That is why, soon after Yanukovych decided to flee to Russia, Putin’s “little green men” began to appear openly in Crimea, while Russian Buk anti-aircraft missiles and Russian battalion battle groups appeared in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region not long after. In annexing Crimea and stoking separatist violence in Donbas, the Kremlin’s aim has clearly been to destabilize Ukraine in order to bring it under Russia’s thumb.