The Crimean Nexus

Book excerpt: How the West sleepwalked into another Cold War A native of Yalta, Constantine Pleshakov is intimately familiar with Crimea s ethnic tensions and complex political history. Now, he offers a much-needed look at one of the most urgent flash points in current international relations: the first occupation and annexation of one European nation s territory by another since World War II. Pleshakov illustrates how the proxy war unfolding in Ukraine is a clash of incompatible world views. To the U.S. and Europe, Ukraine is a country struggling for self-determination in the face of Russia s imperial nostalgia. To Russia, Ukraine is a sister nation, where NATO expansionism threatens its own borders. In Crimea itself, the native Tatars are Muslims who are vehemently opposed to Russian rule. Engagingly written and bracingly nonpartisan, Pleshakov s book explains the missteps made on all sides to provide a clear, even-handed account of a major international crisis.