A dog named Sevastopol!

As the old joke goes : Two men meet on the streets in Paris, one has a bulldog named Sevastopol. “why is your dog called Sevastopol?” asks the one. “try to take it, and you’ll see” Answers the other.
Since the Crimean peninsula was reintegrated into the Russian federation there has been a lot of writing back and forth about the legitimacy of the referendum or the right to self-determination of the Crimeans.
Mostly done by people not really interested in digging through the historic background or interested in seeing  things from the perspective of the Crimeans.


After all, it’s a lot easier to know what’s best for the Crimeans sitting behind a desk in London than to actually ask them in a referendum…. The referendum was therefore labelled “invalid”.
When you say Crimea, you say Sevastopol.  The harbor is of vital importance for the Russian navy and the facility in Tartus’s survival depends on it.

Sevastopol was founded by Catherine II of Russia in June 1783 as base for a naval squadron.
The city soon became an important Russian naval base and commercial seaport, fortresses were built  and the black sea squadron became the black sea fleet.
The first notable attack came in the Crimean war of 1853-1856 when the British, the French, the Ottomans and Sardinia lay siege to Sevastopol for 11 months. More than a hundred thousand Russian soldiers died defending the city which ultimately fell to the attackers.  The treaty of Paris from 30 march 1856 returned the city back to Russia.

During the second world warthe city was intensely bombarded during the Battle of Sevastopol which lasted 250 days. The German, Italian, Romanian and Bulgarian armies took the city in july 1942.
On may 9, 1944 the city was liberated once again and received the “hero city” title.
The cause for the controversy we see today happened in 1954 when Nikita Krushchev (General secretary of the communist party at the time) by an internal political action transferred the Crimean peninsula to the Ukraine SSR (which was within the soviet union).
When the soviet union broke up in 1991, Moscow refused to recognize the Ukrainian sovereignty over Sevastopol and the Crimean oblast.
From 1991 to 1997 there was a number of incidents, most notably on april 14, 1993 when the presidium of the Crimean parliament called for the creation of the presidential post of the Crimean republic.
Allthough the aspirations of the Crimeans to become independent from Ukraine were largely buried in the may 1997 treaty between Russia and Ukraine, the largely ethnic  Russian city and the peninsula had never really given up on dreaming of joining the Russian federation as an independent republic.

Neither had Russia.
Illustrating to this is the following excerpt of a Russian poem:

“On the ruins of our superpower
There is a major paradox of history
Sevastopol—the city of Russian glory—
Is…outside of Russian territory.”

In reaction to the Maidan revolution and the subsequent events, the city council of Sevastopol Unilaterally declared that it wished to join the Russian federation as a federal subject on March 6, 2014.
On 11 March a joint resolution with the supreme council of Crimea was released to unite as an independent republic.
The new Kiev leadership that was not recognized by the Crimeans did in turn not recognize the Crimean independence or its right for self determination. In this vacuum, Russia played a controversial role.
While Russia had the right to have military in Sevastopol and other Crimean installations, the soldiers did not have the right to bear arms outside of their installations without  permission from Kiev.
Not sure what Kiev was up to in regards to the “insubordinate” Crimeans, Russian military assisted in securing the peninsula wearing incognito uniforms.

-After seeing what happened in Eastern-Ukraine, one can only call this the right decision-
On march 16 the Crimeans held a referendum  to choose the way forward, as an independent republic or as part of the Russian federation. (between march 11 and march 18, Crimea was an independent republic awaiting the outcome of the referendum)

With the outcome of the referendum to join the Russian federation, a treaty of adoption was signed between Russia and Crimea, effectively returning Sevastopol (and the peninsula) “home”.
The history of Crimea, Sevastopol and Russian presence there is ofcourse a lot more complex than I can sum up in a short text, feel free to read deeper into it when some things are too “vague” for you.

But be assured of one thing :
When you hear someone talking about the “annexation” of Crimea by an expansionistic/imperialistic Russia.
Or when someone calls the referendum “rigged” without mentioning that referenda in the 90’s also produced the same results.
Then you know that this person does not know what he is talking about or that he is trying to misrepresent things.
Either way, you can disqualify whatever more this person has to say on the subject.
You might as well ask your local hairdresser for advice on brain surgery.
Author: M.MRDR