I agree with that. They've always had an important navy base on Crimea. And Ukraine did make Ukrainian the official language, when it used be both Rus. and Ukr. and gave a fat middle finger to the ~~ten million russian speakers. I'm all about the self-determination of a group of people. Let them do their thing. The Slovaks wanted to leave Czechoslovakia and did so peacefully.

The Odessa point is interesting because I do believe they could have negotiated to keep it, but at this point the invaders might just take it and keep Kyiv from accessing the sea. We'll see how it plays out.

Thanks for the read and the words, Carey.