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| Europe |
| More than presidency at stake in Ukraine |
| 2004-11-30 |
| EFL Even while we are waiting to see how the crisis finally ends, however, certain victors and vanquished can already be glimpsed, blinking with surprise in the bright orange light. Yushchenko is a victor even if he fails to win the presidency -- this former member of the Ukrainian post-communist establishment is now an international symbol of democratic rights. His opponent Yanukovych is, on the other hand, a loser even if he wins since -- however well he governs -- he will be "damaged goods" internationally and unable to win Ukraine the investment and better relations with Europe that it needs for more balanced economic trade and development. Another loser is Russia's President Putin who unwisely invested vast political capital in Yanukovych. It is odd that Putin, who has shown such diplomatic skill in dealing with the United States, should have misread the historical signs so badly in Russia's "near abroad." But it is a mistake with potentially huge consequences for Putin's grand strategy of rebuilding Russian power through an economic alliance with Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan and other former Russian possessions. A third loser is French President Jacques Chirac and those European leaders who want the European Union to be an anti-American counterweight to America. International crises involving Russia tend to remind Europeans that the United States remains a very valuable ally in a dangerous and unpredictable world. Fantasies of a superpower Europe seem insubstantial delusions by comparison with this tested alliance. The final losers are the U.N. and Kofi Annan. The U.N. has been invisible. As Kofi Annan has been trying to keep his head above oil, he has issued his usual appeal for restraint. But this crisis has brought forth the heroes of the Cold War from retirement -- Vaclav Havel, Lech Walesa and Margaret Thatcher -- to encourage the orange revolutionaries. And Annan cannot begin to compete with their moral authority or the legitimacy they can bestow. Would that all things could work so well |
| Posted by:Mrs. Davis |
| #23 asdf |
| Posted by: asdf 2004-12-01 1:14:54 PM |
| #22 Reeking of Kissinger there ... re: Mr. Khlebnikov ... and what do you propose in response to his whacking? |
| Posted by: Uleque Hupains4686 2004-11-30 5:28:25 PM |
| #21 Not much. |
| Posted by: lex 2004-11-30 5:15:11 PM |
| #20 Yet Georgia was under Soviet rule since the 1920's. Is there no civil society there either? |
| Posted by: Liberalhawk 2004-11-30 3:33:02 PM |
| #19 True. A big reason that Pol-Hun-Cz-Estonia are moving forward and that the FSU are not. There is utterly no spontaneous social organizations in Russia-- no support for the capitalist political parties, no consumer groups, no professional associations, women's groups etc. Zip. As compared to Poland, where you have a powerful Church and thousands of parish organizations, along with farmer's groups and the legacy of independent and active labor unions under the Solidarity umbrella. Russia will not experience real democracy for at least a generation. At most, the city of Moscow might become somewhat more transparent and law-based, but even that would take many years. |
| Posted by: lex 2004-11-30 3:20:09 PM |
| #18 I once knew a man, a Russian immigrant, who was in his 80's when I was a teen. He said that Russia would never be America. His reason was simple: when / if it ever happens, there will be no one left alive there who remembers what life was like pre-Communism. It was that simple in his mind. Thus far, it seems, he was one smart SOB. For the same reason, and a few more, I hold out hope for the Persians. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-11-30 3:02:59 PM |
| #17 Thanks for the tip. I will read about him a bit more before I comment on him. I think the reason the people are apathetic, timid, cynical, etc is because power has been out of their hands for so long, they've forgotten how it can truly BE IN THEIR HANDS (not in a violent, chaotic way, but in a confident, legitimate way). A close friend of mine who attended Moscow University has often complained that all the people of quality-in politics, in the sciences, in the arts, have all long left, been bought out, or been killed. If that is true, it could surely hurt confidence in elections, no matter who wins. |
| Posted by: Jules 187 2004-11-30 2:56:15 PM |
| #16 i have not denied there are many corrupt people in Ukraine or Russia, or that they dominate much of the economy. Yuschenko would have to be more sterling than i would expect to have ALL of them as his enemies. The fact that one of them supports him is, I suppose due to her rivalry with other oligarchs. It does not lessen the importance of stating the truth about the election. Are you stating that the eastern oligarchs who opposed Yuschenko are clean? |
| Posted by: Liberalhawk 2004-11-30 2:50:42 PM |
| #15 "Well, what can we do about it" You're right. Russians are whiney losers. If only they had guts, like the intrepid muckraking American-Russian Forbes magazine journalist Paul Khlebnikov. Google him, you'll be inspired. |
| Posted by: lex 2004-11-30 2:43:35 PM |
| #14 LH, you're seriously misinformed here. The Eleven Billion Dollar Woman's Spetsnaz posse was formed long before this election and was for the sole purpose of sinking her talons into her nation's prime assets. Happened long before there ever was a President Putin. Before we continue, please read some good studies of how corruption works in Russia and the Ukraine. Try Paul Klebnikov's (RIP) stuff, or Comrade Criminal, or Matt Brzezinski's book, Casino Moscow. This ain't about East and West, or a neo-Cold War, or the Guardian's excitable boyz. This is about the criminalization of the former soviet states and the near-total collapse of governance there. We're talking about failed states, really. |
| Posted by: lex 2004-11-30 2:41:31 PM |
| #13 Lex-There is so much I admire in peoples from the former Soviet Union, but victimhood as a mode of life is something I will never understand.I hope someday soon that Russians, Byelorussians, Ukrainians are able to stop embracing victimhood and really take the reins of their government in a healthy way. "Well, what can we do about it" is a mindset that seems permeates life there-leaving victims of crime with no expectation of justice, victims of murderous leaders with apathy...victims of political corruption with crippling cynicism... A second election sounds like the way to legitimacy. After that, the Ukraine will simply join the ranks of many other countries in the world today-where the biggest challenge remaining is finding qualified, bright, and respectable individuals to hold political office. |
| Posted by: Jules 187 2004-11-30 2:39:05 PM |
| #12 and apprently lech walesa and Vaclav Havel also drink this Kool aid. |
| Posted by: Liberalhawk 2004-11-30 2:38:32 PM |
| #11 when your enemies are people like Putin, its probably wise to have some tough bodyguards. How do you gain control of the energy industry of a 4th world country? by buying it I suspect. The mere fact of taking advantage of the chaotic and conditions prevalent in such states is hardly prove of thuggishness. Putin though has a habit of using accusations of corruption against new billionaires WHEN they fund his opposition, while ignoring the same sins when the individuals are NOT funding the opposition. I see the same thing happening in the Ukraine. And are you really talking about Western Koolaid? A conspiracy of the US AND the EU, of the media from right to left, against Russia? One which has been seen through only by Jonathan Steele at the Guardian? |
| Posted by: Liberalhawk 2004-11-30 2:34:05 PM |
| #10 I see no evidence so far of large scale fraud on the part of Yuschenko, which would have been more difficult in any case as they dont control govt. I have seen this argument made on other forums, by some Russians who are hysterically antiwestern, and are convinced fraud was orchestrated by the CIA. I also see no evidence that Yuschenko is a front for Timoshenko, rather than an independent political force. But if such fraud IS found, we should point that out. |
| Posted by: Liberalhawk 2004-11-30 2:29:00 PM |
| #9 im not convinced theyre equally thuggish Stop drinking the western kool-aid. Think about it: how does one individual gain sole control of the entire energy industry of a nation of 50 million people without resorting to what one appratchik described to me and other western fund managers as zheskiye manyeri*? Hint: Yulia's bodyguards included an entire sqaudron of ex-Spetsnaz brutes, some 22 or so. * = harsh methods |
| Posted by: lex 2004-11-30 2:27:23 PM |
| #8 X is blatantly corrupt. X supports candidate Y. Ergo the election of candidate Y is irrelevant to democracy. Im sorry, this just doesnt make sense to me. And BTW, from what ive read, the industrial clans in eastern Ukraine have been opposing Yuschenko, and have used their control of the media to present only one side. And again, the geopolitical signifance is simply to state the truth, and so maintain the credibility of our democracy promotion strategy. And NOT to undercut the Europeans. |
| Posted by: Liberalhawk 2004-11-30 2:25:44 PM |
| #7 What if it turns out, as is almost certainly the case, that the Queen Fraudster and her sidekick also are guilty of electoral fraud? |
| Posted by: lex 2004-11-30 2:24:17 PM |
| #6 Democracy really has little to do with it. except insofar as one of the clans (and im not convinced theyre equally thuggish) MAY have the support of a majority of the electorate, and the other used overt fraud and intimidation and control of the press to cheat them out of it. At this point I dont think its a question of aid, as of simply speaking frankly about the electoral fraud. Simply speaking the truth about it is now considered virtual aggression by Russia and its apologists. |
| Posted by: Liberalhawk 2004-11-30 2:21:23 PM |
| #5 I dont suppose anyones hands are clean over there This drives me nuts. There's a valid realpolitik argument to be made for treating Putin with something like tough love-- I prefer this approach-- but Ukraine is of no great geopolitical significance to us and therefore there's no reason to wink at the extraordinary corruption in that miserable fourth-world backwater. You won't get this from the MSM, but anyone who's done business in Russia and Ukraine can tell you that Ukraine's problems are Russia's sqaured. As a Merrill Lynch banker once told me, "You think corruption's bad in Russia? In Ukraine, it's not enough to pay a bribe; even after you've paid they keep asking you for bribe after bribe after bribe." Get this straight: Yulia Timoshenko stole assets worth 20% of Ukraine's entire GDP. In a couple of years, without creating any economic value whatsoever, this woman connived with PM Lazarenko to create a fortune almost as great as Michael Dell's. Do you seriously believe that this woman is a friend of liberal democracy? |
| Posted by: lex 2004-11-30 2:19:40 PM |
| #4 Afraid so. Not much we can do, really: we supported Yeltsin, that other brave Great White Democratic Hope, and he promptly turned over 40% of Russia's GDP to a band of seven thieving clans. And to save his own corrupt ass, he turned the government over to an FSB stooge who is doing his best to shut down all traces of Russian democracy. Yeltsin screwed Russia for at least one generation, and Putin may have screwed it for another generation to come. The struggle in Ukraine now is primarily a contest between two thuggish clans over control of national resources. Democracy really has little to do with it. At a minimum we should demand an end to fraud of both the electoral and the economic varieties as a precondition for any kind of aid. |
| Posted by: lex 2004-11-30 2:13:51 PM |
| #3 As to Yushchenko as an "international symbol of democratic rights Im not sure whos calling Yusch an international symbol of democratic rights. Ive only seen him called that as a straw man, by Russian apologists, including Jonathan Steele of the Guardian. I dont suppose anyones hands are clean over there - but its up to the people of the Ukraine to choose, not us, and not Vlad Putin. And it seems pretty clear that very rampant fraud and intimidation was used, and that Russia cant seem to keep their hands off, and sees any pressure for democracy as vicious interference by evil NATO, evil EU, evil US, etc. Look, if we're serious about democracy promotion as a strategy, we can hardly pursue it in the Middle East while stepping back in Eastern Europe. And just maybe this can remind folks on BOTH sides of the Atlantic that there is still plenty that unites the US and Europe. At a minimum it is, as the writer says, a blow to the attempt to create a Paris-Berlin-Moscow-Beijing axis against US hegemony. By making clear that such an axis is inevitably aimed against all small and medium sized powers, it alienates the access from the small and medium sized states of Europe, and makes it difficult for Germany especially to adhere to the axis. |
| Posted by: Liberalhawk 2004-11-30 2:11:11 PM |
| #2 So shall we assume that no matter what goes on, the people of Eastern Europe and Russia shall continue their ignimonious tradition of being f**ked? |
| Posted by: Phimble Ulung5313 2004-11-30 2:02:34 PM |
| #1 This came just in time to knock Chirac's little nose-thumbing campaign off of Europe's front pages and remind everyone of how trivial he really is. As to Yushchenko as an "international symbol of democratic rights", color me skeptical. I'm all for PR victories wherever we can get them but having lived and worked in Russia, and seen the disaster that was the Yeltsin Great White Democratic Hope, I can easily foresee more kleptocracy, thuggery and non-democracy from yushchenko and his sidekick, the arch-thief Yulia Timoshenko (aka the "Eleven Billion Woman"). Yulia's part of the problem, not the solution. She contrived with the help of Ukrainian PM Pavel Lazarenko, who was convicted in California of money-laundering and other crimes, to set up a scam holding company that dominated Ukraine's entire energy industry, ie about 20% of Ukraine's entire GDP, and funneled billions in cash to Yulia and other corrupt pols. Prepare for disappointment, folks. As always, the miserable people of the ex-soviet union will suffer the most. |
| Posted by: lex 2004-11-30 12:46:47 PM |