Buzz Words Hide Ukraine’s Meaning for US and EU

Reading as widely on Ukraine as possible, I kept wondering why the  story wasn’t making sense. Then I realized the buzzwords used to tell  the story weren’t adding up.

Here’s what we hear: Democracy in action drove a corrupt leader,  whose snipers had fired on protesters in Kiev, to flee Ukraine. Enter Russian forces into Crimea, Ukraine. The “Free World” must now take its  stand against the “Russian Bear” for freedom, sovereignty and rule of  law, and reject the outcome of an “unconstitutional” referendum in which  Russian-majority-Crimea is expected to vote to join Russia. Meanwhile,  please inject billions of Western taxpayer dollars and euros into  Ukraine.

Mute the rhetoric, though, and it’s hard not to notice that last  month, a violent mob and rump parliament ousted the elected Ukrainian  president in another “unconstitutional” process better known as a coup.  It’s a coup even if Vladimir Putin calls it one, and even if Barack  Obama calls it “standing up on behalf of democracy.”

In this way, “democracy,” too, becomes another buzzword. “Democracy,”  good; “Putin,” maybe worse than Soviet-era dictators who came before  him. (Romanian Communist defector Lt. Gen. Ion Pacepa went so far as to  write online at The Blaze: “Russia’s gradual conquest of Ukraine has  become the most dangerous challenge to peace and stability in the world  since the end of World War II.”) If “democracy” vs. “Putin” is a  struggle of the buzzwords, what is it that Washington and Brussels,  capital of the European Union, are really supporting in Ukraine?

To understand this – and I feel I’m still at the beginning – it’s  important to see the players for who they are, not for who they are  reputed to be. The buzzworded story sticks only if we respond to  injections of Cold War rhetoric by seeing Barack Obama as “Leader of the  Free World” – not as a president who has brought U.S. foreign policy  into closer alignment with jihadist movements worldwide, while further  socializing the U.S. at home and seizing non-constitutional powers for  the executive branch.

We also have to regard the countries of Europe and NATO as “free” –  that is, not “integrated,” and often not freely so (meaning not by  national referendum), into the European Union’s   one-world-fits-all, socialistic superstate, which is run by unelected, unaccountable  ministers, many of whom actually cut their political teeth in Communist  parties.

We also have to believe that “freedom,” “sovereignty” and “rule of  law” – what Washington and Brussels say are at stake in Ukraine – are  not just bursts of propaganda shot off to inspire good people to hand  over those billions of taxpayer dollars and euros for Ukraine through  the International Monetary Fund.

Weirdly little-known fact: The IMF is the post-World War II  brainchild of one of Moscow’s most important and successful Communist  agents ever, Harry Dexter White. For the matter, the United Nations was  also fostered by another Soviet agent, Alger Hiss.

All of which is to say that there are more moving parts here than our  limited stock of buzzwords indicates. More intensive scrutiny is surely  needed – and before we pony up again. Since 1991, the U.S. alone has  spent $5 billion on building democracy and good governance in Ukraine –  and rampantly corrupt Ukraine still just had a coup.

Much remains murky, but one piece of the Ukraine story whose facts  seem within reach concerns the coup’s precipitous event: the shocking  sniper attacks on people in the square in Kiev, which reached a bloody  crescendo on Feb. 20, killing some 40 people out of the “heavenly  hundred” who are believed to have died in all. Who is responsible?

Initial reports blamed the security forces of ousted President Viktor  Yanukovych. Now, according to the Associated Press, the new authorities  in Ukraine “have shifted their focus” from the Yanukovych government to  Vladimir Putin’s Russia – “pursuing the theory,” AP continues, “that  the Kremlin was intent on sowing mayhem as a pretext for military  incursion.” Meanwhile, Russia, the AP reports, believes “the snipers  were organized by opposition leaders trying to whip up local and  international outrage against the government.”

Russia’s argument is bolstered by an extraordinary “intercepted”  phone conversation. In the call, Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet  describes evidence from Olga Bogomolets, a noted Ukrainian  physician-activist, to EU Foreign Minister Catherine Ashton. It suggests  the same snipers were killing people from both sides – policemen and  protestors alike. The new government’s health minister, Oleh Musiy, said  much the same thing to the AP, which adds “that the similarity of  bullet wounds suffered by opposition victims and police indicates the  shooters were trying to stoke tensions on both sides and spark even  greater violence with the goal of toppling Yanukovych.”

Estonia’s Paet continued, conveying his belief to the EU’s Ashton:  “There is now stronger and stronger understanding that behind the  snipers … it was not Yanukovych but it was somebody from the new  coalition.” In other words, some faction associated with the new  government the U.S. and the EU are supporting. Estonia has since  authenticated the call.

The cold-bloodedness of whatever party is behind such a bloody  calculation is chilling, even as the question of responsibility has hot  political ramifications. When it comes to spending billions to promote  “European values” (another buzzword) – let alone “freedom,” “democracy”  and “rule of law” – a non-partial investigation into these events  becomes essential. Buzzwords, meanwhile, are no substitute for the  truth.

Source: Diana West

Diana West is the author of The Death of the Grown-Up: How America’s Arrested Development Is Bringing Down Western Civilization. Her arttcle archive and blog are here.