The cowardly act is that of mimicking your adversary. We all know Putin is losing this bluff. The realization of the modern world order is that America is withdrawing gracefully from interventions that were mistakes of the Bush regime. Putin should withdraw soon or he might end up with a bloodied nose given the worldwide opposition that he faces and his poor reading of modern sentiments and massive enforceable alliances for world peace and legal international relations. Leaders elsewhere in the globe should remind themselves of the new world legal order that potentially can/will seek them out for their war crimes irregardless of nationality. Today, the world judges as a collective enterprise seeking peace, security and stability, not pumped up dictators as rule North Korea and Russia, etc...
The world will NOT sit by and have a pumped up muscle-man Mussolini look-alike out-of-touch dictator control it's future. It will be a frightful fight to the death of bad ideas and illegal actions. Russian poverty of leadership is much worse than Putin's empty rhetoric seem. He has met more than his match in the very capable and shrewd world leadership of Obama and the American democrats who command the world attention against this badly conceived very knee jerk protectionist reactionary step by Putin in the Crimea.
The use of force in a world strongly and overwhelmingly primed for peace is unsustainable and Putin should be made more aware of that FACT that peaceful people can fight. The Western response will hurt, but it will happen if Russia does not help the Ukraine peacefully to succeed.
Rule of international law is a foundation of the modern world order and those that think they can forget that will be eventually hauled before the world court of justice and their record put to shame as vile, one way or another....