in the campaign “Beginning of the Russo-Ukrainian War: Armed Invasion and Occupation of Crimea (2014)”
The manufacturing of an appearance of mass pro-Russian mobilization on the peninsula: behind the "self-defense forces," in whose name the operation was conducted, stood Russian troops, as Putin admitted on 17 April 2014: "behind the backs of Crimea's self-defense forces, our servicemen, of course, stood"[1]. Rally and "volunteer" crowds supplied the picture of a popular impulse whose legal significance the UN rejected[2].