Not much to report. The next big event will be the election being sponsored by the U.S. and the EU. If it is fair, and if the Russian-leaning parts of the Ukraine participate, there is a fair chance that the crisis will slowly wind down.
The western press is now beginning to use the word "annexation" instead of "occupation" to describe the Russian takeover of the Crimea, language which associates the event with Germany in 1938 but also accepts it as a fact on the ground. Recent reports of Russian soldiers on the border "ready to invade" seem wildly overblown but the careful statements by the NATO military commander on potential responses seem about right. Everybody is still acting carefully and responsibly.
One other minor tidbit. About a week after the original Russian takeover there was a confrontation at the major Crimean airbase. Russian troops seem to have realized a bit late that there was a functioning antiaircraft battery very near the airfield that could easily shoot down incoming Russian planes. So Russian troops took control of the actual missiles but when they tried to occupy the headquarters building the Ukrainian soldiers rebuffed them. The fact that a very real Ukrainian antiaircraft system was operating right next to the primary landing field being used for Russian reinforcements says two things; first, that the original operation was not done with any pre-planning- it was a direct response to the overthrow of the Kiev government by the demonstrators; second, the Ukrainian and Russian militarys early-on realized that any accident that led to the death or injury of a soldier could blow up the situation, something both sides wanted to avoid.
According to recent Ukrainian estimates roughly half of the Ukrainian soldiers and sailors in the Crimea have chosen to go with the Russians, which gives some hint of how divided the loyalties of Russian-speaking Ukrainians are.
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