptly stopped rebroadcasts of Ukraine's TV over Crimea, talk about propaganda.

How on earth do you envision a minority population of a country which constitutes a large majority in one area of the country ever being able to detach from it for any reason what so ever (be it feeling threatened, not wanting to go the same way the rest of the country is going, being oppressed or persecuted or just plain wanting a country of their own) if the entirety of the country has to say yes? Seriously ? Are you that deluded in thinking that say tomorrow the basque or the catalan asked for a referendum on detaching the parts of spain in which they have a majority anyone would let them even ask the entire country let alone that the rest of the country would vote to let them go ? ... Where is the democracy in the majority always having the power to keep the minority where they want them ? ... It's like claiming the US had no rights to declare independence from the British empire unless all of the empire was asked to vote on it ... Don't just quote the media ... think about the copy before you paste it ...

Why do you put the democratically elected in quotes? The entire assembly of crimea was democratically elected in 2010 in elections verified and sanctioned by the Vrhonva Rada which is the Ukranian Assembly in Kiev. No irregularities were reported and everyone who was in that assembly was there for 4 years before this crisis blew ... so why the quotes ? Is it maybe because you are buying into the whole "there was no quorum" bull which came from, surprise surprise Leonid Pilunsky a high ranking member of the Qurultay-Rukh which happens to be representing the one faction in crimea that has historical reasons not to join russia since they were deported under Soviet rule to Siberia in the 50's. The crimean Tatars. What would be funny if it weren't so ironic is that a huge majority of the Tatars actually turned up to vote on the referendum ... and not only them ... the ethnic makeup of crimea is 58.32% Russian, 24.32% Ukrainian and 12.10% Crimean Tatars ... the turnout for the vote was way above 80% (verified by OSCE mission representatives from several countries including some from Spain and other EU countries) ... which means that ALL the russians voted ... and nearly ALL the ukrainians voted ... and at least some Tatars voted ... and out of all who voted 97% chose to join Russia. You can pretend it didn't happen and you can dream up nonsense like this:

but the fact remains that Russia has a sizable nuclear maritime arsenal and significant strategic hardware and interests (oil pipelines and the only non-oceanic military port for it's fleet) in Crimea and if that part of the Ukraine is preparing to secede from it don't you think there was a high probability that the government in Kiev would have intervened if the Russians hadn't beaten them to the punch ? If you think otherwise you are seriously lacking knowledge in the ways things have been done in the past and are still being done in that part of the world.

Kosovo-shomosovo. Milosevic — a client of Russia, BTW — actually was engaging in ethnic cleansings and outright genocide in Kosovo and Bosnia. That is what justified the European intervention first, and then, only after the "Gayropeans" demonstrated their impotence [wikipedia.org] did the US intervene to stop the humanitarian catastrophe.

Love it how you dismiss the event that gave precedent to the crisis in the Ukraine as a joke. If this part was any longer I'd probably have puked a bit. Your knowledge of the Balkan conflict apparently amounts to news headlines heard in passing. Milosevic (as power hungry and dictatorial as he was) was not a client of russia ... if he were they wouldn't have let NATO bomb the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (the then name for Serbia and Montenegro up until 2003) without so much as a peep ... but they did their very best to look the other way and punch the gas on an armored convoy from their contingent based in Bosnia to reach the Pristina airport before the US did to dismantle all the equipment they've been selling the former Yugoslavia and then take a hike back to Russia as soon as they got all their gear out nearly starting a shooting war with NATO in the process (well actually it was general Wesley Clarke on the NATO side who ordered that the Russians be 'overpowered' but then again it can't possibly have been him ... it must be propaganda from the Kremlin right?) . Also if you still believe everything the media told you about Kosovo you probably still think Bin Laden hid in Afghanistan and not Pakistan, that Sadam had weapons of mass destruction (which vanished with a poof as soon as the oil was secured) ... that the Libyan government was overthrown from the inside and not because it wouldn't sign the oil deals that were coming up for renewal and that the interim government that was set up for a period of a few weeks in which the only piece of work it did was to renew the oil treaties with US, UK and French companies and was then left to fend with a civil war. When was the first time you ever heard about the strife in Kosovo ? ... The strife that lasted since the early 70's (if you don't count the constant back and forth of landgrabbing between Serbia and Albania during the world wars) ... or was it when CNN and the likes started telling you about that humanitarian crisis without caring to mention what came before it ... perhaps you should read up on the nearly half a century of strife and conflict which ended in NATO building it's second largest european base in Kosovo (after trying to force it self onto Serbian territory through the Rambouillet 'accord' appendix B ).

Ok, you seriously need to read up on this stuff before you write things like this ... you are justifying the NATO bombings (which included a quite hefty amount of European military hardware, pilots and resources) of a sovereign nation (including civilian targets) in 1999 that sidestepped and broke just about every international organization and law, by the incompetence of the "Gayropeans" (awesome term there mate ... real classy) in the UNPROFOR (UNITED NATIONS Protection Force) to prevent a genocide in another country 4 years prior? Really ? Bosnia is a completely different subject matter relating to a completely different war between completely different people and I really don't have any desire to go into without writing half a novel worth of history even before getting to the start of the war.

Where do I start with this ... so ... the Euromaidan 'opposition' backed by the US and the EU and almost every major news network in the western world (and before you even think they might be independent have a look at who owns them and just how big their stake in the industry and economics of said countries is) takes to the streets for 'peaceful' protests and 2 months later there are nearly 100 dead, 600 wounded, 130 of those are police officers ... On the other hand there's Putin ... I love it how it seems that one man runs all of russia but the US is only run by Obama if he's doing something wrong ... otherwise it's the us government not him alone) ... so 'Putin' annexes an entire peninsula, confiscates half the Ukranian navy, both their major army bases in the crimea and with his '30000 invaders, a relentless propaganda campaign using his one Russia Today network and 'Spetznas units actively inciting violence' he INVADES crimea and the results is: 2 deaths (and another one unconfirmed), and half a dozen injured in scuffles. Yeah ... he's such a monster ... now have a looong hard look at the wars waged in the past 3 decades and see how many of those involved Putin and the russian military .... two ... Abkhazia / Georgia conflict ... and Chechnya ... now take a look at the rest of the dozen or so conflicts and see who the major contributor of military force there is ... Putin doesn't seem that evil now does he? And believe me when I say he really is a nasty power-player with a very ruthless fist and a knack for oppression but the crowd he's playing against leaves so much for him to be desired in terms of body-count, unlawful imprisonment, rendition, covert surveillance and intrusion, illegal aerial strikes as well as violation of sovereignty, international law and the UN charter ...

legally speaking the International Court in the Hague is the highest instance on the planet and the only one authorized to rule in disputes between sovereign nations ... your Blah Blah comment goest to show just how serious you take international law ... as for Kosovo ... there is legal and then there is justified ... they are neither mutually exclusive nor do they always mean the same ... The court specifically ruled without citing reason or situation because for reason to change the meaning of the word of the law would be to invite the need for a higher arbitrary who decides what is the right reason to secede and what is the wrong reason ... and since that falls under a completely different topic the ruling still remains the same ... if Kosovo was a legal referendum then by any possible definitions of the law so is the one in Crimea ... the fact is just that this one is inconvenient for the US and EU ... Kosovo wasn't ...

... as soon as you start making sense in terms of what is actually happening in the Ukraine and not repeat everything you get fed by mainstream media at prime time I will stop pointing out all the obvious flaws and hypocrisies on the other side of the argument.

Wow! great job of sidelining a mountain of explanation by proclaiming it to be propaganda ... well done! Fox News would be proud of you ... however I thought that since everyone is up in arms about the so called "invasion" of Crimea by the Russians, a word which I recall being used as an excuse quite extensively in the Balkans during the 90's (even tho it was a breakup of a federation thru forced secession from a country so diverse in population it could only end in civil war but was constantly called an "attack" or "invasion" by the mainstream media) I'd add a view on it from another side (and no, I'm neither Russian nor do I think they weren't involved in the powerplay in the Ukraine ... only an idiot with that much at stake wouldn't be ... but I do think their side had quite a lot of merit on the issue considering the way a absolutely legally and democratically elected government was forced out through violence and subversion and replaced by an openly anti-russian puppet 'government') ... So to answer your original question, NO I don't think they (the Americans) would like it, just like a lot of them don't like a lot of things some US states vote on in referendums, but if they are truly democratic then they would respect the decision of 95.8 precent of the people who took the time to vote. The sheer number of "yes, we're outta here votes" so obviously speaks of just how much the Crimean people really wanted to stay in the Ukraine and just how awesome they feel about the 'new government' in Kiev ... but your bias is obvious even in the terminology you use ... 'staged' by the 'invaders' ... NO ... the referendum was called by the democratically elected government of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea ... that's a body of state recognized by the official Ukraine since far before Yanukovic and this crisis ... even the new government in Kiev recognizes them as legit ... they just don't like the fact that they wouldn't go along with their power-grab and direction towards the EU and NATO ... yes, according to the constitution of the Ukraine it is an illegal referendum because the constitution specifies that all of Ukraine has to be in favor ... that's like asking the entire UK to let Scotland become independent from it this fall and not just the Scots ... that would really be a fair referendum right? ... The heart of the matter is the US made a precedent when they let Kosovo declare independence and even went so far as to point at the ruling of the international court in the Hague and saying 'see it's all legit' ... that is exactly what the Russians are saying now ... 'see it's all legit, the international court said it and you backed it' ... and the crazy twist is that the ruling is situation unspecific ... it says a majority people can decide to unilaterally declare independence and it is not against international law ... no mention of circumstances or special cases or sui generis as the US likes to call the Kosovo debacle.

I forgot to mention that in the scenario you proposed California used to be part of Mexico a bit over 60 years ago and the then ruler of a supernation Mexico and the US both belonged to decided it would be a cool idea to give California away to the US for the express purpose of cutting down on bureaucracy and to have a reason to relocate the unruly asian minorities that were creating unrest (equivalent of the Tatars in the Ukraine) ... the only reason Russia agreed to the Crimea remain as part of the Ukraine when the Soviet Union broke up was to make the Ukraine relinquish the 1900 nuclear weapons they held at the time http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N... ... the guarantees that in exchange Ukraine territorial integrity would be respected, were Russia on one side and 2 major NATO countries on the other side ... Now once the Ukraine drove off the legally elected (only 2 years ago mind you) pro-russian president, made a new government (on a friggin town square ... NOT in an election) from all kinds of people and then as a first act of government (having failed to agree on removing a ban on nazi hate speech) banned the use of russian as a official language (which is natively spoken by approximately 10 million inhabitants or 1/5 of the population) and decided to 'move away from russia and join the EU and NATO' that guarantee from Budapest became null and void ... you can't expect someone to guarantee they will respect your borders while at the same time doing your best to join the opposite side of that agreement ... Imagine this hypothetical scenario ... the Germans run their country economically into the ground and everyone blames Angela Merkel for being a decadent dictator (and she might well be but having been RE elected by a vast majority just two years prior to the events after the opposition leader failed to impress anyone in his stint at power it's a bit dubious at best) ... the Russians start supporting the dissidents with money and political influence and they organize very violent riots in the streets while the russian global media machine keeps referring to them as peaceful protestors and any response by the German police as repression ... now the dissidents come out on top as winners and make a completely anti-us government filled with US haters of the taliban caliber and vow to take Germany back towards the good ol days of the East German republic where they had close ties with Russia and are also considering joining the Russian Military Federation and bringing in their military to Germany ... what do you think the US response would be? ... do you think they would pull back all of their troops into Rammstein, recall their armed forces and sit back and see what happens? Would they make sure Rammstein is safe and secure by say asking the people who live there wether they really want to go join russia and deploying troops just to be certain nothing goes wrong ... or being the US would they just say the new guys have ties to terrorists and most 'certainly' possess weapons of mass destruction and then bomb the crap out of them?

If the Mexican Army already had (by agreement with the US like the Russian Federation had with the Ukraine) nearly 20000 troops in the area already (legally mind you) and one of their largest maritime bases (hosting several nuclear powered and armed vessels) was located in the south of the US (INSIDE the US) and the government in Washington had just been removed from office by a crowd sponsored by a foreign nuclear power that time and again demonstrated the will and intent to bring it's own forces and armaments as close to the mexican border as possible (like NATO is doing by expanding into almost every country bordering with the Russian Federation ... To illustrate http://pp.vk.me/c618625/v61862... ) then YES ... I can quite see the Mexican government doing something like that ... especially after that other force closing in on it's borders had already done the same thing in another country only a few years prior and even had the international court in the Hague call it completely legitimate (Kosovo's declaration of independence which followed a 78 day long bombing campaign and a de facto occupation of a sovereign nation WITHOUT prior approval by the UN, and the forceful violation of a UN member state's territorial integrity which resulted in a quasi country that even today (15 years after the bombing and 6 years after the declaration of independence) has not been recognized by half the world and even some of the countries involved in the bombing) ... this is all without even going into the whole business about gas and oil pipelines that a forceful regime change in the Ukraine threatens (and thus Russian strategic interests) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F... ... the red lines crossing the Ukraine should make why all this is happening quite obvious ...