| > Just imagine Ukraine allowing people in Donetsk and Lugansk to actually decide their status themselves, instead of using an army to force them into Ukraine. Apologies to everybody for continuing this huge tangent, but this is bizarre. The Ukrainian army did not try to force Donetsk and Luhansk into Ukraine. First, a linguistic quibble: they had been part of Ukraine from the moment of its independence (and in the independence referendum 80+% of the voters in the two regions had voted for independence), so they couldn't be forced "into" Ukraine. Second, the conflict began when Russian and Russian-backed forces started an armed insurrection, so it's more the case that Russia tried to force them out of Ukraine, against their will. I'm highly confident that if a free referendum had been held there in 2014, a majority of the population of the Donbas would have voted to stay in Ukraine. Obviously, we'll now never find out, due to Russia carrying out ethnic cleansing of the region (mass deportations and killings). > I would even go as far as the community level. If a city in Scotland vote to stay in Britain, I would allow them to become independent of Scotland and stay. In the same ways as I would allow a city in Donetsk to stay in Ukraine if they want so. This is a very interesting question, but it'd be very complicated to get right, since the support for independence of particular regions can be entangled. For instance, people in Aberdeen might support Scottish independence iff Edinburgh stays in Scotland; people in Edinburgh might support independence iff the border territories stay in Scotland etc. That is not to say that we shouldn't try, if possible. |