Russia loses another dependency.

For those of us who worked as observers during the recent Ukrainian election it is clear that the majority of the population and an overwhelming number of under-40 year olds wanted and desire a Western styled political system. Yushchenko and his pro-Western party won a clear victory with 52 % of the vote which probably understates his real margin of victory. Though the election was cleaner than the past 2 run-offs, and ratified by International Observers, it is hard to imagine that in the criminal strongholds of Donetsk and Lugansk which lie in the east, and Odessa [where I was observing], and the Crimea in the south, that widespread double voting and fraud did not occur. Yanukovych the Russian stooge, backed with mafia and Kremlin money and support, and a twice convicted criminal, will not go quietly and that he fabricated millions of extra votes from fraudulent activity is undoubted. He and his friends who have raped the country for 10 years have too much to lose and now of course they will use the courts to try to overturn the results. They will fail, but it shows the crass classlessness of the man and his backers that they would try to subvert a popularly elected government. I would state that the real margin of victory for the enlightened forces of Yushchenko was more in the order of a 60-40 split, with almost no one outside of the Russified east and south voting for Yanukovych.

In advance of the election the media gave wide speculation to a bloody civil war pitting the Western, more rural, Ukrainian speaking regions against the more industrialized Russified East and South. There was never any threat of such an occurrence. The Ukrainians almost to a man wanted to eschew bloodshed and more importantly the desire for reform is endemic in the entire country not just in Kiev or in the West. Even in Odessa a Russian-Yanukovych stronghold there was little threat of violence or revolution once it became obvious that the liberalizing forces of Yushchenko would claim victory. In Odessa there were muted protests in the city center of some 3 dozen young drunk Odessians, mostly male, who honked horns and made proclamations against Yushchenko and Kiev while drinking beer and waving blue and white flags – the colors of the Yanukovych campaign. This was despite media claims that Yushchenko and Kiev would kill all Russian speaking Yanukovych supporters. In fact this and other innuendo about the hateful purges that would follow a Yushchenko victory dominated Russian language dailies. In effect a sullen populace accepted the results.

Such moroseness is reflected by the quietude of Russia. Significantly Putin and Russia have eschewed their previous, nervous, enthusiastic and early proclamations of Yanukovych’s great victories in the first 2 run-offs and have said nothing about the election of Yushchenko. Even the dictatorial and arrogant Putin must now comprehend the stupidity and duplicity of Russian involvement in another country’s election. Russian pomposity, over-reach and poor political judgement have now been displayed to a world wide audience. It is time to readdress the Russian question with more realism. In any event Putin’s dream of a post-Soviet East European empire will now be confined to poor, insignificant and failing Belarus.

Importantly for the Ukrainian people the election victory is a win for the forces of commercial and intellectual modernization and progress. Contrary to the western media’s coverage it is simply untrue to state that the Russian speaking east of the country is the only industrialized area of the Ukraine. It is true that the Dnipro river – a historically significant waterway for trade and war – cuts through the middle of the country and along this water way lie great concentrations of factories and industry. Some major centres along this artery, such as Lugansk or Donetsk are Russified, but many including the capital Kiev, are not. The Dnipro corridor below Kiev is not however, the only major centre of business concentration.

Around Kiev, in the major cities in the West and North and along other significant rivers such as the Dniester, cluster businesses and industrial conurbations. In fact the Russified Dnipro corridor, south of Kiev, and including contiguous East Ukraine only accounts for about 40 % of Ukrainian GDP and about 50 % of the population. This area is still largely reliant on ‘second stage’ industry such as mining and steel, formed and built during the 1930s under Stalinist industrialization. As a total of GDP and accounting for productivity and new forms of industrialization, computerization and modern business clusters, much more significant activity is happening in the northern Dnipro corridor and outside of the Russified east. In other words the Kiev-northern Dnipro-Western Ukraine areas are significantly ahead in many keys economic, business and technological areas. Their dynamism should eventual change the Stalinist Russified areas to re-orient themselves and restructure their socio-economic systems. If not they will only get poorer and citizen demands will eventually force change.

A main reason why the non-Stalinist areas of the Ukraine are and will continue to prosper, far in excess of their poorer Russified cousins, is the acceptance of European ideals, capital and new business opportunities and their disdain for mafia, corruption and Russian state sponsored extortion. Such attitudes are exemplified by Ukrainian history and by its capital Kiev. Ukrainian history has been informed by strong ties to the West, through religion, trade, commerce, intellectual exchange and outside of religious works even architecture and literature. The Ukraine is just simply not ‘Asiatic’ or ‘Oriental’ like Russia and Moscow. The imposition of Putinism and Stalinism in the East and South is a historical aberration that will eventually disappear.

Such Western facing modernity is reflected in the now bustling 4 million strong capital of Kiev, which is home to most Western investment, where business can be done within the framework of laws and honesty. Kiev is the heart and soul of the Ukraine and was the original seat of the Kievan Rus Empire – the first Russian empire established about 900 AD by Rus Princes descended from Viking warriors and traders. This empire sat on wide plains, with major rivers that encouraged trade and intercourse with foreign empires and peoples. The Ukraine has always been an area of convergence – the open plains allowed for easy transport, trade and of course invasion.

Tuetons, Turks, Tatars, Mongols, Hungarians, Poles, Swedes, Eastern Russians, Greeks, Germans and Arab armies have all engaged in warfare and empire building on the plains of the Ukraine. While this accounts for untold tragedies in Ukrainian history such as ancient slave trading, the Russian famines of the 1930s where 10 million or more died, or the Nazi Second World War occupation where another 10-15 million perished, the Ukraine by its commercial, geographical, and intellectual character has never been ‘Russian’ or ‘Oriental’. It is a Western nation, with long religious, historical, commercial and intellectual ties to the Christian European world with especially significant linkages to the Baltics and Poland. It is about as Oriental in its innate disposition as is Estonia or Hungary.

Yushchenko’s victory after courageously challenging the falsified election results in the first two run-offs is thus a major advance for the Ukraine and the West. Another people have chosen freedom and change over tyranny, despotism and narcissism. The fact that many analysts maintain that the Ukraine is ‘different’ and Oriental is foolhardy. The Ukraine is a Western country overrun by voracious, criminalized Russians who still intend to control and exploit its rich mineral and industrial reserves. The Ukraine now needs Western help – in the form of investment; integration with the European Common Market and military – defense guarantees in or outside of NATO, and access to other non Russian energy sources. The West must show Orientalists, such as Putin, that standing up to tyranny and ensuring freedom and human rights in East Europe and elsewhere are the values that guide Western foreign policy - not crass interest in Russian oil and natural gas. Framing foreign policy around oil and plant production investments might be the policies of the French, but it should not be those of the enlightened members of the Western alliance.

The work of 1989 is still not finished and the West must rapidly consolidate its gains in the Ukraine.