It's been two weeks since Vladimir Putin asked the upper chamber of the Russian parliament to authorize the use of force in Ukraine. Since then, he's non-invaded Crimea, which is today voting on whether it wants to join Russia, though we already know what the answer is going to be since there's no "no" option on the referendum ballot. Even without the referendum, though, Crimea is already de facto his, and has been for at least the last week.

Putin has also shown that he was serious about using force not just in Crimea, but in Ukraine proper. So far, he has kept it just to busing in hooligans into eastern Ukraine to act as grassroots pro-Russian protesters. But make no mistake, Putin is about to take eastern Ukraine, too.

To wit: On Saturday, the two-week anniversary of the authorization, the Russian foreign ministry was already laying the foundations for such a seizure, saying that it was being flooded with requests from citizens across eastern Ukraine, asking the Russians for protection against the western Ukrainian fascists.

But that’s just the pretext, not the reason. When Putin asked for and got his authorization, I wrote that, in predicting Russia’s actions these days, pessimism always wins. But, in this case, it isn’t just simple nastiness that’s going to drive this. For the first time in this manufactured crisis, Putin is going to be acting out of sheer pragmatism and necessity.

Take what else happened on Saturday. About 80 soldiers wearing uniforms without insignia took over a gas plant just across the Crimean border, in the Kherson region of Ukraine. Quoth the Times: