How Big a Deal is 1991?

Political Science and International Law — don’t fall for either. They’re good for brief instances of argumentation. Are you stuck on the principled value of ‘Ukrainian sovereignty’ and on the consequence of that sovereign identity to Europe and European identity?  I give you ‘Yugoslavian sovereignty.’  Meh. Would you feel a moral imperative to fight (using NATO maybe) for the sovereignty of Georgia? Armenia? Azerbaijan? Any of the stans? Is Uti Possidetis that big a deal? Here are a few thoughts on that from a guy who did some thinking on that: Steven R. Ratner, “Drawing a Better Line: Uti Possidetis and the Borders of New States,” The American Journal of International Law, Vol. 90, No. 4 (Oct., 1996), pp. 590-624 (35 pages). I have no idea how Mr. Ratner feels about Ukrainian sovereign identity, but I think it’s worth something. I just don’t think it has to have all the square miles assigned to it that the Russians assigned to it before 1991.