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The Americans are leaving Camp Leatherneck today. In a formal handover of the base they share with British troops, the last U.S. Marine battalion in Afghanistan turned the complex over to Afghan forces and began the process of heading home. The coalition base in southern Helmand Province was first established nearly six years ago.

For Britain, the day brought an end to 13 years of military operations in Afghanistan.

NPR's Sean Carberry describes the scene at the base:

"The U.S., U.K. and NATO flags are lowered at Camps Leatherneck and Bastion. As ceremonial music plays, dozens of Marines, British troops, and Afghan soldiers stand at attention.

" 'This transfer is a sign of progress,' says Brigadier. Gen. Daniel Yoo, part of the Marine unit that stormed southern Afghanistan in 2001. Today, he's closing down the last Marine mission in Afghanistan.

Afghan Army Gen. Cher Mohammed Karimi says he appreciates the work of NATO forces, and 'their sacrifices here, in the toughest area of Afghanistan.'

"Helmand continues to be one of the most violent provinces in Afghanistan. More than 350 Marines and 400 British forces have died here. And more than 700 Afghan forces have been killed in Helmand just this year."

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Marines play a game of cards as British and U.S. troops prepare to leave the Camp Bastion-Leatherneck complex at Lashkar Gah in Afghanistan's Helmand province. The base was formally handed over to an Afghan force Sunday. Wakil Kohsar/AFP/Getty Images hide caption

itoggle caption Wakil Kohsar/AFP/Getty Images

Marines play a game of cards as British and U.S. troops prepare to leave the Camp Bastion-Leatherneck complex at Lashkar Gah in Afghanistan's Helmand province. The base was formally handed over to an Afghan force Sunday.

Wakil Kohsar/AFP/Getty Images

Britain

Afghanistan

Marines

Back in the day, the city of Bluefields inspired poets. In truth, it should be paradise, because it sits in an enviable position along Nicaragua's Caribbean coast.

But as history unfolded, Bluefields became a forgotten city, cut off from the rest of the country by a vast jungle and different culture. As you walk its main street, you feel a struggle: Utility cables crisscross the streets, framing buildings, making them look like they're sagging under the weight of history. It rains so much that when paint peels off a piece of concrete, it doesn't take long for moss to set in. And no matter where you are, you're hit by the stench of open sewers.

Eight out of 10 people in this city are unemployed, yet there are stores everywhere and business seems brisk.

Roberto Campbell, a storekeeper who's hanging out on a wooden cart, says this place depends fully on the the drug trade.

"It's not no secret. Everybody knows that," he says in English. "The big businesses from here, if there are no drugs around, they cannot sell their articles. So when you see things are good, that means drugs are around."

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Downtown Bluefields is flush with businesses. This, despite the fact that most of the people in the region are considered unemployed. Juan Carlos /for NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Juan Carlos /for NPR

Downtown Bluefields is flush with businesses. This, despite the fact that most of the people in the region are considered unemployed.

Juan Carlos /for NPR

The drug trade is this city's blessing and its curse. It's a city that's part of a country that has managed to remain relatively peaceful despite being in one of the most dangerous regions in the world. Analysts say one of the explanations for that relative peace is that Nicaragua has taken a different approach to fighting drug trafficking.

Whether by circumstance or choice, it has foregone its neighbors' military approach for a less confrontational — and some would say more opportunistic — strategy. It's an approach that has helped the country avoid the kind of violence that makes international headlines, but also suggests an uncomfortably close relationship between the people, the government and the drug dealers.

Back in 2012, the citizens of Bluefields took to the streets to protest the arrest of a notorious kingpin. News footage showed hundreds of people marching around demanding "justice" and "freedom." The government alleged that Ted Hayman was involved in the drug trade, so they confiscated his home — a huge, gaudy structure in the hills surrounding Bluefields.

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Canal is one of the poorest neighborhoods the the coastal city of Bluefields. Juan Carlos for NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Juan Carlos for NPR

Canal is one of the poorest neighborhoods the the coastal city of Bluefields.

Juan Carlos for NPR

Donald Byers, who runs a museum about this region's history, says Hayman was Bluefields' Pablo Escobar, the Colombian drug lord who pumped his drug money into his hometown economy. There were entire neighborhoods that were on Hayman's payroll, so when he and a couple dozen of his deputies were imprisoned, the economy essentially collapsed.

"That Christmas you could feel Bluefields wasn't the Bluefields that I know," Byers says. "You could feel a big difference. You could see a lot of people with no work on the street. People were complaining, 'This damn government. It's just messing up. They don't give us work. This guy came and give us work and now they put him in jail.'"

Byers says when the clock struck midnight and Christmas Eve turned into Christmas, there were no fireworks like previous years. Instead, it was quiet; it was sad.

The Management Of Crime

On the surface, it seems like the Nicaraguan government is doing quite a bit to fight the drug war and that Bluefields is a place of perdition.

But reality is more complicated.

Cocaine Trafficking Routes Through Nicaragua

Source: United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime: "Transnational Organized Crime in Central America and the Caribbean" (September 2012)

Credit: Alyson Hurt / NPR

Nicaragua — the largest country in Central America — has a lengthy coastline on the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea. With its remote location, Bluefields is well placed to serve as a pit stop along the corridor where drugs travel from the South American producers to U.S. consumers.

What's more, the cocaine moving through Nicaragua's territory represents a higher share of GDP than any other Central American country, which in the words of the U.N.'s Office on Drugs and Crime, should give traffickers greater leverage to both sow more corruption and foment violence.

Instead, like the rest of Nicaragua, Bluefields is an outlier. For instance, its murder rate is relatively low. According to numbers compiled by the Mexican think tank The Citizen Council for Public Security and Penal Justice, San Pedro Sula in Honduras is the murder capital of the world with a homicide rate of 169 intentional homicides per 100,000 people; Belize City has a murder rate of 105. According to Nicaraguan government data, Bluefields has a homicide rate of 42 — just a touch lower than that of Detroit.

Before 2006, when Mexico's former President Felipe Caldern declared a war on drugs, none of this mattered. But as Mexico squeezed its cartels at home, the violence moved south in a big way, transforming Central America from a passive transit route to a central theater in the war on drugs.

Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala and Belize responded by fighting fire with fire, militarizing their response with funding and training from United States, under a new scheme called the Central American Regional Security Initiative (CARSI).

Nicaragua, partly because of its cold relationship with the United States, was mostly shut out of that funding and chose a different path.

In private, government officials will tell you that Nicaragua does what it can. It goes after local kingpins like Hayman, because it doesn't have the navy or air force to go after the big drug dealers that are inevitably moving large amounts of drugs across Nicaraguan territory.

Roberto Orozco, an expert on Nicaraguan security, believes, however, that this is a deliberate strategy.

"Nicaragua administers, manages its organized crime," Orozco says.

He says that countries like Honduras and Guatemala have at different points tried to do the same thing, but there is one huge difference: In Nicaragua, there is no turf war.

"Because in Nicaragua, there is only one mafia," Orozco says. "And that mafia controls the entire national territory."

When asked who that mafia is, Orozco laughs nervously, delivering a roundabout answer before finally saying, "When I say that Nicaragua manages organized crime, I mean that the business deals are made with representatives from the state."

In other words, Nicaragua essentially regulates the drug trade.

Jose Miguel Cruz, a professor at Florida International University who wrote his dissertation on what he calls "Nicaraguan exceptionalism" in matters of security, explains it like this: "People in the government know that the drugs are crossing there. But as long as they don't generate too much violence and too much conflict and disrupt the social order, they can just pass."

Cruz says that explanation makes sense, but there is no smoking gun to point to that kind of relationship between Nicaragua and the cartels.

Two members of the Nicaraguan government denied those kinds of allegations in interviews. But they're also not new. The United States Embassy in Managua made much the same claims in a secret 2006 diplomatic cable published by WikiLeaks.

The cable alleges that President Daniel Ortega and his party used money from international drug traffickers to finance political campaigns. As the U.S. cable explains, it's a relationship that dates back to the '80s, when Ortega cut a transit deal with Pablo Escobar. The Drug Enforcement Agency placed hidden cameras on one of Escobar's planes and they caught high-ranking Nicaraguan officials loading cocaine onto the aircraft.

When pressed, Jacinto Suarez, the governing party's international secretary, laughs off the allegations and points out that Nicaragua seizes tons of cocaine each year.

Then, growing angry, he says if the world wanted to fix the drug problem, the United States should look to its own people first.

"We're the ones dealing with all of the dead people and all of the fighting, yet the consumers, the ones who provoke the phenomenon, are the ones who also decide who is doing a good job combating drugs," Suarez says. "That's why, some leaders have said, 'Let's legalize this and let the drugs flow north. Because if we don't, the gringos are going to keep swallowing drugs, while we kill each other.'"

Pirates Prowl For 'White Lobsters'

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Fishermen cast their nets out in Bluefields Bay on Nicaragua's Caribbean coast. Juan Carlos for NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Juan Carlos for NPR

Fishermen cast their nets out in Bluefields Bay on Nicaragua's Caribbean coast.

Juan Carlos for NPR

The small wooden boats start heading out to Bluefields Bay even before the sun rises. As it peaks from the horizon, the water is dotted with men trying their luck on the ocean.

Jos Ral Snchez, a 36-year-old fisherman who has spent most of his life out at sea, says he's out here nearly every day. He says he's had opportunities to make money from the drug trade, but he's never done so. People will kill you for a kilo, he says.

On the other side of Sanchez's boat, his nephew gathers a net. The lead weights drag against bottom of the boat. Slowly, with the patience and skill of an old lady praying a rosary, he runs the net through his fingers, putting part of it in his mouth. Then, with a single movement, he throws. Out here, it's so quiet you can hear the nylon cut through the air.

Suddenly, past the mangroves, in the expanse of open ocean, we hear the roar of big engines.

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For many residents of Bluefields, there are only two choices when it comes to making a living: the drug trade or the ocean. Juan Carlos for NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Juan Carlos for NPR

For many residents of Bluefields, there are only two choices when it comes to making a living: the drug trade or the ocean.

Juan Carlos for NPR

Sanchez says those are the pirates, the guys on bigger boats who go looking for "white lobsters," or kilos of cocaine thrown overboard by drug traffickers trying to escape from authorities. He says when the pirates get their hands on a packet, whole neighborhoods benefit.

It presents a stark choice to all of Bluefields: embrace the drug trade or live in deep poverty.

Sanchez says he's seen the damage that drugs have caused young people, so he decides to stay above the fray. "I have a son, and I would not want him involved in that," he says.

In a lot of ways, the Nicaraguan government faces some of the same tough choices: Take on the drug trade with military might the way Honduras and El Salvador have done and risk greater violence, or accept corruption and allow the drug trade to operate.

As Orozco, the Nicaraguan security expert, sees it, the government has chosen the "lesser of two evils."

The government's approach "is much better, because we avoid the kind of extravagant crime you see in places like Mexico," he says, "where they hang a dozen people off an overpass."

To some extent, the kind of policies Nicaragua has chosen have started to gain traction internationally.

In 2011, The Global Commission on Drugs, a high-profile panel of world leaders – including former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and former U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker — declared that the "global war on drugs has failed." And this September, the commission followed up with a report recommending policies that work, including some legalization and encouraging countries to try regulating instead of prohibiting some aspects of the drug trade.

Orozco worries, however, that Nicaragua's relative peace is tenuous. The economic incentive for cartels to control this territory is huge. So how long, he asks, will it be before the Nicaraguan government's sole control is challenged by a well-heeled, well-armed cartel with little to lose?

This story was funded with a grant from the Ford Foundation, administered by the International Center for Journalists.

Nicaragua

war on drugs

Dr. Bhadelia spent 12 days caring for the sick in an Ebola ward. Her experience has convinced her that she must return. Courtesy of Nahid Bhadelia hide caption

itoggle caption Courtesy of Nahid Bhadelia

I am an infectious disease (ID) physician at Boston Medical Center, and I serve as the Director of Infection Control at National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratory, helping design medical response programs to potential exposures to viruses that cause viral hemorrhagic fevers. This summer I spent 12 days in Sierra Leone, serving as part of a team treating patients at Kenema Government Hospital's Ebola treatment center. The center was supported by the World Health Organization with guidance, logistics and clinicians. My colleagues and I were recruited through the Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network, a network that WHO hosts. I traveled with Dr. George Risi, a fellow ID doc, and Kate Hurley, RN, MSN, from St. Patrick's Hospital in Missoula, which provides medical backup to Rocky Mountain Laboratories.

My journey to Sierra Leone and Kenema Hospital to serve as a physician in the Ebola Treatment Unit (ETU) started more than a month before I actually traveled there. It is as much a mental journey as a physical one. What was once a textbook understanding of the virus quickly became an intimate experience of losing many around me to the disease. Before I left, traveling to West Africa to take care of these patients was an abstract humanitarian imperative for me. Now that I'm back, having seen what I have seen, I could never forgive myself if I did not make another trip.

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U.S. Doctor To Travel To Sierra Leone To Help Ebola Victims Aug. 20, 2014

The first day in Sierra Leone, the day of arrival, all of the flight attendants put on gloves shortly before we landed. As I walked out into the customs halls in Lungi Airport in Freetown, every wall was plastered with posters providing information about Ebola. We were asked to complete a health questionnaire and fever check — one of dozens I would receive during my time in the country. In the dark rainy night, the water taxi that carried us from Lungi airport to Freetown seemed otherworldly. Seeing my co-clinicians, who had arrived a few hours before me, at the hotel was a big step in helping me reorient to the purpose of my journey.

George, Kate and I needed to make it to Kenema in time to overlap with the outgoing team. It's a three and a half hour trip from Freetown. On the way, we saw many children on the streets. It was a weekday. We wondered why they were not in school. Our driver told us school had been canceled because of Ebola. In fact, there were no weddings, no baptisms. People had stopped gathering. In between small villages, the lush green landscape was dotted with occasional burned buildings, remnants of the civil war.

We arrived in Kenema and met the outgoing group at dinner. Their camaraderie was palpable. I could see how these relationships were critical. In this environment, you depend on the people you work with for your safety.

It was hard not to feel like the new kid.

We were somber at hearing about the continued dearth of healthcare workers and the patient load. On the first day at the treatment unit, we followed a clinician who'd been there for a while, learning about the available resources and the patients currently receiving treatment. Every thing I did that first day took a moment of reflection. OK, I am entering an ETU for the first time; I am now seeing and caring for an Ebola patient for the first time. I am carefully coming out of my personal protective equipment (PPE) for the first time in the field — a time I am statistically most likely to infect myself. But after every first time, anxiety turned into resolve, and practice made the process routine.

The following days were a blur. Hard work, the smell of chlorine, the heat. Each day started with a group breakfast, then the 10-minute drive to the hospital, a rush to get all the information, including overnight deaths, transfers, lab results. Although being inside the PPE was physically unbearable because of the heat, I felt a sense of urgency every morning to get into the unit.

At the hospital, we each collected our PPE. We counted out the six items every day, a trick to develop muscle memory: gloves, tyvek suit, hood, face shield, mask, rubber boots. It was our shield as we walked into battle. Or so it felt.

In pairs or as a team, we entered the low-risk area. Sullivan, the man at the entrance, always had a ready smile as he sprayed down our rubber boots with bleach solution. We entered the donning tent. I saw so many people in that tent and early on wondered who they were. They were porters, hygienists, food servers.

In the donning tent, we put on the equipment, checked each other out to check the suit for gaps and tears. I soon came to realize that you can spend an entire day with someone in PPE and not know what they look like. It's why we put our names on our aprons, the top layer of the PPE, so we'd know each other's identity.

And then we entered the high-risk zone. First it was the suspect wards, for patients who fit the case definition of Ebola and were waiting for a test to confirm the diagnosis. We called it the "Annex." which housed both those who will test positive and those who had symptoms similar to Ebola but may turn out to have another disease, like malaria. It was our daily challenge to separate the sick from those who are less symptomatic.

The minute we entered the high-risk zone, people were waiting on the landing of the ward entrance to ask what their test results were. Beyond the Annex were the confirmed ward and recovery wards. In the confirmed ward, the healing and the dying mingled. The hallways were filled with people at varying stages of their disease, from those on the road to recovery to those in the throes of their illness, coming to terms with the gravity of their situation. Many of these patients had already seen family members going through this and in some cases die. They were dehydrated, confused, looking at you, looking past you, too weak, bed bound, barely able to use the waste bucket next to their bed. Every day, it felt like you were putting out fires, trying to address the most urgent needs before your own resolve started to fade, your face shield fogged up, your mask was so filled with sweat you couldn't breathe.

In the ward, the patients whose tests shows they have recovered from Ebola have to be discharged so that we can make room for the new patients who have positive tests. Suspect patients who don't have the disease have to be quickly discharged so they do not contract the infection while in the ETU. By the time you got out in the afternoon, wondering where the past few hours had gone, you were spent.

On a typical day, I'd do either three two-hour shifts in the suit, or two three-hour shifts. The other six hours of the day I'd deal with case management and collect data to help with clinical care and keep tabs on this epidemic. And recover from the stress of being in the Ebola ward.

After getting out of the PPE, I would hydrate like a marathoner. The idea that I'd put my body through that again, let alone later that afternoon, seemed unreal. But then my mind started to equilibriate with the return of the fluid and the electrolytes and I'd became strong enough to ignore the complaints of my body.

Midday, we'd regroup and have lunch and share information about this patient or that. Some days I felt good coming out after a morning in the ward, as if I had made a difference and put things in order.

Then three hours later I'd go back in and faced chaos. It's as if fate was laughing at me. New patients had arrived who had not been tested; some were deathly ill. Patients who looked good only a few hours ago had taken a turn for the worst. Some even died in the interim.

The whole process started again: helping one human at a time and providing for immediate needs, while trying to keep my mind focused through the constant, "Doctor, doctor" requests coming from all directions.

One of the largest ethical dilemmas working in this environment was striking a balance between personal safety and patient survival. At times I'd have to leave the ward because the electricity was out and it was unsafe to continue working. It didn't matter that I had a child in my hands who needed my help. Logically, healthcare worker safety is paramount because loss of workers will further stymie the response to the epidemic. But in reality, in that moment, as the provider for that patient, it will be the hardest choice you will make.

At night, after our 12-hour days, we tried to spend some time with each other, decompressing. We tried to keep the mood light, joked, shared stories from home. We wondered if any of us could truly explain to others back home what this experience is really like. I tried to talk to family but exhaustion, and fear of revealing my own anxieties about contracting the disease, made me keep the conversations short.

And then I'd do something silly, something that went against all logical understanding of this disease. I cleaned all major surfaces in my room with bleach wipes as if I was creating an invisible fortress of cleanliness, leaving the day behind me, and got into bed to fall asleep.

If there are things that I wish I could share with others about my experience, they would be:

1) Most people can survive this disease. In the patients who presented to us in time, and who stayed hydrated before and during treatment, the mortality was under 40 percent. This is despite the lack of human resources and medical and lab supplies. My favorite days were days when we discharged patients from the recovery ward. One of my co-clinicians asked the children in recovery to come up with a "recovery song," a celebration in anticipation of when their tests will turn negative and they will leave this place for home. The children would greet him every time he returned with the song. After a couple of days it was clear the adults also were partaking in this ritual. It was the most powerful thing I have ever witnessed, sometimes sitting outside the unit, hearing songs from the recovery ward. We can improve the mortality rate by just improving the number of hands helping and by giving patients the best basic supportive care. The early and continued provision of oral rehydration solution can help as well.

2) Every day I was there someone thanked me, thanked me for taking care of these patients. This encouragement was so important. I have provided care to patients in setting with limited resources, but generally as providers, we don't have to worry about our own safety. We place an artificial barrier between ourselves and the patients, as if we are somehow immune to the diseases around us. It is an important part of being able to provide care. That faade is harder in this setting, knowing how many healthcare workers have died before us and seeing so many young people present with minimal symptoms and full faculties, and then watching them become so debilitated that they cannot get out of bed to defecate. Then to see that a hundred times over breaks the most stoic of dispositions. The words of encouragement were so important in light of the loss inside the unit.

3) Inside this ward is a microcosm of humanity and almost all of it is kindness and selflessness. A sick patient one bed over might offer to translate your words if the person you are interviewing doesn't speak English. Healthier patients advocate for those who have taken a turn for the worst. Women adopted orphans and cared for them if the children's own mother had died. People gave each other encouragement from across large ward rooms. Inside the wards, you found some of the most committed nurses from the local staff. Despite losing so many of their own, having their morale decimated, nurses like French, who became the head nurse at Kenema ETU, spent hours upon hours, day after day providing compassionate care.

On one of my last days at Kenema, I found an old man in a triage tent who was extremely ill. I was giving him oral rehydration and kept asking him his name: "Sir, tell me your name so I can see if you have been tested already." He kept mumbling and when I could finally hear what he was saying repeatedly, it was, "I am nobody. I am nobody." I will never forget that moment.

This epidemic is not one of nameless, faceless individuals living far away. It is a story of family members who expressed love and grief at losing their loved ones. It's about strangers who provide kindness at the right time to others. It's about children who wandered alone through the halls of illness but then made it out and survived. It's about those who died in my hands despite all my efforts. It's about the healthcare workers who buried their own and are continuing to work. It's about entire communities that have been debilitated by this epidemic and about countries that will see an entire generation affected by it. It's about putting your fear aside and doing what you know is needed in that moment. It's about you and me and what we do next to eradicate the epidemic.

PPE

Sierra Leone

ebola

Morning Edition host David Greene traveled to Crimea to see what's changed since Russia sent troops in this spring and shortly afterward annexed the territory despite widespread international criticism. His stories will be on air and online this week.

I was traveling through flat farmland on a two-lane road in the far north of Crimea, when suddenly it was interrupted by a checkpoint. Actually, Russia now considers it the border, a physical reminder of the new divide between Russia and Ukraine — and the West.

A guy in military camouflage, with a Kalashnikov rifle slung over his shoulder, sees NPR producer Lauren Migaki with her tape recorder going, and he makes it clear he wants it off.

She turns off the recorder. But that's not enough. Another guy in military fatigues comes over says we broke the law as foreigners by being so close to a Russian border. He takes our passports and asks our interpreter to come with him, leaving us to wait.

This little episode was a personal reminder that Russia is now in control. All across Crimea the signs of Russian power and influence have arrived.

Ukrainian flags that flew atop government buildings have been removed, replaced by Russian flags. Menus in restaurants have been reprinted with prices in Russian rubles. New labels have been glued on wine bottles — even older vintages — saying the wine is from "Crimea, Russia."

Map of Crimea

Credit: Alyson Hurt / NPR

And, there's a wall, perhaps a mile or so long, running alongside the road from Crimea's main airport. There are murals painted by school children who were assigned a theme: We Love Russia.

There are outlines of the Crimean peninsula painted in colors of the Russian flag and scenes from Crimean cities. But someone took a section of a mural and painted a heart over it in the Ukrainian colors, blue and yellow.

So there is resistance to Russia's takeover here, even if you don't hear it openly.

Still, many Crimeans are elated to join Russia. And what Russia has going for it is a very deep history here.

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Most of the artwork on this wall near Crimea's main airport is pro-Russian. But the blue-and-yellow heart is painted in the colors of Ukraine's flag, and the green line covers the word "Russia." Lauren Migaki /NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Lauren Migaki /NPR

Most of the artwork on this wall near Crimea's main airport is pro-Russian. But the blue-and-yellow heart is painted in the colors of Ukraine's flag, and the green line covers the word "Russia."

Lauren Migaki /NPR

The Crimean city of Sevastopol has this vast harbor opening on to the Black Sea. Ships travel south from here to Turkey, then through the Bosphorous Strait and out to the Mediterranean Sea. This explains why Russia has for centuries anchored its Black Sea naval fleet here.

After the Soviet Union broke apart in 1991, Russia rented and shared the harbor with Ukraine's navy. But now, Russia is taking all the spoils. The Ukrainian naval vessels in Sevastopol now belong to Russia, our guide tells us.

Sevastopol doesn't seem to fear change because it's been through so much of it. In World War II, the city was attacked and occupied by the Nazis who leveled almost every structure in town. The Soviet navy eventually drove the Nazis out and liberated it.

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Russia established the Crimean port of Sevastopol in the 18th century. After the Soviet breakup in 1991, Russia and Ukraine shared the naval base. But Russia has now taken the entire base, including Ukrainian ships. Max Avdeev for NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Max Avdeev for NPR

Russia established the Crimean port of Sevastopol in the 18th century. After the Soviet breakup in 1991, Russia and Ukraine shared the naval base. But Russia has now taken the entire base, including Ukrainian ships.

Max Avdeev for NPR

This place has been filled with Soviet pride since then and all through the Cold War when submarines from this port spied on the U.S.

I remember as a kid imagining those Soviet subs out there lurking in the oceans. My image was Sean Connery as the commander, like in the movie The Hunt for Red October.

How could we pass up the chance to meet a real Soviet sub commander. So we took a taxi up a hill from the harbor. The driver was blaring Soviet tunes as he took us to the home of Valentin Danilov, former executive officer on a Soviet sub. Danilov, 83, is in full uniform, from the old Soviet glory days.

The dark blue uniform is cleanly pressed. A navy cap is trimmed with gold. A submarine pin is on his chest. On the shoulder is the blue and white flag of the Russian navy. He loves to wear it in public. During the 23 years after the Soviet collapse, when this was Ukraine, he got some dirty looks wearing the uniform. Those looks disappeared once Russia annexed Crimea.

"You feel more secure when you see guys in uniform walking down the street," Danilov explains. "It's good not only for men, but women love it."

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Parallels

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The most important woman in Danilov's life was married to him for 60 years. She died a few months ago. He walks us into the apartment where he lived with her, apologizing for the mess. I'm a bachelor, he tells us. He says he's so happy his wife lived long enough to see Crimea return to Russia.

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"My wife was energized," Danilov says. "Back in March, she was in the hospital. Her condition was severe, very bad. When she heard about this great news, it gave her power and energy to live a couple months more."

Before we leave, Danilov utters that Russian phrase that's either inviting or terrifying, depending on your mood. "Na pasashok," or "One for the road."

We say yes, and the captain brings out his homemade whiskey, along with pickles and sliced pork fat.

Older Crimeans, like Danilov, have lived in three different countries. The Soviet Union, then Ukraine, and now Russia. All within 25 years. They haven't actually moved anywhere. But they feel like they've returned home.

Crimea

Russia