It is clear to me the Putin had a plan when he encouraged and supported the unrest in the Crimea and in eastern Ukraine. His main objective was to reach out and grab the Crimea and enfold it in the Russian Federation. The Crimea provides Russia with a good warm weather port and it sets on top of a giant oil reserve.
He clearly succeeded.
He judged the western reaction accurately and reasoned that the US and the NATO countries were just a shadow of what they were prior to the Obama administration. Putin would never have tried to pull this type of territory grab under Kennedy, Truman or Reagan, in fact with any leader prior to Obama. But,he sees Obama as a naive leader who thinks that everything can be settled without the threat of force.
Putin took over the Crimea and continued to foment trouble in the eastern Ukraine. Recently he has pulled a lot of troops back from the Ukrainian border and Obama breaths a sigh of relief, conceding the Crimea to Russia. He's playing the west like a fine violin. By keeping the attention on the trouble in eastern Ukraine he diverts attention away from the Crimea takeover.
Of course, now that he has let the cat out of the bag in the Ukraine, he may have trouble controlling it. But, given that he is supplying the arms and even manpower to fight this uprising, he generally has control. We'll see.
If this doesn't remind you of the early days of WWII when Hitler moved in and took over the Rhineland, Austria and the Sudetenland before he just took over Czechoslovakia, I would be surprised. Obama's actions hark back to Neville Chamberland of Great Briton and the actions of appeasement that lead straight into WWII .
