John R. Schindler, Observer (USA)
[There] was a comment [Trump] made about Crimea, the Ukrainian region on the Black Sea that was annexed by Russian forces in early 2014, setting off what I termed at the time Cold War 2.0. On Sunday’s This Week program on ABC, Trump appeared to accept Moscow’s occupation of Crimea (...). [However,] the United Nations has spoken, with a March 2014 General Assembly resolution recognizing Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity: 100 members supported it while only 11 voted against. The United States along with the European Union have spoken with one voice on the Crimea issue, enforcing economic sanctions on Russia that have caused real pain for Putin. Recognizing Russia’s illegal occupation was not a political, much less a partisan, issue in our country, beyond its odd fringes—until Donald Trump made it one. It’s easy to dismiss far-off Crimea as a matter of little importance to Americans in an election year, especially since de facto the peninsula really is Russia’s now, and Ukraine lacks the power to change the post-2014 status quo. Yet Crimea matters for several reasons, ranging from the pragmatic to the philosophical.