Last week, under supposed pressure, Putin said that he was going to pull troops back from the Ukrainian border. At the same time he “told” the Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine that they should postpone the vote on independence. And the whole world seems to be quiet, even though there are no signs that Russia has pulled back troops, nor did the separatists postpone the vote.
While there is some chance that Putin was sincere in his statement, the primary thing that stands out is that he expertly played the game again, and won the right to look conciliatory. However this move of his may have been highly orchestrated to allow the vote to happen, but without Moscow’s shadow. If anything, Putin learned from the Crimean vote that if it looked like he was behind the vote, the international community would not accept the vote. This way, no matter what he was saying behind the scenes, the world will grudgingly have to accept the vote, because it was a local phenomenon, and because people have the right to self-determination and governance the world will have to accept whatever outcome there is.
Whether or not the above is correct, Putin has once again shown his expert maneuvers on the world stage. If the vote wins, Putin can say that he had nothing to do with it, and if the vote fails, he had already warned the separatists that they shouldn’t have held the vote. Either way, he wins.