UKRAINE LATEST – AT 10:21 A.M. ET:  Former Secretary of State James Baker correctly said a few days ago that Ukraine represented a new Cold War.  Former Defense Secretary Bob Gates said that, given Ukraine, we should not be cutting our defenses.  I doubt if either man will be listened to in the Obama vacation White House.  The Ukraine crisis is not easing.  From AFP: 

Kiev (AFP) - Ukraine sought urgent Western backing on Monday after Russian President Vladimir Putin insisted that Crimea had the right to join his country even while hinting at a readiness for dialogue.

The self-declared leadership on the predominantly ethnic Russian peninsula of Crimea has proclaimed independence from Kiev and set a March 16 referendum on switching over to Kremlin rule.

The decision has been condemned by Western powers who are also furious at Moscow's seizure of Crimea in a lightning but bloodless operation that began days after the February 22 fall and subsequent escape to Russia of president Viktor Yanukovych.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel -- whose cautious approach to imposing sanctions on Russia has clashed with the more hawkish positions of Eastern European nations and the United States -- bluntly told Putin on Sunday that the Crimean referendum was "illegal."

"The United States is not prepared to recognise any result of the so-called referendum," US ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt told reporters in Kiev on Monday.

The most explosive East-West crisis since the Cold War was stoked further when the Kremlin said Putin told both Merkel and British Prime Minister David Cameron that he fully recognised the actions of Crimea's leaders -- in power since an end of February seizure of the local parliament and government by pro-Kremlin gunmen.

But Merkel's office also said Putin had promised to discuss with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Monday the creation of an "international contact group" on Ukraine that he had resisted before.

Germany is pushing the group's creation as a way of avoiding a full-fledged war breaking out on the eastern edge of Europe that would see Ukraine call for Western help against its nuclear-armed neighbour.

COMMENT:  My own sense is that Putin is maneuvering to run out the clock – simply have conferences, "dialogue," and all that other stuff, while cementing Russia's hold over Crimea and its influence over Ukraine.  Everyone could say they tried hard and avoided war, but we'd still have 1938 all over again.

On the other hand, Putin could blunder, see weakness in Washington, and try for a direct military grab of territory.  

This is a tinderbox.  An accidental clash, or some bloody demonstration, could throw all calculations into that well-known dustbin of history.

March 10, 2014