Russian-Ukrainian Conflict News

[Grey Havoc]

Let's try this again.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26645477

11:51: Meanwhile, the Ukrainian defence minister was due to fly to Crimea to "resolve the situation", but Crimea's pro-Russian Prime Minister Sergei Aksyonov said: "They will not be allowed to enter in Crimea. They will be sent back."

11:47: Men - presumed to be Ukrainian naval officers and sailors - were seen leaving the Sevastopol base with uniforms and belongings, passing pro-Russian forces at the gate.

11:38: The takeover appears to have been carried out without bloodshed. Oleksander Balanyuk, a captain in the Ukrainian navy, told Reuters: "This morning they stormed the compound. They cut the gates open, but I heard no shooting."

11:27: Earlier pro-Russian forces stormed the base, replacing the Ukrainian flag with a Russian one. A number of Ukrainian servicemen were seen leaving the base, unarmed and in civilian clothing.

11:27: Various sources say the commander of the Ukrainian navy, Admiral Serhiy Haiduk, has been forced to leave the Ukrainian naval headquarters in Crimea, in Sevastopol, and has been taken away, apparently by Russian intelligence officers.

12:00: Sevastopol-based website Sevastopol.su has published photographs apparently showing Russian Black Sea Fleet commander Aleksandr Vitko inside the Ukrainian navy base in Sevastopol. See the photos here.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26643141


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ukraine/10706927/Crimea-crisis-shifts-to-military-stage-after-soldier-killed.html

 

[Grey Havoc]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ukraine/10707473/Ukraine-crisis-live.html

11.59 There are reports that Russian forces have also taken over the Ukrainian military base in Perevalnoye, near the Crimean capital of Simferopol, encountering no resistence. Though the details of the situation have yet to be confirmed, images from the scene indicate it has indeed been seized.


11.51 The Telegraph's Roland Oliphant is outside the Sevastopol headquarters of the Ukrainian navy, which has been seized by Russian and pro-Russian forces. He reports:


Early this morning, so-called civilian "self defence" men - pro-Russian militia - entered the base unarmed but backed by fully armed Russian regulars. They told the Ukrainians to quit the base. The Ukrainian naval commander, Sergei Haiduk, was apparently detained, put in a car and driven away by these pro-Russian forces. There is no word on where he is. The Ukrainian defence ministry claims he was led away in handcuffs.

The admiral in command of the Russian Black Sea Fleet is apparently inside the base negotiating the surrender of the final hardcore of Ukrainian troops who are refusing to leave. But many Ukrainian servicemen and women are already packing their bags, dressing in civiliian clothes and leaving through the back gates, which is guarded by Russian troops and already has the Russian flag flying over it.

One Ukrainian servicewoman, who declined to give her name, was standing outside with a bag containing her uniform and personal effects, waiting for her officer husband, who was still in the base, to join her. She said although she was born in Russia and was a native Russian speaker she would rather move to mainland Ukraine than live in what is now the Russian Federation. The weekend's referendum, she told The Telegraph, had been a farce.

11.08 The world's attention is centred on Crimea but elsewhere in Ukraine, other Russian-leaning regions threaten to head down a similar path. In the eastern city of Donesk, the Ukraine parachute battalion is engaged in a cat and mouse game with its own population as it deploys to the Russian border. Damien McElroy, the Telegraph's correspondent in Donetsk, reports:

Since running into a roadblock by a pro-Russian group on Sunday night at a remote railway crossing, they have been cutting across country to move forward. Three battalions got through but the one I spoke to got stuck and has made camp.

 

[Grey Havoc]

A bit of background and analysis: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26644082

 

[Grey Havoc]

BBC again:

12:36: Oleg Boldyrev BBC Russian says: At Novoozernaya naval base in Yevpatoria, Crimea, a worker welds the gates back on, after they were crushed by people who took over the base this morning. Russian flags are at the gate. Ukrainian soldiers are mixing with Russians and locals. Ukrainian commanders are now discussing options with the Russian ones. A Ukrainian soldier at the gate said no-one was hurt, and commanders are "looking at options to save face". He says the same is happening at many bases around Crimea.

12:35: Ukraine's First Deputy Prime Minister, Vitaly Yarema, and Defence Minister Ihor Tenyukh have been prevented from entering Crimea, Interfax-Ukraine news agency quotes Social Policy Minister Lyudmyla Denysova as saying. Via BBC Monitoring

Roland Oliphant tweets: Seems clear it'll be over soon. Ukrainian forces packing up their personal effects going home. Reports Perevalnoye is surrendering too.

 

[Grey Havoc]

Daily Telegraph stream:

12.55 Prime Minister David Cameron has warned that Russia could be expelled from the G8 over its actions in Ukraine. He told Parliament that G7 nations meeting next week should discuss "whether or not to expel Russia permanently from the G8 if further steps are taken" by Moscow to destabilise Ukraine.


12.50 Moscow has by no means been cowed by Washington's military warnings, with the Russian foreign ministry delivering some tough words of its own. Katerina Kravtsova in Moscow reports:


Russia's foreign ministry has issued a statement accusing Western countries of indulging a coup d'etat in Ukraine last month and violating their promise to respect Ukraine's sovereignty under a security assurance agreement.


The agreement was signed by Britain, the US and Russia in 1994 after Ukraine's commitment to give up its nuclear arsenal. Western countries said recently that Russia had violated the pact by threatening to send troops to Crimea.

“In the context of the situation in Ukraine, some of our partners reminded Russia about its commitments under the 1994 agreement,” the foreign ministry's statement said.

It went on: “How should we react to the almost constant patrol of the Maidan by Western envoys ... and the EU and US statement that they do not recognise the legitimately elected president as their partner?”

Many Western politicians, including Baroness Ashton, the EU foreign policy chief and John Kerry, the US secretary of state, visited the Maidan from last November, when the protests started, to February, when President Viktor Yanukovich was ousted.

Meanwhile, Russia's representative to Nato, Alexander Grushko, said Russian soldiers did not participate in Tuesday's storming of a Ukrainian military base in Ukraine. “Investigation of the incident is underway, those guilty will be punished,” he said, according to the Russian news agency Interfax.

BBC:

12:53: Troops who say they are from Russia's Main Intelligence Directorate are blocking the Ukrainian naval missile division in Sevastopol, BBC Monitoring says Interfax-Ukraine news agency is reporting.

12:52: Ukraine is to boycott fencing tournaments in Russia to protest against the death of a Ukrainian serviceman in Crimea on Tuesday, Reuters says, quoting an official statement from the Ukraine fencing federation.

 

[Grey Havoc]

BBC News:

13:09: Russia may restrict foreign companies' involvement in oil and gas exploration off the coast of Crimea, Russian Deputy Minister for Natural Resources and Environment, Denis Khramov, has told Russian state news agency RIA Novosti. Under Russian law, only majority state-owned companies can be involved in exploring reserves classed as being of "federal importance", the agency says. (BBC Monitoring)

13:08: Ukraine is resigning the rotating chairmanship of the Commonwealth of Independent States, a Moscow-led regional alliance which comprises most of the former Soviet republics, and is considering leaving it altogether, says Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman Yevhen Perebyynis. (Interfax-Ukraine via BBC Monitoring)

13:22: Russia's Defence Ministry says a planned inspection of Russian military facilities by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) in the coming days will be its last in Russia this year, the privately-owned Russian military news agency Interfax-AVN has reported. Defence Ministry official Sergei Ryzhkov is quoted as saying that the quota for inspections by the OSCE under a 2011 agreement had been "exhausted".

Roland Oliphant, Telegraph tweets: Ukrainian navy officers and ratings leave fleet HQ, evicted by Russians. "We fulfilled our duty to the end"

 

[Grey Havoc]

Mark Urban diplomatic and defence editor, Newsnight tweets: Thanks to those who helped establish that 90 on plates of RU trucks at Ukraine navy HQ = belong to Black Sea Fleet

Daily Telegraph:

13.36 Russian state news agency Ria Novosti is carrying the ominous report that Crimean Tatars - who make up 15 per cent of the region's population and are heavily pro-Kiev - are to be forced off their lands under plans by the Crimean authorities. Crimean Deputy Prime Minister Rustam Temirgaliyev reportedly said in an interview with the agency that the Tatars have been told to leave some of their lands and move to allocated plots, raising fears of ethnic cleansing among the minority group.


The Tatars were deported to Central Asia by Stalin 70 years ago and on their return to their historic homeland in the 1990s were unable to reclaim their properties. As a result, many have settled on unclaimed lands, resulting in long-simmering land disputes which now threaten to turn increasingly ugly under the new status quo.


Mr Termirgaliyev was quoted as saying that Tatars could receive senior positions in the new government, in an apparent attempt to soothe ethnic tensions in the region. But on the ground, most Tatars are fearful of what the future holds for them in a Russian Crimea.

An alternate take on this development: http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?236054-2nd-attempt-at-the-Ukraine-discussion-thread&p=7095464&viewfull=1#post7095464

 

[Grey Havoc]

BBC News:

13:40: The BBC's Mark Lowen says around 100 Ukrainian servicemen are still barricaded inside the naval base in Sevastopol.

 

[SOC]

Yesterday or the day before there were reports of pro-Russia demonstrations in Lithuania. At this point the only way I see the Crimea issue getting any worse is if 1) Russia decides it needs the eastern Ukraine, too, or 2) they do start throwing around the Tartars. But Lithuania? That would take things to a whole different level, being a NATO member and all.

 

[Grey Havoc]

Which then raises the question; Is NATO even a paper tiger now days?

EDIT: BBC News:

14:05: Bulgaria's president, Rosen Plevneliev, tells the BBC he shares the concerns of his eastern European colleagues that Russia might be tempted to annex parts of other countries.
"What about Lithuania? What about Estonia? We do have Russian communities and minorities there. Is it possible in [the] 21st Century that they can call Moscow and Moscow will send troops and occupy and annex some part of their territory. Is that possible?"

 

[Grey Havoc]

BBC News:

14:08: BBC Monitoring reports: The government of Ukraine has approved an action plan to evacuate Ukrainian citizens from Crimea and resettle them in other parts of the country, senior minister Ostap Semerak is quoted as saying by Interfax-Ukraine.

14:10: Meanwhile Russia has heavily criticised the UK government's decision to partially suspend military cooperation with Moscow.
"The unilateral curtailment of military cooperation nullifies everything positive that had been achieve with such difficulty in recent years," deputy defence minister Anatoly Antonov said.

The BBC's Simon Marr tweets this picture of what he says are Russian troops offloading bedding and food at Sevastopol naval headquarters.

 

[sferrin]

Yesterday or the day before there were reports of pro-Russia demonstrations in Lithuania. At this point the only way I see the Crimea issue getting any worse is if 1) Russia decides it needs the eastern Ukraine, too, or 2) they do start throwing around the Tartars. But Lithuania? That would take things to a whole different level, being a NATO member and all.

If I were Putin I would grab everything I could get my filthy mits on before 2016.

 

[Grey Havoc]

Yesterday or the day before there were reports of pro-Russia demonstrations in Lithuania. At this point the only way I see the Crimea issue getting any worse is if 1) Russia decides it needs the eastern Ukraine, too, or 2) they do start throwing around the Tartars. But Lithuania? That would take things to a whole different level, being a NATO member and all.

If I were Putin I would grab everything I could get my filthy mits on before 2016.

That is quite likely part of the plan.

EDIT: This just in -

Olexiy Solohubenko, BBC Ukraine analyst tweets: Putin orders transport ministry to build a rail and car bridge from Kerch to #Crimea. A tunnel is also considered.

EDIT2:

14:17: Earlier this month, Russia's Black Sea Fleet reportedly scuttled several of its ships at the entrance to the bay to block the seven Ukrainian vessels based there from leaving.

14:16: Ukrainian navy men on board ships blocked inside Donuzlav Bay, western Crimea, are on full alert and ready to defend themselves against possible attacks by Russian troops, Interfax-Ukraine news agency reports. "We're throwing grenades from time to time so that they can't approach us. We have also put up armed guards," said one of the navy commanders.

 

[Grey Havoc]

BBC News:

A Russian soldier patrols on a chimney with Russian flags at Sevastopol navy HQ.

14:20: "Certain efforts" are under way to repair the shelters, Mr Khoma has said, adding that nuclear shelters are being checked, too, and the regional public emergency alert system will be tested later today.

14:20: BBC Monitoring reports: The authorities in Ukraine have carried out an inspection of air raid shelters in the Kharkiv region, which borders Russia, and deemed almost half of them unusable, official Vasyl Khoma told Interfax-Ukraine.

 

[Grey Havoc]

Daily Telegraph:

14.19 Katerina Kravtsova in Moscow has some added detail on the Crimean Tatars and the situation they now find themselves in:


Many Crimean Tatars have apparently boycotted the Sunday referendum on independence, after the former head of the group's unofficial parliament, Mustafa Dzhemilev, said holding the vote would be illegitimate.


In an interview with Reuters, Mr Dzhemilev said that since the Crimean Tatars were vocal supporters of Ukraine's integrity, he feared there would be attacks on them when Crimea joined Russia.


Last Sunday, police found body of Reshat Ametov, a Crimean Tatar, who is believed to be tortured and killed. His relatives said Mr Ametov disappeared after he took part in a rally in Simferopol, which demanded to stop Russia's invasion in Ukraine.


Human Rights Watch called on the Crimean authorities to investigate the case.

At the same time, President Vladimir Putin promised Tuesday to observe the rights of Tatar population in Crimea and make Tatar an official language of the peninsula along with Russian and Ukrainian.

 

[Grey Havoc]

BBC News:

More people, believed to be Ukrainian servicemen, leave Sevastopol navy base. So far there have been no reports of bloodshed during the takeover by pro-Russian troops on Wednesday.

Orion's feline spies are everywhere!

Roland Oliphant Moscow correspondent, Daily Telegraph tweets: Many are local recruits, wondering where to go, what to do. None I spoke to wanted to join the Russian army.

 

[sferrin]

Much like the honey badger, kitty cat don't give a ----.

 

[Grey Havoc]

;D

14:31: BBC Monitoring reports: Prosecutors in Sevastopol deny detaining Ukrainian navy chief Serhiy Hayduk "in connection with any criminal cases," in a statement quoted by Ukrayinska Pravda website. This contradicts an earlier report by local news agency Krym Inform, which said prosecutors had arrested Mr Hayduk after Russian troops stormed the navy HQ in Sevastopol. The Ukrainian Defence Ministry said his whereabouts were unknown.

Probably the GRU have him.

 

[Grey Havoc]

BBC News:

14:37: The AFP reporters say they saw some 50 Ukrainian servicemen filing out of the compound as Russian soldiers stood by, while pro-Moscow forces raised the Russian flag over the base.

14:37: Russian forces have seized a second Ukrainian navy base - this time in western Crimea's Novoozerne naval base - AFP reporters on the ground say.

14:36: The BBC's diplomatic correspondent Jonathan Marcus says Russia's annexation of Crimea is just a taste of things to come, in his analysis of the broader geopolitical implications of the Ukrainian crisis.

 

[Grey Havoc]

Daily Telegraph:

14.40 As European heads of state prepare for the EU summit tomorrow and Friday, where they will discuss the Ukraine crisis, President Putin is attempting to fracture EU unity on the issue by raising an inconvenient historical truth, our Brussels correspondent Bruno Waterfield reports:


There are growing fears that over the coming days and weeks Russia will play a divide and rule game to split Europe and the European Union.


Senior European diplomats here in Brussels fear that Vladimir Putin will respond to Western sanctions by taking retaliatory measures that will focus on the different national and economic interests at play in the EU.


The Russian president’s main tactic will be to try and split Germany from the EU pack by threatening to damage its economy, dependent on imports of Russia’s gas, and by reminding Germans of recent history.


Diplomats point to his annexation of Crimea speech to both houses of the Russian parliament yesterday as evidence with its unsubtle reminder that Britain and France, but not the United States or Russia, opposed German reunification as the Iron Curtain fell in 1989.

“I believe that the Europeans, first and foremost, the Germans, will also understand me. Let me remind you that in the course of political consultations on the unification of East and West Germany, [...] some nations that were then and are now Germany’s allies did not support the idea of unification, the Russian president said.

“Our nation, however, unequivocally supported the sincere, unstoppable desire of the Germans for national unity. I am confident that you have not forgotten this, and I expect that the citizens of Germany will also support the aspiration of the Russians, of historical Russia, to restore unity.”

His comments alarm European diplomats because they rub the EU’s nose in an uncomfortable, inconvenient historical truth: Margaret Thatcher and Francois Mitterrand opposed German reunification, Mikhail Gorbachev and George HW Bush supported it. Angela Merkel, who grew up in East Germany, is well aware of this.

Read more here

 

[Grey Havoc]

Daily Telegraph:

16.29 Our correspondent Damien McElroy in Donetsk has spoken to the city's Kiev-appointed governor, Sergei Taruta, who has called for a national forum to thrash out a new constitution that would decentralise power to the region.

McElroy explains: This is his way of saying parliament in Kiev is not up to the task of addressing the crisis. Diplomats however warn that such a forum could be highjacked by Russia and open the way for the division of the country.


16.20 UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon is to visit Moscow tomorrow and Kiev on Friday to discuss how to peacefully resolve the crisis, the UN press office announced. The UN General Assembly is also to discuss the issue in New York tomorrow.


16.06 NATO's chief is calling Russia's advances in Ukraine the greatest threat to European security and stability since the end of the Cold War.

In a speech set for later today, NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen is expected to say that Moscow's annexation of Ukraine's strategic Crimea Peninsula is a wake-up call for international partners committed to a free and peaceful Europe.

An advance copy of Mr Rasmussen's planned speech at the Brookings Institution think-tank was obtained by The Associated Press.

Rasmussen was to say that NATO must focus on the long-term impact of Russia's aggression on its own security.

BBC News:

16:54: BBC Monitoring reports: Russia has started issuing passports in Crimea, the head of Russia's federal migration service tells Ria Novosti news agency.
Konstantin Romodanovskiy said that "all the residents of Crimea" who request passports will be issued with them "because as of yesterday they are citizens of the Russian Federation".


16:35: "The government will take adequate steps unless all provocations against Ukrainian servicemen end, and Admiral Hayduk and other hostages - both military and civilian - are freed by 21:00 (19:00 GMT)," the Ukrainian president has warned.

16:33: BBC Monitoring reports: Ukraine's Interim President, Olexander Turchynov, has given the authorities in Crimea three hours to release "all hostages", including Ukrainian navy chief Serhiy Hayduk, Unian news agency reports.

 

[Grey Havoc]

BBC News:

16:58: Chris Morris, Europe correspondent The Russification of the Crimean peninsula is accelerating, and there is little that the Ukrainian government can do about it. There is no sign that either western condemnation or western sanctions are having any deterrent effect.

 

[Grey Havoc]

Some general background: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26270866

 

[Grey Havoc]

Daily Telegraph:

16.51 Here's more detail from our correspondent Damien McElroy in Donetsk on his meeting with the city's governor Sergei Taruta:


Sergei Taruta, the Kiev-appointed governor of Donetsk, has called for a EU-backed initiative to establish a "national negotiation forum" to thrash out a new constitution that shift power from Kiev to the regions.


The Russian-speaking city in eastern Ukraine has seek violent protests calling for a Crimea-style referendum in the wake of the revolution that put pro-Western politicans in power in Kiev.


Mr Taruta rejects a referendum but the future of the country could not be decided by the country's parliament. Instead the EU should help organise of conference of politicans, businessmen and other groups.


"We want decentralisation of power and this region should have more rights. We don't need federalisation but we need to show that we govern ourselves," he said. "I think this could be achieved by a forum to discuss the national integrity.

"All those with a stake in the future of the country should be in there. Parliament is not the right place to do this at the moment."

BBC News:

17:19: Russia's Foreign Ministry, in a statement on its website, said that Ukraine was "openly distorting and arbitrarily interpreting the norms of international law".

17:21: BBC Monitoring reports: There are some 3,000 members in the newly-established Ukrainian National Guard in Crimea, says Interior Minister Arsen Avakov. These units, subordinated to the Interior Ministry, "are loyal to their oath of allegiance to Ukraine and are fully functioning," he tells a news conference.

17:23: Speaking about whether the police in Crimea remained loyal to Kiev, Mr Avakov said the situation was "more complicated" and that "the map is patchy, everyone is behaving in their own way," Interfax-Ukraine reports.

 

[Grey Havoc]

BBC News:

17:31: In his statement, Mr Parubiy also accused Russia of trying to provoke a military conflict with Ukraine and disrupt the upcoming presidential elections. Earlier, Russia announced that it had started to issue passports for people in Crimea.

17:30: Ukraine will introduce visa requirements for Russian nationals, Ukraine's security chief Andriy Parubiy says in a televised statement on Ukrainian TV. Russian nationals have not had to obtain visas to visit Ukraine since the Soviet Union broke up, BBC Monitoring reports.

 

[Grey Havoc]

BBC News:

17:40: Ukraine's security chief Andriy Parubiy said the government would appeal to the UN to recognise Crimea as a demilitarised zone and take measures for Russian forces to withdraw from the peninsula.

17:38:

Mounted Cossacks patrol near the Ukrainian-Russian border near Rostov-on-Don, southern Russia.

 

[Grey Havoc]

17:43: Here's shocking footage of far-right Ukrainian MPs who filmed themselves beating the chief of the state broadcaster until he signed a resignation letter.

Think MilitaryPhotos had this last night.

 

[Grey Havoc]

Daily Telegraph:

17.48 Seeking to tighten some screws of its own, Ukraine has introduced a visa requirement for Russians travelling to the country - "a massive restriction of ties with its neighbour and former Soviet sister state", our correspondent Damien McElroy notes.


Ukraine is also to withdraw from the Russian-led CIS union, the country's national security adviser has said on live television.


A Ukrainian foreign ministry spokesman had earlier said Kiev "reserves the right to review" its membership in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) alliance that replaced the Soviet Union and now groups 11 states.


17.37 Ukraine's president has set a three-hour deadline for the release of troops held in Crimea following today's takeover of Ukrainian military bases, warning of "adequate" consequences if Crimean authorities do not comply. Exactly what those consequences might be are not clear, but one source raised the possibility of restrictions on gas or water supplies from the mainland, our correspondent Damien McElroy reports.

 

[Grey Havoc]

BBC News:

17:53: "We are developing a plan that would enable us not only to withdraw servicemen, but also members of their families in Crimea, so that they could be quickly and efficiently moved to mainland Ukraine," Mr Parubiy told a televised press conference.

 

[Grey Havoc]

18:12: Germany has put on hold a deal to deliver a field-exercise simulator to the Russian military. The government said the export was "not justifiable in the current situation", referring to Russia's annexation of Crimea.

17:56: Washington has urged Russia to talk to Ukraine over the military base standoff in Crimea, says White House spokesman Jay Carney. "The continuing efforts by Russian forces to seize Ukrainian military installations are creating a dangerous situation," he adds.

17:55: The emotional - and at times even threatening - tone of President Putin's speech on Tuesday appeared to indicate a new chapter in Russia's relationship with the West. Our diplomatic correspondent Bridget Kendall has read between the lines of the historic address and provided this sharp analysis.

 

[Grey Havoc]

18:30: There are reports of a stand-off at an anti-missile base near the Crimean city of Yevpatoria. The compound is apparently surrounded by Russian forces, including snipers, demanding the surrender of Ukrainian soldiers who have so far refused to give themselves up.

18:30: Ukraine is preparing a military exercise with the US and Great Britain, Ukrainian security chief Andriy Parubiy has said.

Max Seddon Foreign affairs reporter, Buzzfeed tweets: Don't see the logic of Ukraine bringing in a visa regime with Russia, which will disproportionately hurt ordinary Ukrainians in the East

 

[Grey Havoc]

Hopefully the Russian 'de-escalatory' concept won't be coming into play.

Overview of Russian strategic modernization plans by our man LO:


http://www.aviationweek.com/Article.aspx?id=/article-xml/AW_11_11_2013_p48-632594.xml

If the picture surrounding strategic weapons is confusing, Russian tactical systems are a morass of Soviet-style ambiguity. Much discussion revolves around a single system: the 9K720 Iskander missile produced by the KBM company.

The Iskander is a tactical ballistic missile in a class that is extinct in the U.S. and Europe, being more than twice the size of the U.S. MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile System. It is one of very few all-new nonstrategic weapons to have entered service in Russia in large numbers since the early 1990s, becoming fully operational in 2010. The Russian army plans to acquire a total of 120 Iskander systems, each with two missiles, by 2018.

On a basic level, the Iskander is an INF-compliant replacement for KBM's 9K714 Oka (SS-23 Spider), which was scrapped under that treaty. It is a single-stage missile with a 480-kg (1,060-lb.) warhead and a nominal range of 400 km. An Iskander-E export version has been offered, with range reduced to 280 km to comply with Missile Technology Control Regime limits. The initial version has inertial guidance, but in 2011 an Iskander was tested with a digital scene-matching guidance system.

Most observers agree that the Iskander is physically capable of exceeding INF range limits. A detailed report from Finland's National Defense University estimates that the weapon's range is likely to be 700 km or more, with the standard warhead, based on contemporary solid-propulsion performance standards. Only in a low-trajectory, high-drag profile would the weapon's range be inside INF limits. However, the Iskander remains INF-compliant unless it is test-fired beyond the 500-km limit. A more direct violation would be the full-range testing of the Iskander-K, using the same launch vehicle and control system but armed with a turbojet-powered cruise missile.

The Iskander is not officially described as nuclear-capable, but it is designed to be fitted with a variety of different warhead types. Notes Podvig: “I don't think Iskander is actually a nuclear system, but it appears to be nuclear-capable, and Russia would like to keep ambiguity about that.” Schneider notes that although Iskander is a single-stage weapon, it is shipped and stored in two components.

This meshes with the long-standing belief of some U.S. intelligence officials that in the 1990s and early 2000s, Russia engaged in technically illegal “hydronuclear” tests in which the metallic cores of nuclear weapons are compressed explosively but only to a point where small nuclear effects are released. These tests, those officials have argued, could allow Russia to develop new low-yield warheads suited to the relatively accurate Iskander vehicle. This would result in a system that could be suited to the Russian concept of a “de-escalatory” nuclear strike in a conventional campaign, if a high-value target could be found.

The “de-escalatory” doctrine emerged after the 1999 Kosovo war as an equalizer in the case of threatened conventional defeat. “It's a concept that appears to be quite popular in Russia these days, “Podvig says. “Apparently, the thinking is that if Russia uses nuclear weapons in a conflict, everybody would just stop to avoid further escalation.”

The doctrine attracted more attention in September 2009, when the joint Russian-Belarus Zapad exercise included a simulated nuclear attack on Warsaw, Poland. The concern is that the combination of low-yield weapons and “de-escalatory” strikes could lower nuclear thresholds to a dangerous level.

 

[Grey Havoc]

BBC News:

18:56: Moscow's next step? Russia signals concern at Estonia's treatment of its large ethnic Russian minority, Robert Evans writes in this Reuters piece.

 

[Grey Havoc]

19:13: The UK and Germany both agree that the EU should impose further consequences on Russia, a spokeswoman for British Prime Minister David Cameron, says.
She said Mr Cameron had called his German counterpart, Angela Merkel, to discuss EU's response ahead of a meeting of the European Council on Thursday.

 

[Grey Havoc]

19:24: The deadline given by Ukraine's interim President Olexander Turchynov for the release of the detained navy chief, Serhiy Hayduk, has now passed.


19:23:

Armed Crimean self-defence forces stand outside a Ukrainian naval training centre they took control of in Sevastopol.

19:27: Ukraine's acting Foreign Minister Andriy Deshchytsia tells the BBC his government is very concerned about the lives of Ukrainian troops and citizens in Crimea.

 

[Grey Havoc]

Daily Telegraph:

19.33 JUST BREAKING Ukraine is planning to pull its military from Crimea


As many as 25,000 soldiers will be moved to Ukraine in retreat following Russia's announcement that it was annexing the peninsula and an incident yesterday when a Ukrainian soldier was killed by the Russian army.


Thousands of Ukrainian soldiers and sailors have been trapped on military bases and other installations for more than two weeks.

 

[Grey Havoc]

BBC News:

19:34: Mark Urban diplomatic and defence editor, Newsnight tweets: Ukraine govt talks of 'evacuation plan' for Crimea - it fits with rapid Russian mopping up of garrisons here - but it could still go wrong

19:32: Local people gather, with Russian flags, outside the naval training centre in Sevastopol, which has reportedly been taken over by armed Crimea self-defence forces.

 

[SOC]

Are they pulling out the people, or taking the equipment? Do Ukrainians treat military bases as federal property? If so it'd stand to reason that the military stuff is still Ukrainian property. Of course, that'd also mean that Russia taking a military base over is an overt act of war...

 

[Grey Havoc]

From the sounds of things, it's a general retreat. I doubt they'll be able to get out any heavy equipment, much less anything in the way of supplies. They'd be lucky to get themselves and their families clear. And, arguably, a de facto state of hostilities already exists between Russia and the Ukraine...

 

[Grey Havoc]

Daily Telegraph:

19.42 Fantastic pictures and article by Vice News on the formation of a Ukrainian volunteer force dubbed the National Guard.


With the Russian threat looming, take a look inside Ukraine's volunteer National Guard https://t.co/bFmUjVScc4
pic.twitter.com/EDEveLvBuX

— VICE News (@vicenews) March 19, 2014


The government hopes to draft around 60,000 volunteers into the National Guard to help protect Ukraine’s borders, which are looking pretty vulnerable in the face of Russia's hulking army.

Two days later, the mobilization of the National Guard began. I went along to the rallying point outside Ukrainian House, just off the Maidan. A former museum and exhibition space, it is now one of the main bases for Self Defense — one of the militia groups spawned from the EuroMaidan movement. Roughly 500 Self Defense members had turned up from around six different sotnias (the Ukrainian word for a "hundred", into which protesters had organized themselves) and were waiting to board the buses to a police special forces training base just outside the city.

The Self Defense groups are a motley collection of men, plus a few women, who defended the barricades of the Maidan from the police. Many of their members made up the "heavenly hundred" who died during the bloodiest days of the revolution. They’re of varying ages and backgrounds, and hail from all over the country, from both the largely Ukrainian-speaking west and the Russian-speaking east. These people can't match the Russian soldiers for expertise — previously, they were cooks and jewelers, students, and club promoters — but without them, Yanukovych may have never been exiled from Kiev.