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With all the attention focused on the Middle East, the president doesn’t need another foreign policy challenge; this one with Russian troops entering Ukraine.

Reuters News Service reported, that Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said on Thursday that Russian forces had entered his country and the military conflict was worsening after Russian-backed separatists swept into a key town in the east.

Reuters continued to report a NATO military officer said: “We assess well over 1,000 Russian troops are now operating inside Ukraine… They are supporting separatists (and) fighting with them.”

The La Times reported on Thursday, Poroshenko dropped plans to attend the inauguration of Turkey’s newly elected President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and summoned the council as pro-Russia separatists tightened their grip on the town of Novoazovsk in southern Ukraine, opening a new front in the months-long battle with Ukrainian government troops.

“Today the president’s place is in Kiev,” he said.

“I have decided to cancel my visit to Turkey because of the sharp escalation of the situation in the Donetsk region … as Russian forces have entered Ukraine,” he added.

The Times continued to report that Ukraine accuses Russia of sending troops and military equipment across the two countries’ mutual border to support the separatists, who have lost ground to government troops in recent weeks but have opened up a new front in the southern Donetsk region bordering the Azov and Black Seas. Russia has repeatedly denied military involvement in the conflict in southeast Ukraine.

If the first initial reports prove to be accurate this places President Obama in extremely precarious predicament.  Right now Obama is currently meeting with his national security team to decide what course of action the U.S. should pursue in confronting ISIL.

The situation has been unraveling in Iraq, as ISIL has captured large swath of territory and set up an Islamic state covering both Syria and Iraq. The president is contemplating extending airstrikes into Syria.

If the crisis in Ukraine turns into an armed confrontation between Ukraine and Russia it will have ramifications for the United States. The markets reacted negatively on Thursday to the potential conflicts between the two belligerents.

This crisis has been ongoing for months; it’s just been off the media radar because of the situation in the Middle East.

The president’s detractors have criticized his handling of foreign policy as it seems the president just lurches from crisis to crisis and is not actively engaged.

Now the president has to refocus his attention on the Ukrainian situation which has only gotten worse the past few months.  First, with Russia annexing the Crimea, and then last month with the shooting down of a commercial airliner by Russian separatist armed with Russian weapons.

Ukrainian forces have been gaining ground on Russian separatist, and now with potential Russian intervention it changes the equation.

The question is, how will the U.S. respond?

That is an open question?