Putin is not "the new Hitler", but the Russian movement of troops into the Crimea and the subsequent annexation is very much more similar to the Sudetenland crisis than to Grenada.

Actually, I think Russia is not so much like pre WWII Germany, but rather more similar to the pre WWI Ottoman Empire. An empire which has outlasted its usefulness, filled with corruption, not keeping up economically and bent on keeping what tatters of prestige it still enjoys. Is Russia a dynamic, industrial powerhouse (like Hitler's Germany) which is seeking 'breathing room,' or is it clinging to maintain its archaic system of 'client states,' knowing that if it is unsuccessful it will ultimately have to defend a long, virtually indefensible border to keep out the hordes.

if not the best, historical analogies that I have seen so far.

In the Sudetenland, Hitler's media publicized atrocies alleged to have been committed against ethnic Germans, done expressly to give him an excuse to march in to "save" them. The Sudetenland had never been a part of Germany; it was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire prior to WWI.

Crimea was formerly part of the USSR and there is an existent treaty governing Russia's presence there. Events in Ukraine that threatened stability in Crimea - events caused by lots of interference and encouragement from the West, btw, and that have done little to change things for ordinary Ukrainians (merely exchanging one group of corrupt oligarchs for another) - gave Putin credible reason to move in to protect Russia's very real interests in Crimea.

Do I support Putin's actions? No. But I find them wholly understandable and much more geo-politically justified than a) the US invasion of Grenada (likely the closest geographical analogy to any US "interest" under "threat&quot and certainly b) the US-led 2003 invasion of Iraq. Justifying the latter by saying that we sought UN approval is disingenuous at the very least, especially when that approval was based on Colin Powell's trading his honor for a mess of pottage and presenting lies as facts before the UN.

We have no moral high ground. None.

He's not Hitler, in that he isn't rounding up minorities and sending them to concentration camps, although there are some minority groups he doesn't like and doesn't seem to care how they're treated. But some of his military moves are very similar to what Hitler did in central Europe.

His motivations are similar as well. He says he's protecting ethnic Russians, just as Hitler made the excuse that he was protecting German (and German-speaking) peoples. Putin appears to think there's something special about Russians, just as Hitler was fixated on Germans, and feels like they should all be united to their mother country.

Of course, in Hitler's case and in Putin's, this is more of a land grab. Hitler wanted to build a reich that would last 1000 years. Putin wants to restore the former glory of the Soviet Union as a major power in the world. Just as with Hitler, I think the only way to stop Putin is with U.S. intervention.

However, we have many more options at our disposal than Roosevelt had in his time. We can harm Russia economically, which could stir up a lot of problems for Putin with the Russian people. We can give Putin a lot of domestic problems to deal with so he'll have to deal with domestic problems rather than focusing his attention outward.

Hitler was fairly elected.

then Hitler was "fairly elected"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_presidential_election,_1932

Here's a guy who didn't see a war of aggression when it was planned and carried out under the command of a certain war criminal named Tony Blair, but when the New Cold War beckons, he obediently lines up to cry, Hitler, Hitler!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014808179