Crimea had been a part of Russia or the former Soviet Union for over 300 years. Crimea was primarily Russian. They booted the indigenous Tartars long ago although many Tartars remained. There wasn't a hope in hell that Russia would give up its naval base and that was one of the plans of the Ukraine's and the US as well was to force them out. It was more an accident of history that when Khrushchev granted Ukraine a republic as part of the Soviet Union that it included Crimea. Russians had been in Crimea for centuries. Hardly forced them there .