As I understand, the Ukrainian government and its Western backers are eager to prevent the planned for May 11 referendums in eastern Ukraine. The planned for May 25 all-Ukrainian referendum was also canceled. In plain English: the population should have no say in any way. The West and the Kiev putschists know they can not "pacify" eastern Ukraine with the iron fist, thus the spiral of violence and counter-violence will enhance further. And it´s obvious that the US strategists want to escalate the conflict further, thus forcing Russia, sooner or later, to intervene. This will ensure that all plans by the US imperialists will work to perfection (further isolation and destabilization of Russia, splitting the EU/Russia partnership) and their 5 billion USD investement will pay huge dividends: The germans need to get the gas from the US multis, "free markets" will be implemented in Ukraine (I read that US multis have already bid for the shale gas resources in Ukraine), the IMF can expand their debitor market, Monsanto gets the agriculture market, TTIP will be expanded up to the borders of Russia, NATO-military bases will be put onto Ukraine ground, the "defensive" ICBM system grounded on the doorstep of Russia, all together: The US economy is saved on the backs of the poor again.
Now most of us saw all that coming. But for what? Our only "win" is that the fools and MSM believers in this forum* are unmasked (those who believed in a true peoples revolution at Maidan, thought this mess was about freedom & human rights, and called us names. BTW, where are you "Buffalo", "del1962", "toreBear", "VonMises"?)
So the better question is this: If Putin is the great chess player, and OFC knows all this, how will he go out as a winner in front of his citizens, at least saving face? Because if he don´t, Russia will be the next victim (once again) of US implemented Friedman economy. Jelzin area II... Mother Russia phucked forever.
* They are still better off, because they learn something, while the daily newspaper readers still have no clue and never will have. They still think higher taxes and gas prices are needed to support the new won friends in Ukraine (as if we don´t have enough $hit with the non elected EU bureaucracy, ESM, cutting of freedom & rights, and the already EU extension in place)... The fools who are "free" to elect their doomers (& mine. That´s why I hate them) every four years.