The Standoff At Belbek: Inside The First Clash Of The Second Crimean War -- Simon Shuster, Time
After he decided Russian ultimatums to surrender were a bluff, Ukrainian base commander Yuli Mamchur played a mind game of his own by marching to a Russian-occupied airfield while carrying a Soviet flag in a gambit the Russian troops wouldn't open fire
The Ukrainian troops kept the bonfires burning all night on Monday, kicking stones into the embers and waiting for the sun to rise over the Belbek air force base in southern Ukraine. Five days had passed since the start of the siege against them and the strain on the troops was starting to show. The previous day, the Russian forces surrounding their base had issued another ultimatum – surrender your weapons that night and sign an oath of allegiance to Russia or face an assault by 5:00 a.m. The commanders had refused. Some of the troops had defected. The rest stood around the garrison, smoking cigarettes and twitching when the logs popped in the fires. They only understood that the Russians had been bluffing when the roosters started to crow.
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My Comment: In the old Soviet Union .... these Ukrainian soldiers would probably have been shot down ... but times have changed. What this Ukrainian base commander did was very brave .... but he calculated correctly that these Russian military soldiers were professionals (not conscripts), and that they were under strict orders with strict rules of engagement (from the top) not to shoot unless being shot at. Having the international media with him probably helped also.
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