The general view of Ukraine is that it is a part of some great power game with Russia on one side and the US on the other. Where China and Europe fit into this does not seem to be that important to the experts. The American media is not stuffed with worldly, thoughtful people, so they tend to the simple-minded when explaining these issues. In fairness, most American don’t care, so keeping it simple is probably the only way to get the attention of the public.
The more likely issue is a German – Russian one than a replay of the Cold War. The Russians want to maintain energy dominance and their best customer is Germany. The Germans would like to have other options, but there’s not much they can do about it. Ukraine sits in between the two and a whole lot of history. I know, there are a bunch of countries wedged in there now. I’m speaking historically. To steal a line from Joyce, history is a nightmare from which Europe can never awake.
David Goldman is a reliable source on these things. His latest is no exception.
Western governments are jubilant over the fall of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich, a Russian ally. They may be underestimating Vladimir Putin: Russia has the option to hasten Ukraine’s slide into chaos and wait until the hapless European Union acquiesces to – if not begs for – Russian intervention.
That leaves the West with a limited number of choices. The first is to do nothing and watch the country spiral into chaos, with Russia as the eventual beneficiary. The second is to dig deep into its pockets and find US$20 billion or more to buy near-term popularity for a pro-Western government – an unlikely outcome. The third, and the most realistic, is to steer Ukraine towards a constitutional referendum including the option of partition.
Moscow has no need of allies with weak stomachs. But it will withdraw the offer of $15 billion worth of Ukrainian debt purchases and subsidies for natural gas exports to Ukraine and leave the nearly bankrupt country to the ministrations of the West. Careful what you wish for, Russia is telling the West.
Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said that Ukraine should get money from the International Monetary Fund: “We consider that such a situation would meet the interests of Ukraine, would put the country on the path toward major structural reforms. We wish them success in this undertaking and in the rapid stabilization of the political and social situation.”
Siluanov is being mischievous. Twice in the past six years, the IMF suspended promised loans to Ukraine after the country refused to cut salaries and pensions and raise energy prices. Russia had offered a loan without conditions; any money the West offers will require austerity measures that no Ukrainian government is capable of enforcing.
The fall of Yanukovich is an embarrassment to Russia, and a well-deserved one, but that does not leave Russia entirely without options. Russia most likely will adopt the same stance towards pro-European Union politicians that the Egyptian military and its Saudi backers took toward Egypt’s the Muslim Brotherhood: let the opposition take the blame for economic and social chaos, and then move in when the country is on its knees. The Brotherhood ruled Egypt for a year, and then the food and fuel ran out, 30 million Egyptians, more than half the country’s adult population, demonstrated to oust it. The military obliged in August 2013 and immediately obtained emergency loans from the Saudis.
The rest goes into some detail on the financial realities facing Ukraine. This part is particularly interesting.
The country also is a demographic deader. At its present fertility rate (1.3 children per female), its 47 million people will shrink to only 15 million by the end of the century. There are at present 11 million Ukrainian women aged 15 to 49 (although a very large number are working abroad); by the end of the century this will fall to just 2.8 million. There were 52 million Ukrainian citizens when Communism fell in 1989. Its GDP at about $157 billion is a fifth of Turkey’s and half of Switzerland’s.
Ukraine is barely a country, rather an amalgam of provinces left over from failed empires – Russian, Austrian, Lithuanian, Ottoman – cobbled together into a Soviet “republic” and cast adrift after the collapse of Communism. Lviv (Lemberg) was a German-speaking city, part of Austrian Silesia; before World War II a quarter of its people were Jews. Jews were two-fifths of the population of Odessa. A fifth of the population, mainly in the east, are ethnic Russians; a tenth, mainly in the west, are Uniate Catholics, who have a special place in Catholic policy since the papacy of John Paul II.
Ukrainian nationality is as dubious as Byelorussian nationality: neither of them had a dictionary of their language until 1918.
At a great distance, it is not hard to cheer for the flag waving irregulars on the streets we see on television. Up close they are not so inspiring. The Germans and Russians are up close. Every German and every Russian has an ancestor who died in the lands we now call Ukraine. Add in the Poles, Czechs, Slovaks and the dog’s breakfast of minor peoples who have been run over by one army or another and you can appreciate the difference in perspective. Consequently, they see all of this through different eyes. This is a game community organizers are wholly unequipped to play.
That’s not an argument for or against one side of the ruling class. America is an island nation, as a practical matter. Like the Brits, we will naturally have a different take on world affairs. We should appreciate that by staying the heck out of European politics as much as possible. We will never be as good at the Great Game as the Continentals. There’s no shame in it. They will never be as good at sea power and a host of other things that come naturally to people insulated from other tribes by oceans. We can win the Great Game by staying out of it.
