By Fait Accompli, Not Coercion: How States Wrest Territory from Their Adversaries
Journal: Harvard Dataverse
Year: 2017

In February 2014, Russia decided to wrest the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine. Moscow could have threatened to attack Ukraine if Kiev failed to relinquish Crimea. However, Russia did not attempt coercion. Russia unilaterally occupied and annexed the territory, gambling that it could take Crimea without provoking war. This alternative strategy—the fait accompli—receives little scholarly attention. At issue is a fundamental question of statecraft in international politics: How do states make gains?