The Unraveling of Ukraine

Yes, it's happening. Is there anything Obama can do about it?
By EUGENE RUMER and ANDREW S. WEISS
May 14, 2014 |
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/05/the-unraveling-of-ukraine-106685.html#ixzz31oWJVc15
Ukraine is unraveling before our eyes. The crisis increasingly resembles a low-grade civil war. Senseless violence, often captured on amateur video, is becoming a regular occurrence. A Swiss-led mediation effort launched last week was a hopeful sign, but both Washington and Kyiv have shown only muted enthusiasm. Instead, all parties to the conflict have dug in even deeper. The latest and most worrisome sign was last weekend’s separatist referendum in Donetsk and Luhansk, two cities in southeastern Ukraine, in which thousands of people waited for hours to cast their ballots to split off from the country and to join Russia—anything but to remain under Kyiv’s rule. No doubt illegitimate, the referendum was a clear sign that separatism had put down roots in the region and that any effort to put Ukraine back together is going to be a monumental task for many years to come.