See what happened in Ukraine's neighboring country, Moldova, 24 years ago: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_Transnistria Moldova had a population of ethnic Russians that lived on the Eastern bank of the river D'niest'r. (Similar to the Crimean region in Ukraine.) Eventually a civil war broke out, and Russia stepped in to back the ethnically Russian region (sound familiar?). The end result was a stalemate. A ceasef…
> different language (Russian, not Moldovan) The official language of the Republic of Moldova is Romanian[1]. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_Moldova
When given the option in a 2004 census, 60% of the population chose 'Moldovan' as their native language, compared to 16.5% who chose 'Romanian'.