Secretary of State John Kerry Shames Russia for Invading Ukraine: “It’s Really 19th Century Behavior in the 21st Century”

Does President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry realize that Russian President Vladimir Putin is former KGB … he has no shame.

Secretary of State John Kerry made an appearance on NBC’s ‘Meet the Press’ today to discuss the current crisis with the Russian invasion of the Crimea region in Ukraine. Sec. Kerry spoke sternly toward the Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine. Kerry said to David Gregory, “you just don’t invade another country on phony pretext in order to assert your interests.”  Does the Obama administration understand that Putin thinks that you do invade another country to assert your interests? Kerry’s tough talk ought to make Putin reconsider invasion. NOT!!!

Well, we’re now discussing all of the options. This is an act of aggression that is completely trumped up in terms of its pretext. It’s really 19th-century behavior in the 21st century, and there’s no way to start with that if Russia persists in this, that the G8 countries are going to reassemble in Sochi. That’s a starter. But there’s much more than that.

Just a note to Barack Obama and John Kerry, Vladimir Putin is not John Boehner nor Mitch McConnell.

Full transcript can be read here at NBC News, ‘Meet the Press’.

SECRETARY JOHN KERRY:

Well, we’re now discussing all of the options. This is an act of aggression that is completely trumped up in terms of its pretext. It’s really 19th-century behavior in the 21st century, and there’s no way to start with that if Russia persists in this, that the G8 countries are going to reassemble in Sochi. That’s a starter. But there’s much more than that.

Russia has major investment in trade needs and desires. I think there’s a unified view by all of the foreign ministers I talked with yesterday, all of the G8 and more, that they’re simply going to isolate Russia. That they’re not going to engage with Russia in a normal, business-as-usual manner.

Because Russia is inviting opprobrium on the international stage. There could even be ultimately asset freezes, visa bans. There could be certainly a disruption of any of the normal trade routine, and there could be business drawback on investment in the country. The ruble is already going down and feeling the impact of this.

And the reason for this, David, is because you just don’t invade another country on phony pretext in order to assert your interests. There are ways to deal with this. And President Putin knows that. President Obama yesterday offered mediation. There are plenty of ways to protect Russian-speaking people in Crimea or other parts of Ukraine. But they are really sort of a hidden pretext here, possibly trying to annex Crimea.