maybe the Crimean/Ukraine Geo-political event is a Claytons...

maybe the Crimean/Ukraine Geo-political event is a Claytons geo-political event...the kind u have when your not having one...

Dunno!


The BEST NEWS and ANALYSIS is on HOTCOPPER.


From ONCEOVER's brilliant post......#10268554




So now, as a rather chunky shareholder, what do I think is the most likely outcome going forward?

Probably this:

1. The Russians will get the Crimea, either as a part of an enlarged Russia, or far more likely as a nominally independent but closely allied client state: in a similar way to Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which were similarly, and very ruthlessly wrested from the post Soviet nation of Georgia.

Which leaves me feeling very sorry for the Crimean Tartars, the Turkik Moslems who made up 85% of the population of Crimea in the 1940s, when they were dispossessed, deported, starved or murdered en-masse by Joseph Stalin. It appears that the 600,000 of them that remain are just about to go under the boot-heel again.

But Crimea is all that I think the Russians want really: to secure their warm water naval Port at Sevastopol, not to lose it, or see it consumed by the the mayhem that now hems in and threatens their other western warm water naval port, at Tartus in Syria.

Which will be easy, because Crimea is virtually an island, they have already occupied it militarily, and it is easily secured and defended, with a majority of the population now Russian speaking and apparently compliant.

I also think that the west will let them have it without very much fuss, as there is little that they can do about it, apart from go to war with a nuclear-armed nation run by a homicidal kleptocracy, which nobody really wants to do if they can avoid it.

2. I don't think the Russians will go any further or attempt to take the three or four other majority Russian-speaking eastern Ukrainian provinces.

Those may be bargaining chips, but they would be mad to try to occupy a chunk of eastern Ukraine, as it would embroil them in a civil war that would make Afghanistan in the 70s and 80s look mild by comparison, and which would probably bring Russia to its knees in the end.

3. So that will probably be the deal that's finally done with the West: Russia gets Crimea, Ukraine keeps the rest, and then everybody goes back home and leaves them to it.


4. Having got the Crimea, it will then be a question of whether the new authorities are prepared to recognise the rights of the layer of companies that comprise the holding structure through which AWD ultimately hold their entitlement to their share of oil production.

AWD directors appear to have said (reported here) that there is a reasonable chance that their ultimate interests will be recognised.

Which then, whether it is in Ukraine, in an independent Crimea or Russia, probably comes down to which powerful individuals are on their side and still stand to benefit from that.

5. And I think that if it is an independent Crimea, it may be relatively easy to preserve and transfer the relevant beneficiaries and interests, plus a few more added on perhaps.

6. If it becomes part of Russia, well I don't think the realistic system or culture will have changed, it is simply a matter of whether the key individuals can keep things in AWD's and their hands, or whether some other big fish comes along and swallows it all up.

7. And if by some miracle of Western soft power, horse trading or coercion, it reverts to Ukraine, then it will probably be status quo, at least for long enough to get the prospect financed and drilled.

All we really need is a definite political outcome, where we retain operatorship and effective entitlement to our share of the oil that is produced, in a resulting jurisdiction that is stable enough to attract the necessary finance.

And I think that there is a fair chance that we will get that in the end.