WASHINGTON (AP) — Para el presidente Barack Obama, la agresiva anexión de Crimea a Rusia pone a prueba los principios de la filosofía de su política exterior: su convicción en el poder de la diplomacia directa, su preferencia por el uso de sanciones económicas como castigo y su inclinación a proceder con cautela a fin de evitar la creación de mayores problemas a largo plazo.
El asunto que enfrenta la Casa Blanca ahora es si las acciones que han hecho poco para detener a Rusia de anexarse a Crimea son lo suficientemente duras para detener una mayor intensificación por parte de Moscú. Y si continúan siendo insuficientes, ¿qué más está dispuesto Obama a hacer para modificar los cálculos de Vladimir Putin?
La gama de opciones adicionales parece ser limitada. La Casa Blanca señala que no se está sopesando una respuesta militar, y hasta el momento los funcionarios se han negado a aceptar las exhortaciones para que suministre equipo bélico al debilitado gobierno de Ucrania. En cambio, es probable que Estados Unidos se centre en brindar asistencia financiera a Ucrania e intensifique las sanciones económicas contra los funcionarios rusos a quienes la Casa Blanca considera responsables de la crisis.
El portavoz de la Casa Blanca, Jay Carney, prometió el miércoles que "se tomarán más acciones". Indicó que las sanciones financieras podrían ampliarse al sector de armas ruso, a millonarios oligarcas y a otros funcionarios del Kremlin.
Y el vicepresidente Joe Biden, mientras trata de aplacar las preocupaciones en las fronteras de Rusia, dijo en Lituania que Estados Unidos responderá ante cualquier agresión contra un aliado de la OTAN. Declaró: "estamos juntos en esto con ustedes".
Pero hasta el momento, las sanciones impuestas tanto por Estados Unidos y la Unión Europea han hecho poco para detener al presidente ruso Putin.
"Si uno presiona un resorte demasiado fuerte, en algún momento se soltará de regreso", destacó el líder ruso en un fiero discurso el martes. "Siempre tienen que recordar esto".
La crisis de Crimea se ha convertido en un punto crítico de una nueva pugna entre Oriente y Occidente. Rusia envió sus tropas a la península después que el presidente ucraniano Viktor Yanukovich, respaldado por el Kremlin, huyó de la capital Kiev en medio de protestas por su decisión de abandonar los planes para profundizar las relaciones con Europa. El domingo los votantes en Crimea apoyaron mayoritariamente la posición de unirse a Rusia. El miércoles, las fuerzas rusas tomaron las instalaciones militares en toda Crimea.
La Casa Blanca denunció que las maniobras de Moscú constituyen una violación del derecho internacional y no reconoce la anexión de Crimea a Rusia.
Las acciones de Putin han expuesto a Obama a nuevas críticas de los republicanos, que alegan que el presidente en su segundo mandato, ya de por sí debilitado políticamente en su país, ahora se ve endeble en el escenario mundial.
Los senadores republicanos John McCain de Arizona y Lindsey Graham de Carolina del Sur han instado a Obama para que brinde asistencia militar a Ucrania en forma de armas pequeñas y municiones, al igual que asistencia no letal al gobierno de Kiev.
"Occidente debe imponer costos reales a Rusia por su agresión en Ucrania. Pero al no hacerlo, sólo invitamos a una mayor agresión en otros lugares", destacaron los dos senadores en una declaración.
Las naciones europeas, entre ellas la poderosa Alemania, tienen profundos vínculos económicos con Rusia y temen que Putin pueda tomar represalias financieras si la UE intensifica las sanciones. Estados Unidos también depende de Moscú para mantener abiertas las rutas que el Pentágono usa para retirarse de Afganistán, y se apoya en la cooperación de Putin en un acuerdo para despojar a Siria de sus arsenales de armas químicas.
Y quizá aún más apremiante para Obama es el pacto con Rusia sobre las tensas negociaciones internacionales con Irán, con el objeto de poner fin al programa nuclear de la república islámica.
Un alto diplomático ruso dijo el miércoles a la agencia de noticias Interfax que Moscú modificará su posición en las conversaciones nucleares en respuesta a las acciones tomadas por Estados Unidos y Europa.
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Julie Pace está en Twitter como: <a href="http://twitter.com/jpaceDC" rel="nofollow">http://twitter.com/jpaceDC</a>
An AP News Analysis
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An EU summit in Brussels on Thursday is likely to extend a blacklist of Russian and Crimean figures subject to travel bans and asset freezes, senior officials and diplomats say, but is unlikely to embark on moves which could spiral into a full-blown trade war between Europe and Russia.
Divided over how to react to the Kremlin's annexation of Crimea from Ukraine, European leaders are poised to deliver a minimal response to the crisis.
Moscow has already reacted with derision to the EU decision on Monday to blacklist 21 Russian and Crimean officials and has upped the ante in the confrontation by declaring Crimea Russian territory and making concrete moves on the ground to entrench the seizure. There is little to suggest that Vladimir Putin's policy will be affected by extending the number of officials or businessmen punished for the Kremlin's actions.
Senior EU officials met late into the night in Brussels on Wednesday trying to hammer out a compromise between 28 countries. With hours to go before the summit opened in Brussels, they had not yet agreed on common action. Twelve pages of a draft summit statement, obtained by the Guardian, had nothing yet to say about Ukraine or Russia.
A senior German government official made plain that there was little stomach in Berlin to move to the kind of trade or economic sanctions that could hurt Russia but also damage Germany and much of the EU in what could becomean escalating sanctions war.
The senior official said the EU reserved the option to move to trade sanctions, but that the trigger for this would be Russian "escalation and destabilisation" in Ukraine. Putin's action on Crimea did not pass the escalation test, the source signalled. Russian action in eastern or southern Ukraine, excepting Crimea, would be a form of red line, triggering the more forceful sanctions, he added.
The summit is also likely to cancel a meeting of Russian and EU leaders scheduled for Sochi in June and to consider other measures aimed at isolating Russia politically and internationally.
The Germans trumpeted the notion that Brussels and Kiev would sign part of an association agreement between Ukraine and the EU on Friday. The abrupt refusal of Ukraine's deposed president, Viktor Yanukovych, to sign the same agreement last November triggered the street rebellion that culminated in his overthrow three weeks ago and sparked Russia's intervention.
The signs are that the west is settling in for a long game with uncertain outcomes. Barack Obama is due in the Netherlands and Brussels next week for a series of summits expected to be dominated by Putin and Ukraine.
The White House on Wednesday called on Russia to open dialogue with Ukraine on the military base standoff in Crimea and said Moscow was responsible for any casualties inflicted by its own or allied forces after a Ukrainian soldier was shot dead on Tuesday. "The continuing efforts by Russian forces to seize Ukrainian military installations are creating a dangerous situation," said White House spokesman Jay Carney. "We condemn these actions. Russia should immediately begin discussions with the Ukrainian government to ensure the safety of Ukrainian forces in the Crimean region of Ukraine."
The Nato secretary-general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, told a forum at Georgetown University in Washington: "We have seen Russia rip up the international rule book, trying to redraw the map of Europe and creating, in just a few weeks, the most serious security crisis since the end of the cold war."
The US stepped up its rhetoric on the economic costs of the crisis to Russia, insisting the limited sanctions were already having an effect on broader market confidence, despite the ridicule from Moscow.
Jen Psaki, the US state department spokeswoman, said: "There is a huge economic impact that we are seeing on the ground in Russia and that is partly in response to the political steps we have taken but also in anticipation of the some of the economic steps. Despite the intervention of the Russian central bank, the rouble is at a five-year low against the dollar. More capital has already fled Russia this year than in all of 2013. There are impacts."
The UN secretary-general, Ban-Ki-Moon, is to go to Moscow and Kiev on Thursday/today and Friday/tomorrow to try to get negotiations going between Russia and Ukraine.
The Kremlin maintained its argument that the US and the EU had fomented an anti-Yanukovych coup on Kiev, abrogating the 1994 Budapest memorandum in which Russia, the US, Britain and France guaranteed Ukraine's border and territorial integrity in return for Kiev's surrender of its Soviet-era nuclear arsenal.
The US and the EU argue that Putin has shredded that 1994 pact by seizing part of Ukraine and redrawing the country's borders.
Psaki said the Kremlin was guilty of aggression in Crimea.
"The Russian military is directly responsible for any casualties that its forces inflict, whether they be regular uniformed troops or irregulars without insignia.
"Reports that a Ukrainian military officer was killed yesterday are particularly concerning and fly in the face of President Putin's claim that Russia's military intervention in Crimea has brought stability."
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Ukraine is planning to withdraw its forces and their families from Crimea "quickly and efficiently" after more Ukrainian bases were taken over by local militias and Russian troops on Wednesday.
Andriy Parubiy, head of the national security and defence council, told reporters in Kiev that it planned to relocate 25,000 service personnel and families. "We are developing a plan that would enable us not only to withdraw servicemen but also members of their families in Crimea, so that they could be quickly and efficiently moved to mainland Ukraine."
His comments came before Russian forces took over a naval base in Bakhchisaray in Crimea on Wednesday night, the latest in a series of takeovers of Ukrainian bases by Russian troops and local self-defence forces using a mixture of attrition and threats, as well as the dawning realisation that Kiev has lost control over the peninsula and has no way of fighting to regain it.
On Wednesday, the day after Vladimir Putin announced that Russia would absorb Crimea and a Ukrainian soldier was shot dead by a sniper at a base in Simferopol, a pro-Russian militia took control of the Ukrainian naval headquarters in Sevastopol.
"We freed the prisoners inside this base. This is Russian territory. Moscow already accepted Crimea," said Vladimir Melnik, head of a local self-defence unit, shortly after the Russian flag was raised at the base.
According to Melnik, several branches of the local militia co-ordinated in storming of the site during the morning. "We are peaceful people, but we are military people and if we receive orders to storm we will follow them," he said, adding that the civil defence units were under the command of the city administration.
Andrey Kochebarov, a deputy leader of local Cossacks, said: "There was no fight, no resistance; the guys inside clearly understood what situation they are in. This is the naval base headquarters so if they gave up this one, they will give them all up."
In the hours that followed, the Ukrainian troops, who had been inside the besieged base for three weeks, slowly trickled out with heads bowed. Morale is low and the soldiers say they are uncertain what the future holds.
"We have no word from Kiev about what to do next," said Sergei, who has served as an officer in the Ukrainian army for 21 years and remained inside the building until the bitter end. "Of course, there was no resistance [when the building was stormed]. What are we meant to do, outnumbered and without weapons?" Sergei denied the local militia's claims that the men inside were liberated: "This is a lie. We remained there of our own free will."
Sergei, from Sevastopol, said he and the 50 colleagues who remained inside had been able to leave the building, but would not have been able to return if they did so. "I stayed because I swore an oath to the Ukrainian army." He said the Ukrainian officers were not physically threatened, but they were kept without enough food and water, and the electricity was often shut off.
Outside, his tearful wife greeted him with a hug. "It's been a very difficult time. I was very anxious about his safety," she said. "I'm delighted to have him back."
Tough decisions lie ahead for all the troops in the Crimea region who have remained loyal to Ukraine. Russian and Crimean officials have issued an ultimatum to the Ukrainian troops either to join the Russian army or take the option of a safe passage out of the peninsula.
Parubiy said the Ukrainian government would appeal to the UN to declare Crimea a de-militarised zone, which he hoped would lead to Russia and Ukraine both withdrawing its forces.
The Ukrainian navy commander, Serhiy Haiduk, was captured during the storming of the headquarters and was believed to have been taken into Russian detention. On Wednesday evening, acting Ukrainian president Oleksandr Turchynov gave the Russians and Crimean authorities three hours to free Haiduk or face "adequate responses, including of a technical and technological nature", without clarifying further.
There was no immediate time frame given for Parubiy's announcement that the troops would be relocated.
Ukrainian politician Vitali Klitschko had earlier said Ukraine should not recognise Russian rule over Crimea, but did call for safe passage to be granted so Ukrainian troops on the peninsula could withdraw to "temporary bases" elsewhere in Ukraine, to prevent further bloodshed.
The Ukrainian government wanted to dispatch two ministers to Crimea on Wednesday to "resolve the situation", but were informed by Crimean authorities that they would not be allowed to enter the territory.
The process of annexation continued apace, with Ukrainian signs being removed from government buildings. Russia's constitutional court reviewed the treaty to join Crimea to Russia and found it legal, and the parliament is expected to ratify the decision by the end of the week.
Putin announced that a rail and road bridge connecting the Crimean peninsula to Russia across the two-mile Kerch Strait would be built.
Russia had already begun distributing passports in the region, said Konstantin Romodanovsky, head of Russia's federal migration service. "Some passports were issued today, and the work will only get more intensive with each new day," he told RIA Novosti. He did not clarify what would happen with those Crimea residents who did not take up Russian citizenship.
Concerns have been voiced about the fate of Crimean Tatars, who make up 13% of the population and, on the whole, are loyal to Kiev. They mostly boycotted the hastily organised referendum that returned a 97% vote for union with Russia. Crimean officials have said some of them may have to return land to which they do not own proper legal rights. Many Tatars live on unregistered land; they were deported en masse during the Stalin era and often found their property in new hands when they returned a generation later.
The most pressing issue remains what happens with the remaining Ukrainian servicemen in bases. Crimean authorities claimed that the officer who was shot dead on Tuesday was shot by a 17-year-old radical Ukrainian nationalist, which has been dismissed as implausible by authorities in Kiev.
A spokesperson for the defence ministry was unable to clarify how many soldiers were left on bases, saying he did not know himself. But there was little fighting talk at bases around the peninsula and more of a sense of resignation that the territory has been lost.
Evgeniy Cherednichenko, an officer at the logistical command centre in Sevastopol, on Wednesday made the decision to abandon his position inside the besieged base.
"It's a very difficult and complicated situation. We don't have proper information. In the end, I just decided to pick up my personal stuff and leave," he said. "I have not deserted the Ukrainian army, I don't know what to do next."
The base is surrounded by Russian troops; through the wire fence it is possible to see the Ukrainian troops moving around. A sniper sits calmly on top of a garage watching the men below.
Speaking by telephone from inside the base, lieutenant colonel Aleksandr Lusyan said: "Kiev should have given the order to use weapons at the beginning, because then we could fight back, but they were afraid to give this command because they were afraid to spill blood. Now we are outnumbered and we cannot fight back."
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March 19, 2014 11:58 p.m. ET
The mayor of San Cristóbal, Venezuela, Daniel Ceballos, appeared at a rally on Tuesday. European Pressphoto Agency
CARACAS, Venezuela—Venezuela's secret police arrested the mayor of an opposition bastion on Wednesday as President Nicolás Maduro's administration extended a crackdown on protests that have shaken the oil-rich country for six weeks.
Agents arrested Daniel Ceballos, the mayor of the western city of San Cristóbal, where demonstrations against the government began in early February. The city has become the site of the fiercest showdowns between street protesters and security forces, even as the size of demonstrations decline and show signs of fatigue in other places like the capital, Caracas.
"It's an act of justice against a mayor, who not only stopped complying with his obligations under the law and constitution, but facilitated and helped all the irrational violence in San Cristóbal," Interior Minister Miguel Rodríguez said on state television, announcing the arrest. He said Mr. Ceballos would be charged in court.
Mr. Ceballos "has nothing to hide," his lawyer, Ana Leonor Acosta, said in a statement put out by the mayor's political party, Popular Will. The party condemned the arrest as a "kidnapping." They said he was taken away by several armed officials with their faces covered, on unclear charges, as he was taking part in a meeting at a hotel in Caracas. The party called it an "arbitrary" action and said that it followed a series of arrest orders put out for officials of the political movement.
Analysts say the arrest could inflame the opposition and breathe new life into the protest movement, which has claimed about 30 lives. Rights groups say the majority of the victims have been demonstrators killed at the hands of police and pro-government forces.
But security forces, too, have suffered casualties. On Wednesday, the attorney general's office said it was investigating the death of a 23-year-old National Guardsman, who was shot and killed while breaking up a protest outside of a military university in San Cristóbal.
Mr. Ceballos is the second high-profile opposition politician to be jailed for allegedly inciting the civil unrest gripping the country. Last month, Leopoldo López, another top opposition official, was arrested and remains in a military prison for allegedly inciting the protests. Critics say Mr. Lopez's detention is an attempt by Mr. Maduro's regime to reverse the antigovernment movement.
"What does the government want with the fascist detention of San Cristóbal Mayor Daniel Ceballos, peace or war?" opposition leader Henrique Capriles, said in a message on Twitter. He warned that the decision would intensify the conflict and accused Mr. Maduro of wanting "more confrontation and to promote violence in the whole country."
On Tuesday the National Assembly, dominated by Mr. Maduro's Socialist Party, requested the attorney general's office strip opposition congresswoman María Corina Machado of parliamentary immunity to begin an investigation of her alleged involvement in inciting the recent violence.
Ms. Machado has been among the most vocal critics of the government, calling for Mr. Maduro's immediate exit and pushing for international condemnation of the Venezuelan government's crackdown. On Friday, Ms. Machado is scheduled to speak at the Organization of American States in Washington.
Protests began in the western state of Tachira last month as students voiced frustration with Venezuela's rampant crime problem, but the movement has since grown to address what the opposition says is the government's economic mismanagement, which has resulted in an inflation rate approaching 60% and widespread shortages of food and basic goods.
A parking attendant at the hotel said Mr. Ceballos was whisked away by four to six men in dark clothing.
In the upscale Caracas districts of Altamira and Chacao, news of Mr. Ceballos's arrest sparked an immediate reaction, with residents marching and banging on pots and pans, a comment form of protest in Latin America.
"What is he accused of? Why is he arrested? From what I can tell his only crime is thinking differently from the government," said a resident, Roger Vargas. "If the government keeps tightening the noose, there won't be peace in this country."
Mr. Rodríguez, the interior minister, said Mr. Ceballos' detention would be a step toward restoring calm and normalcy in the country.
"The path to peace is justice," he said.
Some outside observers had a different perspective.
"The government of President Maduro has engaged in a pattern of persecuting opposition leaders by attributing to them responsibility in criminal cases without showing evidence that links them to the crimes," said Jose Miguel Vivanco, the Americas director of Human Rights Watch. "This is a violation of the basic rules of due process."
Write to Kejal Vyas at kejal.vyas@wsj.com
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· · · · ·
Щодо Росії запровадять додаткові економічні санкції - про це розповів Барак Обама. Президент США дав інтерв'ю американському телеканалу NBC. Він зазначив, Штати - не планують військового втручання в ситуацію в Україні. Обама переконаний, це не принесе користі саме українцям.
Барак Обама, президент США:
- Ми плануємо мобілізувати увесь наш дипломатичний потенціал, створити сильну міжнародну коаліцію, яка посилатиме Росії чіткий сигнал - українці повинні самостійно вирішувати власну долю. Росія нині порушує міжнародне право та суверенітет сусідньої країни. І ми плануємо й надалі посилювати тиск на неї.
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Alexei Beltyukov has his own personal reasons for being involved with the Skolkovo Foundation. After all, this organization was set up to provide entrepreneurs with opportunities—opportunities that Beltyukov himself was never given.
He ascended to successful entrepreneur status slowly but surely. When he was born—during the Soviet era—being an entrepreneur was considered criminal activity. In time, with the Soviet collapse, that changed. Alexei Beltyukov experienced his own version of the American Dream—set in Russia, of course—and slowly but surely pulled himself up to the status of successful business owner.
Through trial and error, he has developed a network of several successful companies. Now, he is in a position where he can give back. He does so through his volunteer position with the Skolkovo Foundation.
About the Skolkovo Foundation
The Skolkovo Foundation is on a single-minded mission to revamp the entire Russian economy. Here are some quick facts:
- The foundation was established in 2010, as a partnership between the Russian government and local businesses. Some of the foundation work was also steered by experts from MIT and other international organizations.
- The mission of the foundation has always been to spur economic growth through promoting innovation and entrepreneurship.
- The foundation builds up a center for technological innovation, focusing on the fields of clean energy, space exploration, biomedicine, and IT.
- The foundation also provides grant money and tax incentives to technology ventures throughout Russia.
Economic Benefits
The Skolkovo Foundation offers many economic benefits. Helping Russia’s economy to thrive is the organization’s central goal, and it has found success in a number of ways.
Giving Technology Start-ups the Boost They Need
Clearly, the foundation is startup-centric. It works to promote the values of entrepreneurship throughout Russia. This is easier said than done, as many Russian professionals still have a Soviet mindset—that is, one in which business ownership is essentially criminal activity.
The foundation seeks to remove those outdated notions, and also to provide entrepreneurs and scientists with every opportunity to succeed. It does so in a couple of key financial ways: Through tax incentives and through grant money. The foundation has been given special powers by the government to award tax breaks.
Consultancy Services Make a Difference
In bestowing these tax breaks and grants, Skolkovo is not just helping small businesses; it ultimately helps the entire Russian economy, as it facilitates the growth and development of independent enterprises. This would not be the case if the foundation simply doled out money and then left companies to continue making unwise or impractical decisions, however. It also provides consultations.
Innovation Helps Everyone
Skolkovo also operates facilities in which new technologies and business innovations are developed and tested. These developments encompass everything from green energy to business IT. In promoting innovation, the Skolkovo foundation helps to ensure that the Russian economy remains nimble and adaptable—and that its small businesses have the technologies they need to compete in global marketplaces.
Heightened Standards of Transparency
A final way in which the Skolkovo Foundation helps the Russian economy is by bringing about greater standards of ethics and integrity. The foundation seeks to ensure that corruption and dishonesty have no place in its process, at any point. Into its application process it has built the following anti-corruption checks:
The entire application process takes place online, with no human contact involved. This is a benefit because it ensures there is no chance for bribery, and that applicants can be certain that their projects will be reviewed on their merits and nothing else.
All applications are reviewed by fair and nonpartisan science and business leaders—none of whom are Skolkovo Foundation employees, and many of whom do not even live in Russia.
Finally, the grants are ultimately awarded by a committee including ex-ministers, professors, and businessmen, all of whom are unbiased and none of whom are Skolkovo Foundation employees.
Given how much corruption can poison an otherwise healthy economy, these efforts are advantageous for all of Russia—not just those directly impacted by the Skolkovo Foundation.
The same could be said of everything this organization does. While its immediate focus is on new ventures, the Skolkovo Foundation is really bringing about a new, positive era for the Russian economy.
ABOUT:
As a seasoned MD, salesman, and teacher, Beltyukov is one of the most versatile and respected entrepreneurs in Russia. He started developing a name for himself shortly after the fall of the Soviet Union, and since that time has developed numerous successful businesses. He is currently involved with the Skolkovo Foundation, which seeks to provide opportunities for technology entrepreneurs in Russia. Alexei Beltyukov is zealous for assisting entrepreneurs, giving them some of the opportunities that he was never given.
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· · · ·
SEVASTOPOL, Crimea — Bowing to the reality of the Russian military occupation of Crimea a day after Russia announced it was annexing the disputed peninsula, the Ukrainian government said on Wednesday that it had drawn up plans to evacuate all of its military personnel and their families and was prepared to relocate as many as 25,000 of them to mainland Ukraine.
Thousands of Ukrainian soldiers and sailors have been trapped on military bases and other installations here for more than two weeks, surrounded by heavily armed Russian military forces and loosely organized local militia.
While the provisional government in Kiev has insisted that Russia’s annexation of Crimea is illegal and has appealed to international supporters for help, the evacuation announcement by the head of the national security council, Andriy Parubiy, effectively amounted to a surrender of Crimea, at least from a military standpoint.
It came hours after militiamen, backed by Russian forces, seized the headquarters of the Ukrainian navy in Sevastopol and detained its commander.
Officers of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, which is also headquartered here, later entered the base through its main gates as Ukrainian military personnel streamed out carrying clothing and other personal belongings.
The takeover proceeded as anger intensified in the West over Russia’s move to annex Crimea, with calls for Russia’s expulsion from important international bodies such as the G-8 grouping of leading economic powers. At the same time, Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. continued his effort to reassure American allies in the Baltic region, once part of the Soviet Union, that the United States would protect them from any aggression by Russia.
The United Nations said Wednesday that Ban Ki-moon, the secretary general, would fly to Moscow and Kiev, the capital of Ukraine, on Thursday and Friday for meetings with leaders, including President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, whose moves to reclaim Crimea have set off the biggest crisis in East-West relations since the Soviet Union’s demise two decades ago.
Mr. Ban has expressed disappointment over the Kremlin-backed weekend referendum in Crimea that created the basis for Russia’s annexation, but he has said nothing about whether he considers the Russian step to be illegal. The United States and other Western members of the Security Council, which was meeting later Thursday, proposed a resolution last Saturday declaring the referendum illegal but Russia vetoed that measure.
At the Ukrainian naval headquarters here, soldiers with machine guns, wearing green camouflage but still no identifying insignia, were deployed in and around the base. A large military truck parked just outside the base bore the black-and-white license plates of the Russian forces.
Although the gates were forced open during the initial storming of the base, there were no reports of shooting or injuries. And while there was no indication that the Ukrainian government was prepared to issue a formal surrender in Crimea, capitulation by military units surrounded throughout the peninsulaseemed increasingly inevitable.
When asked why they did not return fire, one Ukrainian soldier leaving the base here said, “We had no order and no weapons.” Another said, “We met them empty-handed.”
On Tuesday evening, after reports that a shooting at another military installation, not far from the Crimean capital of Simferopol, had left at least one Ukrainian soldier dead, the Ukrainian Defense Ministry in Kiev issued a statement saying its troops had been authorized to use force to defend themselves.
At the base here in Sevastopol, however, the troops seemed to feel less of a threat of deadly harm, than the resolute sense of facing eviction at gunpoint.
Andrew Yankov, a member of a local self-defense group who was present during the takeover, described the action as “a big victory.”
“We stood here for weeks and now we’re finally successful,” Mr. Yankov said. “It’s also freedom for the guys inside. We took responsibility. They’re happy because they’re tired. They want to go home.”
At a far side of the base, local militia units appeared to be looting some equipment, removing a refrigerator through one gate, and throwing bags over the walls, which were then loaded onto a truck.
The base, likes other military installations across Crimea, has been surrounded since shortly after Russian forces occupied the region at the beginning of March.
The local militiamen have been guarding the perimeter of the base along with professional soldiers who have no identifying badges but whose equipment and organization leave little doubt they are Russian military personnel. The militiamen entered the base around 8 a.m. and an hour or so later hoisted a Russian flag on the main flagpole.
The seizure came a day after Mr. Putin reclaimed Crimea as a part of Russia, reversing what he described as a historical injustice made by the Soviet Union 60 years ago and brushing aside international condemnation that could leave Russia shunned internationally.
The United States and Western allies have begun imposing economic sanctions to punish Russia for the incursion into Crimea, but it is not clear that they are prepared for any action that would prevent the Russian annexation from moving forward.
On Wednesday, there were reports from several bases that Russian forces and local militias were gathering in anticipation of seizing control, in Novoozornoe, on a lake not far from the city of Yevpatoriaa on the western coast of Crimea.
Russia’s annexation of Crimea drew broad Western protest on Tuesday as governments scrambled to find a response to the Kremlin’s audacious moves, which have unfolded with remarkable haste since the stealthy takeover of the strategic peninsula began.
Speaking in Parliament on Wednesday, Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain said the world’s leading industrialized countries should consider expelling Russia permanently from the G-8 grouping. The United States, Britain and their allies in the older G-7 body are meeting in The Hague next week to debate further measures against Russia, which will not be present at the gathering.
“I think it’s important that we move together with our allies and partners and I think we should be discussing whether or not to expel Russia permanently from the G-8 if further steps are taken,” Mr. Cameron told Parliament, echoing a similar call several weeks ago by Secretary of State John Kerry. “That’s the meeting we’ll have on Monday and I think that’s the right way to proceed.”
Before the crisis in Crimea, Mr. Putin was scheduled to host a gathering of the G-8 countries in June in Sochi, where the Winter Olympics and Paralympic Games were held, but Western countries have suspended their participation.
On Thursday, leaders of the 28-nation European Union are scheduled to discuss a response to Russia’s moves.
“If we turn away from this crisis and don’t act,” Mr. Cameron said, “we will pay a very high price in the longer term.”
Germany’s government, by contrast, has expressed more caution, reflecting its deep intertwined economic relations with Russia. Although Chancellor Angela Merkel took a tough tone with Moscow in public last week, business executives in Germany are reluctant to jeopardize trade ties, and diplomats and officials steeped in decades of conciliation with Russia are hesitant to sever avenues for negotiation. High-level talks scheduled for April have not been canceled.
Nonetheless, the German government spokesman, Steffen Seibert, speaking Wednesday after Ms. Merkel’s weekly cabinet meeting, said that Russia was “pursuing a path of international isolation, and it is a path containing great dangers for the coexistence of states in Europe.”
He also gave the first official response to Mr. Putin’s appeal on Tuesday to ordinary Germans to support what he depicted as Russian reunification, just as Russia had supported German reunification in 1990.
German reunification had brought together two German states, Mr. Seibert said, while “Russia’s intervention by contrast is leading to a division of Ukraine.”
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WASHINGTON — A Defense Department review of the mass shooting that killed 12 people at the Washington Navy Yard in September has concluded that the deaths could have been prevented if the Navy had properly evaluated and reported alarming behavior by the gunman, Aaron Alexis, a former Navy reservist.
At a Pentagon news conference on Tuesday, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel released the review along with an independent review that found that threats to military men and women were increasingly coming from within, including from colleagues with security clearances.
In response to both reviews, Mr. Hagel ordered new security procedures at the Pentagon and at American military bases in the United States and overseas.
The independent review called the overall security process at Pentagon installations outdated, with too much focus on keeping a secure perimeter against outside threats and not enough on examining the potential threats from people granted secret-level clearance to enter the installations. The review recommended that the Pentagon examine the number of people with security clearances and consider revoking at least 10 percent of them.
Mr. Hagel said the reviews found “troubling gaps” in the Defense Department’s “ability to detect, prevent and respond to instances where someone working for us — a government employee, member of our military, or a contractor — decides to inflict harm on this institution and its people.”
A month before the Navy Yard shooting, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan was convicted of carrying out the largest mass murder at a military installation in American history, a shooting in November 2009 that killed 13 people and left more than 30 wounded at a medical deployment center at Fort Hood, Tex.
From 2007 to 2011, Mr. Alexis was a full-time reservist in the Navy, where he served as an aviation electrician’s mate and achieved the rank of petty officer third class. At the time of the shooting, he worked for a company called the Experts that was a subcontractor for Hewlett-Packard and serviced the Navy’s Internet system. He had a secret-level clearance.
On the morning of Sept. 16, Mr. Alexis entered the base with a concealed, sawed-off shotgun, killed 12 people and wounded four others before he was killed by the police an hour and a half after he first opened fire.
The Defense Department review found that both Navy officials and Mr. Alexis’ employers should have raised alerts about events in Mr. Alexis’ history that the review portrayed as red flags. In particular, the report took the contracting companies to task for not taking any action to deal with his “emotional, mental and personality condition, even when they had concerns” that he could harm others.
“Had this information been reported, properly adjudicated and acted upon,” the review said, Mr. Alexis’ “authorization to access secure facilities and information would have been revoked.”
In 2004, three years before enlisting as a Navy reservist, Mr. Alexis brandished a .45-caliber pistol and fired at the tires of a construction worker’s car. In September 2010, he was arrested by the police in Fort Worth after he fired through the ceiling of his residence. But commanders stopped efforts to force Mr. Alexis out of the Navy with a less-than-honorable discharge because the police declined to pursue the case, and it was not entered into his military file.
In August 2013, a few weeks before the shooting, Mr. Alexis told the police in Rhode Island that he was hearing voices sent by a “microwave machine,” prompting the authorities to fax a report to a naval police in Newport, where Mr. Alexis was working temporarily as a contractor. But the naval police did not alert superiors in Washington.
At the time, Mr. Alexis’ company temporarily withdrew his access to classified information and contacted his mother, who told them, according to a subsequent company investigation, that her son was paranoid and that the microwave episode was not the first of that kind he had experienced. But the report said the company restored his secure access after concluding that the information was based on rumor.
Paul N. Stockton, a former assistant secretary of defense who worked on the independent review, told reporters at the news conference that for decades the military has operated on the premise that “if we build a fence around us, we’ll be secure.” But he said that approach “is outmoded, it’s broken, and it needs to be replaced.” Much more needs to be done, he added, to make sure that people working on American military bases are not dangerous to others.
The independent review, led by Mr. Stockton, also suggested conducting more background checks on people who already have security clearances.
Currently security clearances are reviewed every five or 10 years, depending on the level of clearance. “The assessment is that that approach limits our ability to understand the evolution that may occur in a person’s life that may have them evolve from a trusted insider to an insider threat,” said Marcel Lettre, the principal deputy under secretary of defense for intelligence, who spoke at the news conference.
Defense officials said they would also work to “de-stigmatize” mental health treatment in the military, although they did not go into specifics on how.
Mr. Stockton said one possibility might be changing the question on standard security questionnaires. The current form, he said, asks whether a respondent seeks mental health care.
“I believe that this question ought to be drastically changed,” he said, adding that “self-reporting is inherently unreliable.”
But defense officials also said that they must try to make sure that military men and women, and the civilians who work with them, do not end up getting the message that they will be fired if they seek mental health care.
“It is important as we move forward to think about the services that we can provide to both our military and our civilian work force to help them as they determine they may need to seek mental health counseling,” Mr. Lettre said. “And we need to make sure that we do that in conjunction with, in parallel with the other efforts that we’ve undertaken here to deal with the insider threat challenge.”
Representative Darrell Issa, the California Republican who is chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, said in a statement on Tuesday that it was “imperative that we fix these glaring problems before another tragedy occurs.”
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The New York Times reports a Defense Department review of the mass shooting that killed 12 people at the Washington Navy Yard in September has concluded that the deaths could have been prevented if the Navy had properly evaluated and reported alarming behavior by the gunman, Aaron Alexis, a former Navy reservist. At a Pentagon news conference on Tuesday, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel released the review along with an independent review that found that threats to military men and women were increasingly coming from within, including from colleagues with security clearances. In response to both reviews, Hagel ordered new security procedures at the Pentagon and at American military bases in the United States and overseas.
