What You’re Not Seeing

One part of the unfolding crisis in Ukraine that in part obvious but can also escape notice is that a key driver of the current situation is the lack of any effectively functioning government in Kiev. There is a nominal head of state in place. In practice there is a power vacuum at the apex of the Ukrainian state. Its ability to react effectively to the situation in Crimea, given the huge Russia military presence already there and the pro-Russian population, would be quite limited in any case. But the fact that the state structure itself is still half-decapitated gives the Russians an even greater ability to dictate the course of events than they might otherwise have.