Will Trump push for recognition of the Russian annexation of Crimea?

[America Needs R'hllor]

Crimea was land that was legitimately Russian up until it was split away and haphazardly assigned to Ukraine.

How exactly was the decision to move Crimea from Russia to Ukraine in the 1950s not legitimate? If your argument is that any decision done by the Soviet Union was illegitimate, then I guess Russia should resign its permanent membership in the UN security council too, since that membership was given to the Soviet Union.

Oh yes, and Königsberg (Kaliningrad now) was legitimately German prior to the Soviets annexing it; when is Putin going to return it?

The history of Russia is a history of continuous imperialist conquest. If we were to go by the principle "to which people does this territory originally belong", Russia would lose much of its territory (including all of Siberia and the Far East where the Russians certainly are not indigenous).

This. I have Russian relatives, and their only argument for Crimea being Russian is "but muh Soviet gift and muh vote!" The smarter ones among them, like my father, oppose the homophobic, racist, authoritative dictatorship of Vladimir Putin.
And please. If your argument is that it was transferred from Russia to Ukraine during the Soviet era, kindly return Alaska to the Russians. I'm sure you will like that a lot.

[mencken]

Crimea was land that was legitimately Russian up until it was split away and haphazardly assigned to Ukraine.

How exactly was the decision to move Crimea from Russia to Ukraine in the 1950s not legitimate? If your argument is that any decision done by the Soviet Union was illegitimate, then I guess Russia should resign its permanent membership in the UN security council too, since that membership was given to the Soviet Union.

Oh yes, and Königsberg (Kaliningrad now) was legitimately German prior to the Soviets annexing it; when is Putin going to return it?

The history of Russia is a history of continuous imperialist conquest. If we were to go by the principle "to which people does this territory originally belong", Russia would lose much of its territory (including all of Siberia and the Far East where the Russians certainly are not indigenous).

This. I have Russian relatives, and their only argument for Crimea being Russian is "but muh Soviet gift and muh vote!" The smarter ones among them, like my father, oppose the homophobic, racist, authoritative dictatorship of Vladimir Putin.
And please. If your argument is that it was transferred from Russia to Ukraine during the Soviet era, kindly return Alaska to the Russians. I'm sure you will like that a lot.

When Alaska votes for a Russophilic candidate in landslide proportions, I will get back to you on that.

Oh shi...

[Frozen Sky Ever Why]

Crimea was land that was legitimately Russian up until it was split away and haphazardly assigned to Ukraine.

How exactly was the decision to move Crimea from Russia to Ukraine in the 1950s not legitimate? If your argument is that any decision done by the Soviet Union was illegitimate, then I guess Russia should resign its permanent membership in the UN security council too, since that membership was given to the Soviet Union.

Oh yes, and Königsberg (Kaliningrad now) was legitimately German prior to the Soviets annexing it; when is Putin going to return it?

The history of Russia is a history of continuous imperialist conquest. If we were to go by the principle "to which people does this territory originally belong", Russia would lose much of its territory (including all of Siberia and the Far East where the Russians certainly are not indigenous).

This. I have Russian relatives, and their only argument for Crimea being Russian is "but muh Soviet gift and muh vote!" The smarter ones among them, like my father, oppose the homophobic, racist, authoritative dictatorship of Vladimir Putin.
And please. If your argument is that it was transferred from Russia to Ukraine during the Soviet era, kindly return Alaska to the Russians. I'm sure you will like that a lot.

So, the people of Crimea should have no say over where they want to be? If you consider the referendum illegitimate, fine, but are you saying that no referendum should have happened?

[America Needs R'hllor]

Crimea was land that was legitimately Russian up until it was split away and haphazardly assigned to Ukraine.

How exactly was the decision to move Crimea from Russia to Ukraine in the 1950s not legitimate? If your argument is that any decision done by the Soviet Union was illegitimate, then I guess Russia should resign its permanent membership in the UN security council too, since that membership was given to the Soviet Union.

Oh yes, and Königsberg (Kaliningrad now) was legitimately German prior to the Soviets annexing it; when is Putin going to return it?

The history of Russia is a history of continuous imperialist conquest. If we were to go by the principle "to which people does this territory originally belong", Russia would lose much of its territory (including all of Siberia and the Far East where the Russians certainly are not indigenous).

This. I have Russian relatives, and their only argument for Crimea being Russian is "but muh Soviet gift and muh vote!" The smarter ones among them, like my father, oppose the homophobic, racist, authoritative dictatorship of Vladimir Putin.
And please. If your argument is that it was transferred from Russia to Ukraine during the Soviet era, kindly return Alaska to the Russians. I'm sure you will like that a lot.

So, the people of Crimea should have no say over where they want to be? If you consider the referendum illegitimate, fine, but are you saying that no referendum should have happened?

A referendum would be ok if it was peacefully determined, without Russian military pressure.

[Person Man]

Crimea was land that was legitimately Russian up until it was split away and haphazardly assigned to Ukraine.

How exactly was the decision to move Crimea from Russia to Ukraine in the 1950s not legitimate? If your argument is that any decision done by the Soviet Union was illegitimate, then I guess Russia should resign its permanent membership in the UN security council too, since that membership was given to the Soviet Union.

Oh yes, and Königsberg (Kaliningrad now) was legitimately German prior to the Soviets annexing it; when is Putin going to return it?

The history of Russia is a history of continuous imperialist conquest. If we were to go by the principle "to which people does this territory originally belong", Russia would lose much of its territory (including all of Siberia and the Far East where the Russians certainly are not indigenous).

This. I have Russian relatives, and their only argument for Crimea being Russian is "but muh Soviet gift and muh vote!" The smarter ones among them, like my father, oppose the homophobic, racist, authoritative dictatorship of Vladimir Putin.
And please. If your argument is that it was transferred from Russia to Ukraine during the Soviet era, kindly return Alaska to the Russians. I'm sure you will like that a lot.

So, the people of Crimea should have no say over where they want to be? If you consider the referendum illegitimate, fine, but are you saying that no referendum should have happened?

A referendum would be ok if it was peacefully determined, without Russian military pressure.

Do we want to go down this slope? In theory, it is a great idea but we won't like the results. This is up there with Hamas being allowed to rule Gaza indepedently.

[Helsinkian]

So, the people of Crimea should have no say over where they want to be? If you consider the referendum illegitimate, fine, but are you saying that no referendum should have happened?

In 1861 the states of Texas, Virginia and Tennessee each held a referendum in which their citizens voted in favour of secession from the US. Needless to say, the US federal government did not accept it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ordinance_of_Secession

Russia, by the way, does not tolerate any sort of separatism in its own territories; merely suggesting a referendum in a Russian territory on the question of secession is punishable by imprisonment.

[Frozen Sky Ever Why]

So, the people of Crimea should have no say over where they want to be? If you consider the referendum illegitimate, fine, but are you saying that no referendum should have happened?

In 1861 the states of Texas, Virginia and Tennessee each held a referendum in which their citizens voted in favour of secession from the US. Needless to say, the US federal government did not accept it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ordinance_of_Secession

Russia, by the way, does not tolerate any sort of separatism in its own territories; simply demaning a referendum in a Russian territory on the question of secession is punishable by imprisonment.

It's different because Crimea was with Russia for hundreds of years.

[America Needs R'hllor]

Crimea was land that was legitimately Russian up until it was split away and haphazardly assigned to Ukraine.

How exactly was the decision to move Crimea from Russia to Ukraine in the 1950s not legitimate? If your argument is that any decision done by the Soviet Union was illegitimate, then I guess Russia should resign its permanent membership in the UN security council too, since that membership was given to the Soviet Union.

Oh yes, and Königsberg (Kaliningrad now) was legitimately German prior to the Soviets annexing it; when is Putin going to return it?

The history of Russia is a history of continuous imperialist conquest. If we were to go by the principle "to which people does this territory originally belong", Russia would lose much of its territory (including all of Siberia and the Far East where the Russians certainly are not indigenous).

This. I have Russian relatives, and their only argument for Crimea being Russian is "but muh Soviet gift and muh vote!" The smarter ones among them, like my father, oppose the homophobic, racist, authoritative dictatorship of Vladimir Putin.
And please. If your argument is that it was transferred from Russia to Ukraine during the Soviet era, kindly return Alaska to the Russians. I'm sure you will like that a lot.

So, the people of Crimea should have no say over where they want to be? If you consider the referendum illegitimate, fine, but are you saying that no referendum should have happened?

A referendum would be ok if it was peacefully determined, without Russian military pressure.

Do we want to go down this slope? In theory, it is a great idea but we won't like the results. This is up there with Hamas being allowed to rule Gaza indepedently.

I agree. The borders of countries can't really be the choice of a single area of people. I think that the question would be, what does Crimea resemble more- Scotland or Bavaria? I think it's the latter, but even if it's the former and the Crimeans really do not fit in Ukraine, that should not be determined under a Russian threat,

[Helsinkian]

It's different because Crimea was with Russia for hundreds of years.

171 years, actually: annexed to Russia in 1783, transferred to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic in 1954.

And ethnic Russians only became the majority population (over 50 percent) in Crimea as a result of the Stalinist policy of ethnically cleansing the area of the native Crimean Tatars during World War II.

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

It's different because Crimea was with Russia for hundreds of years.

171 years, actually: annexed to Russia in 1783, transferred to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic in 1954.

And ethnic Russians only became the majority population (over 50 percent) in Crimea as a result of the Stalinist policy of ethnically cleansing the area of the native Crimean Tatars during World War II.

So the rule of the majority should be removed because of events 70 years ago? The ethnic population of Russian was always very close to the number of Tartars (in 1897, the proportion of Tartars to Russians was 35%-33% if you do a quick Google search).

There are a myriad of reasons why Russia's repatriation of the Crimea was legitimate aside from the popular will of the residents (and don't cry fraud-every election that results in something against the will of the establishment is always "fraudulent" or in general gets undermined, hence why there are efforts to nullify Brexit underway or were efforts to unbound the RNC delegates). The Ukrainian government was overthrown in murky circumstances, and the administration has clearly shown that regardless of who is at the head of the State Department, the antagonistic approach to Russia will always remain. I think Russia has as much of a national interest (and a right to enforce that) in retaining the Crimea for it's warm water ports to prevent NATO expansion into the Black Sea. I'd be very much against the Russians building a naval base in the Bahamas on the same grounds. The balance of power shouldn't be rocked because of "muh post WWII liberal order." It's not worth the mushroom clouds.

As to the Soviet Union, yes, most Stalin era decisions should be nullified. Why not return Austria to Germany since the decisions of historical dictators are apparently infallible! To answer Helenskian's queries, I'd argue that yes, Germany has a claim to East Prussia if they wanted to reconquer an inconsequential Baltic province with a population that is 0.8% German. Yet unlike Crimea, there is no national interest to further justify it, and I just sure hope NATO isn't around if they decide to do that.

The Post World War II order is dying. It's falling apart. We need to get real here. Is Crimea or Syria worth a nuclear exchange? I think not and when those are the consequences of a potential showdown over these places, it really does show how absurd the post World War II order has become.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

So, the people of Crimea should have no say over where they want to be? If you consider the referendum illegitimate, fine, but are you saying that no referendum should have happened?

In 1861 the states of Texas, Virginia and Tennessee each held a referendum in which their citizens voted in favour of secession from the US. Needless to say, the US federal government did not accept it.

Well, their white citizens voted that way.

[JoshPA]

50/50
most likely not and he may likely stay away from anything relating to russia for a bit ((apart from improving relation a much needed sorry dont want to die in a nuclear war)

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

for comparison:

this is like redrawing ALL of post-world war 2-frontiers cause they don't make sense or are "unfair". formula for long-term conflicts and war.

It's funny isn't it? All these hardcore nationalists endorsing the Russian argument, even if it were to be followed through, it would destroy almost every tenet we have to hold to maintain the modern nation-state.