Stephen Franklin White asserts in his recent letter (“War could have been avoided,” Our Readers’ Views, March 27) that “the leadership in Ukraine could have prevented the war through reasonable negotiation.” Presumably, because according to Mr. White, “Crimea was part of Russia before Ukraine became independent,” all Ukraine needed to do was surrender Crimea (and, he implies, Donetsk and Luhansk) to Russia, and its problems would have been over. This is completely incorrect.
While Crimea was home to a very large number of ethnic Russians, it was not “Russian”; it had formally been part of Ukraine for generations. When the USSR fell apart in 1991, a vote was held in Ukraine to determine whether it should remain part of the USSR. Over 90 percent of the votes were to leave the USSR and become an independent nation. Each and every one of the 27 geographical constituencies — including Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk — voted to leave. Even in Crimea, a 54 percent majority voted to leave the USSR, so in addition to ethic Ukrainians, large numbers of ethnic Russians supported independence.
Finally, it should be obvious that Vladimir Putin’s appetite was for far more than just Crimea, and that only the ferocious resistance of the Ukrainian people is forcing him to temper his territorial ambitions.
