SIMFEROPOL, Ukraine (AP) — Associated Press journalists say hundreds of unidentified gunmen have just arrived outside Ukraine’s infantry base in Privolnoye in its Crimea region.

Russian soldiers and 20+ vehicles. Surrounding Ukrainian base at Perevalne in Crimea. Reported demanding surrender pic.twitter.com/Dnnji2czhL

— James Mates (@jamesmatesitv) March 2, 2014

The convoy includes at least 13 troop vehicles each containing 30 soldiers and four armored vehicles with mounted machine guns. The vehicles — which have Russian license plates — have surrounded the base and are blocking Ukrainian soldiers from entering or leaving it.

Squad of Russian reinforcements arrive at Perevalne base where #Ukraine troops surrounded. No sign of them moving in. pic.twitter.com/vFypJnw8dy

— James Mates (@jamesmatesitv) March 2, 2014

(more…)

As reported by Ed Driscoll at PJ Media,apparently the transition of American leadership from the John Wayne/Malboro Man prototype of sturdy masculinity has now morphed to ….. Pyjama Beta Boy Petulance.

“…Imagine you’re a backroom boffin in Vladimir Putin’s Russia assigned to monitor all of the news media out of the West that references Russia and your boss. Imagine the chuckle you know Putin’s going to get when you show him the following screen capture from CNN…”

(more…)

Confirmation Hearings Have Consequences:

(Left) Director of National Intelligence James Clapper  –  (Right)  Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel

(left) Director of CIA John Brennan – (Right) Joint Chiefs Chairman Martin Dempsey

The four men above are the players who give the daily National Security Briefing to President Obama. (more…)

Moments ago Russia’s Parliament voted unanimously to authorize President Vladimir Putin to use military force in Ukraine.   Most international observers agree the Russian military has been present throughout Crimea (Ukraine Territory) since yesterday.

Significantly, Russia’s parliament has been rushing through laws to make it easier to absorb new territories into its state, sparking suspicions Crimea and possibly other regions of Ukraine – all former parts of the old Soviet empire – could be re-incorporated by president Vladimir Putin.  (link)

(more…)

UPDATE:   As if on cue:  President Obama skips another national security briefing again TODAY…

EARLIER:  When you elect an inexperienced, and profoundly ideological leader like Barack Obama based on a principle ruse of cultural popularity you eventually discover that “Hope and Chage” really means “Hoax and Chains”.   Fundamental chains.

President Obama is no more capable of leading international crisis than Milli Vanilli to sing acapella. The former needing a teleprompter the latter needing to lip-sync. (more…)

https://twitter.com/SalenaZitoTrib/statuses/439526062390001664

UPDATE:  Less than an hour after delivering a mortally flaccid and limp wristed denouncement of Russia invading Ukraine’s Crimea, Dear Leader shows up at DNC fundraiser to announce HAPPY HOUR.

(more…)

RT @NoahCRothman: CNN: U.S. confirms that Russian troops are present in Ukrainian Crimea.

— Jedediah Bila (@JedediahBila) February 28, 2014

Putin: rolling into Ukraine. Obama: running in circles through the White House with Biden.

— John Hayward (@Cobretata) February 28, 2014

YESTERDAY – CNN’s Chief International Correspondent, Christiane Amanpour, informed network anchor Wolf Blitzer on Thursday that there was no indication that Russian forces were planning to intervene militarily in Ukraine. Less than 24-hours later, Russian forces militarily intervened in Ukraine.

“Some are concerned we might be on the eve of another Cold War,” Blitzer fretted. “What, if anything, would stop Vladimir Putin from getting involved?”

“There doesn’t seem to be any notion that he is actually going to do so,” Amanpour insisted.

“The U.S. right now says it only sees Russia’s military exercises ‘within the normal range,’” she continued. “It does not see any of the kind of massive planning that Russia would have to do in terms of planning, and logistics, and securing air, and land, and rail, and road corridors to incur into Ukraine.”

TODAY –  Reports indicate that Russian paramilitary forces under Moscow’s control occupied airports in the autonomous Ukrainian Republic of Crimea overnight on Friday, less than 12 hours after Amanpour made this declaration. This preliminary occupation turned out to be a prelude to Russian forces exploding out of the Russian naval base at Sevastopol and taking control of the regional capital just 80 kilometers to the Northeast. (more…)

(AP) – Ukraine’s fugitive president surfaced on Thursday in Moscow, where he was said to have been seen at an opulent five-star hotel and a Kremlin country retreat once favored by the late Boris Yeltsin.

Viktor Yanukovych reportedly was granted protection in Russia, but he has not received a warm reception. Although Russia still considers him the legitimate president of Ukraine, the Kremlin has treated him cautiously and portrayed him as a coward who betrayed those who stood by him. (more…)

In the annals of historical military research the #1 justification (affirmative/offensive reason) for beginning any war is always the claim of protection needed for a specific citizenry.    Watch Putin use the excuse that Russian ethnics in Ukraine need to be protected…..

RUSSIA – President Vladimir Putin ordered an urgent drill to test the combat readiness of the armed forces across western Russia on Wednesday, news agencies reported, flexing Moscow’s military muscle amid tension with the West over Ukraine.

“In accordance with an order from the president of the Russian Federation, forces of the Western Military District were put on alert at 1400 (0500 ET) today,” Interfax quoted Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu as saying. (more…)

Major kudos to John Fund of NRO who actually went to the heart of what took place this past weekend.    Inside this article you find the substance of when the actual Ukrainian straw was placed on the camels’ back.

Following on the heels of the “brokered” Friday 2/21 agreement one brave journalist went on *LIVE* ( <– important ) TV and did two distinct things.   First she destroyed the claims of the government.  But, more importantly, she showed the Ukrainian people how the media was complicit in telling a false story thereby destroying the construct of the ruse.   There are major lessons for all of us in the USA within her strategy.

EXCELLENT ARTICLE at NRO –  Every revolution has moments where the hinge of history seems to swing wide and everything is different and the old regime is delegitimized.

In Ukraine’s revolution, the moment that’s likely to be immortalized is when protestors charged police barricades in Kiev’s Independence Square (“Maidan”) last Thursday, reportedly capturing a number of police troops, only to have dozens of protesters then gunned down by snipers. Even a face-saving compromise brokered the next day by Western diplomats couldn’t save President Viktor Yanukovych.

His security forces withdrew their support, leaving him unguarded. At 2 a.m. last Saturday, helicopters ferried him and his stooges away from his Michael Jackson–style presidential palace to the Russophone eastern sector of Ukraine. He remains in hiding.

But for many Ukrainians, there was another moment when they realized the ground was shifting beneath them. (more…)