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In reply to the discussion: The single most powerful moral statement the USA could make against Putin moving into Crimea [View all]amandabeech
(9,893 posts)Crimea to accept the ships and personnel currently stationed in Ukrainian Crimea.
Novorisk was supposed to be the location, and there are other ports, as well, on the Russian shore of the Black Sea east of Crimea. Navies in the Black Sea are not supposed to include single-purpose aircraft carriers by treaty, so you don't need a humungous port for them. What Russia needed was a port for medium to small sized ships. Surely those could have been built with Russian technology and whatever other technology and oil and gas rich Russia could have built. You realize, of course, that the Russians sold their largest multi-purpose ship with the ability to launch aircraft to the Chinese.
If Putin had put some real money into that project, he's have Russian ports for Russian ships.
Instead, he spent money elsewhere, including $50 billion to build up Socchi, a semi-tropical resort with winter sports facilities
I'm not knocking Socchi. It looked very nice. But which project do you think deserved the highest priority: a Russian base for the Russian Black Sea fleet, or a resort with semi-tropical with winter sports facilities?
I know which I would have voted for.