Ever since the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991, the United States has pursued a strategy of encircling Russia. It has expanded NATO right to the borders of Russia, including a military outpost in Georgia, incorporating twelve former Soviet allies in central Europe. This is in direct contravention of George H. W. Bush's promise not to extend NATO when Germany was reunited.

The EU also played a significant role. Its offer of free trade to Ukraine actually included military clauses that called for integrating Ukraine into the EU defense structure, including cooperation on "civilian and military crisis management operations" and "relevant exercises" concerning them.

In other words, the United States and NATO continue to fight the Cold War after it had ended long ago.

There is no denying that they engineered the putsch that ousted Ukraine President Yanukovych. It is understandable that Russia, whose interests are seriously threatened, reacted to these developments strongly.

As the Ukraine crisis intensifies, hawkish bluster fills the U.S. airwaves. Right-wing commentators claim that it is not only Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity that is at stake in the crisis, but also Washington's "credibility" as a global superpower. Obama is criticized for "taking the stick off the table."

Super hawks like Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer, Freedom House President David Kramer and the Wall Street Journal editorial page called for Obama to deploy naval ships in the Black Sea.

So far no responsible official has joined their war mongering. Even though the Ukrainian media has been touting the possibility of the super-carrier USS George H. W. Bush and three nuclear subs entering the Black Sea, it sounds more like wishful thinking. Ukraine is not a NATO member. Washington has no cause to confront Moscow militarily.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has always been a bête noire to the Western media, is being further demonized as somebody who has lost touch with reality. A Washington Post editorial has ridiculed the claim by Russian TV that "fascists" and other armed extremists violently seized power in Ukraine. But that was exactly what happened. A fact shrugged off by the mainstream media as "a few ultra-nationalists."

One of three major parties in the interim government, Svoboda ("Freedom") has been condemned by the European Parliament for its "racist, anti-Semitic and xenophobic views." It is in fact a neo-fascist party. Its leader Oleh Tyahnybok is a top official of the Parliament, a man Russia regards as the biggest threat in Ukraine.

Tyahnybok is not alone. Svoboda activists hold at least eight top cabinet positions, including Ihor Tenyukh -- interim defense minister; Andriy Parubiy -- National Security Council head and Dmytro Yarosh -- deputy head of the National Security Council. He is also the founder-leader of "Right Sector," a neo-Nazi paramilitary group in charge of security in Maidan Square. Oleh Makhnitsky -- prosecutor-general and Oleksandr Sych -- Svoboda's chief ideologist, is deputy prime minister for economic affairs. Serhiy Kvit is to head up the Education Ministry. Andriy Moknyk will be minister of ecology and Ihor Shvaika minister of agriculture.

It was Yorash's paramilitary group that played a key role in accomplishing the regime change and became the nucleus of the reconstituted police force. Urmas Paet, the Estonian foreign minister who was recently in Kiev, revealed in a leaked conversation with EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton that the snipers who fired on protestors were actually hired by the protest leaders themselves.

These are what the U.S. media called "a few ultra-nationalists."

Acting President Oleksandr Turchynov is a Baptist in an overwhelmingly Eastern Orthodox country. There are only 135,000 Baptists in a population of 45 million. Most protestants in Ukraine were recently converted after the country allowed missionaries, particularly from the United States, to proselytize in Ukraine.

So it looks like the U.S strategy is full-spectrum encirclement of Russia.

The author is a columnist with China.org.cn. For more information please visit: http://www.china.org.cn/opinion/zhaojinglun.htm

Opinion articles reflect the views of their authors, not necessarily those of China.org.cn.

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