Very often Ukrainian politicians are engaged in shakkozakidatelstvom, writes on the portal NW Russian journalist Yevgeny Kiselev.

Let's remember the Baltic States. In fact, in 1939 the USSR annexed Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. Naturally, there were pseudo-elections that took place at the sight of Red Army rifles.

The US has always stressed that they do not recognize the accession of the Baltic countries to the USSR. But at the same time they did not tear diplomatic relations: Congress continued to send delegations of its senators and congressmen to Moscow. The Supreme Soviet of the USSR, a part of which was elected in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, was not subjected to an international boycott. Although the sanctions continued.

The Baltic countries were able to gain independence only on the eve of the collapse of the USSR. History does not know the subjunctive mood. But if the inhabitants of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia did not act as a mountain for national revival and divorce with the former USSR, we would have three autonomous republics within the Russian Federation today.

Very often Ukrainian politicians are engaged in shapeshak. Like, they will not go anywhere, Crimea will return to us. Like, sooner or later the Crimeans will see what a breakthrough Ukraine has made on the way to building a democratic government, and will return.

But, I'm afraid, everything is much more complicated: the more time passes since the moment of annexation, the more difficult is the process of deannexia.

Now the Russian authorities are doing one terrible thing, which from the point of view of international laws is an absolute crime. Russia, relatively speaking, carries out the demographic regulation of the Crimean population: it relocates Russians to the Russian peninsula from the mainland, especially servitude civil servants, and in their place lays the native Crimean inhabitants. And if in the boundless future the situation with the return of the Crimea will begin to develop, the composition of the population of the peninsula by that time will already change significantly. And it will terribly burden the problem.

It is necessary to pay tribute to the leaders of the Baltic countries: no matter how communists and supporters of the USSR they were, somewhere in their heads sat the thought that it is still necessary to preserve the national identity. This is especially true of Lithuania and its then long-standing communist leader Antanas Snechkus. Rested with soft kotyachimi paws, he did everything to minimize the number of immigrants from other territories of the former USSR. Like, we have enough qualified force and educated people who can work in all areas of the economy.

As a result, Lithuania was, perhaps, not the first of the Baltic countries to talk about disengagement from the USSR, but their independence movement was the most powerful and progressive. As far back as 1989, people's deputies of Lithuania simply got up and left the session of the All-Union Congress of Soviets. They said that Lithuania is now independent and does not intend to participate in the work of the highest legislative body of the country from which they seek full independence. In fact, they found it only after the failed putsch in August 1991 - when Moscow accepted this.

But this became to a large extent possible only because Lithuania was preserved as a monoethnic state with a very small percentage of the Russian population. Maybe, thanks to this, from the ethnopolitical point of view, now the most calm and stable situation in Lithuania. There is no problem with the pro-Moscow and pro-Putin Russian-speaking minority, as in neighboring Latvia and Estonia.

Problems with the return of the Crimea is very much. It seems to me that there is a serious deficit of a responsible approach to the design of a long-term Crimean policy.

War, hot or cold, ends either in victory, in defeat, or in a peace treaty, which is always based on a compromise. How to start negotiations with that future Russia, which sooner or later will change, we must think now. Putin is not eternal. Even if he decides, like Xi Jinping, to reign until his death, sooner or later there will still be another political regime.

It is clear that Ukraine can not lose the political war over the Crimea, and it is hardly possible to win it today with the help of force or only legal methods. It is necessary to have patience and prepare to conduct explanatory and propaganda work in the Crimea - to seek a way to reach the consciousness of every Crimean.

If Russia tried to influence the elections in the US with the help of modern Internet technologies, then in this direction it is necessary to think and Ukrainian politicians.

In the 70s, for the sake of easing tension, reducing the level of confrontation and signing certain agreements, the West closed its eyes to many things in the USSR - including the annexation of the Baltic states.

Now it is very important to do everything to prevent the recurrence of those times.