Reverse Cargo Cult
When the sociopolitical order of Easter Island disappeared in a wave of violence and depravity after deforestation led to the collapse of its ecological basis of existence, as described in Jared Diamond’s book Collapse, the most visible symbol of its passing was the mass toppling of the moai statues that had represented the power and prestige of the old order.
But this cargo cult in reverse didn’t do anything for the Easter Islanders’ level of civilization or living standards, which regressed into outright barbarism, up to and including cannibalism. This lasted until contact with Europeans put the new culture out of its misery to be replaced with pestilence and slavery.
Just in case one was to think this can only happen in primitive societies, let us now turn to Northern Gabon – or perhaps we should now call it New Liberia, in deference to Condoleezza Rice – which has recently pulled down the largest remaining statue of Lenin in yet another ringing accomplishment for the Euromaidan.
Although the svidomy ideologues behind this imagine this is supposed to liberate Ukraine, or confirm its European identity, or trigger the moskals, or whatever, the banal reality is closer to this:
Namely, nobody cares.
Nobody of any significance, at any rate. Considering that opinion polls indicate that at least as many if not more Ukrainians miss the Soviet Union as Russians, it’s a safe bet that the vast majority of people actively hurt by this are elderly Ukrainians who are going to die away in ten to twenty years anyway. In between living out their twilight years in the crushing poverty brought about a “European Choice” they didn’t ask for, their life’s legacy and values spat upon, and beaten up by Azov thugs in those rare cases when they dare protest against a regime purportedly established to guarantee basic liberties such as freedom of assembly, it’s fair to say their generation is to be the sacrificial victim upon whose bones Ukraine’s European future is to be built.
But which European future to be precise?
Increasingly, it’s not the one that even the Euromaidan’s vanguard had asked for two years ago.
The Education of a Svidomy Fanatic
One of the most striking individual cracks in the facade has to do with one of the most curious and remarkably political turnarounds I have ever encountered.
There was this hardcore Azov supporter, who I will abbreviate here as “E.V.”, who used to comment/troll on my posts 1-2 years back. He had all the stereotypical accoutrements of your typical Maidanist fanatic: Uncritical praise and support for the Revolution of Dignity, claims Ukrainians would now live in freedom and dignity unlike Russians under Putin’s kleptocracy, uncompromising support for the ATO, welcoming of the toppling of Lenin statues, etc.
But you’d be shocked by perusing his profile in more recent months. It is now full of “vatnik” talking points condemning the current government not just for the economic collapse but for destroying Soviet monuments, rewriting history, pursuing Russophobia, and even praising the LDNR and calling for Russia and Ukraine to unite into one state.
I don’t actually know that person apart from his comments on my updates during that period, but that is quite the stunning ideological reversal if there ever was one.
What makes it all the more curious is that he is still a dedicated White Nationalist who also posts in support of Trump, rails against #RefugeesWelcome, and even retains his approval of Azov (many of whom appear to share his disgruntlement with the Poroshenko regime, if presumably not his unexpected Russophilia… at least for the time being).
Rather ironic how it was more than anything that ultimate gesture of “Europeanness” in the form of #RefugeesWelcome that soured this onetime devotee of Ukraine’s “European Choice” on the whole project – refugees that are now beginning to get diverted to Ukraine itself, as core Europe buckles under the strain and Merkel seeks to unload the burden anywhere she can, including the cargo cultists who rule in Kiev and are only too happy to oblige the whims of their Western superiors.
When the victims are ordinary people, at any rate. No amount of Western lectures and imprecations have done anything to stem the runaway corruption of the Maidanist regime. Here is just the latest headline that says it all: “General Prosecutor of Ukraine to investigate the theft of EU and US grants for the reform of the General Prosecutor of Ukraine.”
The End of the UkSSR
To be sure, a single anecdote doesn’t say all that much, but it makes sense in the context of Gallup’s December 2015 finding that Poroshenko now has a lower approval rating than Yanukovych at the time of the coup. Such turnarounds might still be a rarity, but as the legitimacy of the regime and its foreign sponsors continues to unravel, Ukrainians will be searching for another ideological and spiritual anchor.
That anchor could potentially – ironically – have been the Soviet Union itself, for it was the Soviets personified by the grim apparatchiks starting with Lenin himself whose statues have been getting toppled throughout the last 2 years who more than anyone else created what we know as Ukraine. The Soviet legacy is what holds the Ukraine together. It might be a dark force, in many respects, but it has a certain majesty and gravitas to it, whereas the parochial Banderism of the Maidanist thugs, apart from being nasty and evil, is just more pathetic than anything else.
It’s like the difference between Ghengis Khan and the neighborhood furry-obsessed creep who is discovered with half a dozen corpses in his freezer.
One of those is sustainable, at least for a few generations; the other is not.
Moreover, Banderism is an ideology that actual Europeans are not rushing to embrace, if increasingly evident European and even American fatigue on the Ukraine question and Dutch voting intentions on the forthcoming EU-Ukraine Association referendum are anything to go by. Without foreign infusions to keep it afloat, it will increasingly be running on empty, a walking corpse that has yet to realize it is dead.
But what was there before the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, which is even now croaking out its final death throes?
Before the UkSSR, before Bandera, there was Novorossiya, Malorossiya, and the Taurida Guberniya, and Kiev was one of the intellectual centers of Russian nationalism.
Before you can rebuild, you have to clear away the rubble.
It is therefore ultimately for the best that Ukrainians have been the ones to take the initiative in returning to their historic roots.
And since the Ukraine has been so conveniently de-Sovietizing itself, the logical endpoint of that search now leads back to the USSR’s predecessor, the Russian Empire:
“I cannot say what kind of soul I have, Ukrainian or Russian. I know only that I would not give preference to the Ukrainian over the Russian, nor to the Russian over the Ukrainian. Both natures are too greatly gifted by God, as if by some purpose each contains within itself that which the other does not–a clear sign that they are meant to complete each other. To this end their past histories were made distinct; so that their diverse strengths of character, developing separately, might later merge together and form something more complete in human kind.” – Nikolai V. Gogol, Complete Works, volume 13, pp. 418-419.
As more and more Ukrainians “awaken,” we will soon have to start thinking about E.V.’s question on “how to achieve this deep integration” – and where to go from there.
“For what is dead may never die, but rises again, harder and stronger!’
I do not share your opinion that the bankruptcy of the banderite ideology will lead to adoption of some Soviet or Russian Imperial system of reference. Humans are notoriously ignorant of history, and origins, and require somebody to translate and serve the past to them. The first stop is usually the school system, and then popular culture that is often supported by the state.
Gogol does not even use the term “Ukrainian” in that quote, he speaks of Khokhols. The translation is adapted to contemporary nomenclature.
Speaking purely from point of Polish interests, it’s better to have any independent Ukraine, even deep shit poor, than the whole region being incorporated into Russia. I would of course prefer rich, democratic Ukraine which would be allied with us.
If Ukraine cannot be independent, then of course division of the country is another possibility. Once again, I stress that I wish Ukrainians all the best, I would want their country to be strong, unified, rich and so on; but being Polish, I have to think first and foremost about my country interests.
If division of Ukraine is impossible (into independent part and pro-Russian part) then another option is incorporation of western Ukraine into Poland. This is just one of options, I do not want this, this would bring us problems and it would mean we would have to crush mercilessly Ukrainian nationalism; but if the alternative is incorporation of the whole Ukraine into Russia, well… On the other hand, maybe it would be even better to give whole region to Russia, preserving open options for the future game, in which Poland would not be given a role of a villain. Maybe Galicia as autonomous region in Poland, which would then have to be transformed in something more like federal state… political fantasy, of course, but given the world situation right now, who knows, what may happen in the future.
Once again, I wish Ukrainians all the best, but if you can’t keep your country strong and independent, no matter how sad it would be to me and my compatriots, we would have to think about our interests. We can help you (i.e. Ukrainians), we would want to help you even at costs to ourselves and without wishing anything in return, but – if the costs are too great – you would be on your own. My own fantasy is Poland-Ukraine alliance + set of other, smaller states (Czechs, Slovakia, Hungary, Lithuania, Croatia, Slovenia) forming a federation or something like that, but again, fantasies are just fantasies and sometimes you have to do things the situation forces you to do.
There was a joke doing rounds on Russian Twitter recently that sums up Karlin’s article. It goes like this:
Ukranian man complains to God:”God, you gave Russians writers, poets, composers, scientists, philosophers while you gave us nothing! It’s not fair!”
God:”I gave the same to you.”
Ukranian:”When?”
God:”When you were Russian”.
I agree. Corruption and economic misery will not convince Ukrainians to go back. Homo economicus is a fictional character. The one thing that could bring Ukrainians back is changing the media message in the Ukraine. It wouldn’t be as easy as Russia-affiliated forces buying up the TV channels – people own media for political purposes more than to make money, so they’re not going to sell to their enemies. Changing the media message in the Ukraine would be difficult, and it’s not the kind of thing that Russia is good at.
EV’s about-turn might well be as he claims – disillusionment with Europe and Poroshenko rather than changing from anti-Russian to pro-Russian. If EV actually always shared the belief in a deep connection between Ukraine and Russia socially and culturally then indeed his earlier comments (especially if they didn’t contain explicit anti-Russian racist terminology like “moskals”) could have been a reflection of a belief that the Maidan revolution would usher in a clean government that would turn Ukraine around and ultimately be viewed as an alternative to Putin’s style of government (with Putin’s style of government probably being associated with Yanukovych around that time) and that something similar would eventually happen in Russia to bring Russia and Ukraine back into the same camp (presumably the EU in the future).
With Europe now seeming not to be what it was thought by EV and Poroshenko disappointing on a massive level, the idea of continuing the Maidan revolution and for Russia to join a Ukraine that lead the way to that glorious future is out and instead the thoughts now seem to be how to lead Ukraine back from the path it has taken and back into the same camp with Russia (even with Putin, who by now probably doesn’t seem so bad relatively speaking once it was known what being “European” really meant).
Oh, that version of the events is seriously challenged:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/02/090218095435.htm
http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/02/new-evidence-easter-island-civilization-was-not-destroyed-by-war/
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/has-the-mystery-of-easter-island-finally-been-solved-2274075.html
Our contemporaries may yet turn to be super-barbarians.
Thanks for the Ukraine update.
“since the Ukraine has been so conveniently de-Sovietizing”
One recent feat of desovietisation by the Banderites involved attacking statues in the former home of a Polish noble near Lvov – statues of those evil Bolsheviks Socrates, Plato and Aristotle.
It’s worth pointing out that if “EV” is doxed he’ll be in serious trouble in the European democracy of Ukraine. He could face a long prison sentence or worse.
Oles Buzina (who called himself “a Ukrainian, which is a variety of Russian”) was placed on a public “please kill” list maintained by the then minister of defence and was duly murdered. A murder that has gone largely unreported in the West.
Why not Galicia as an independent country? Then the rest of Ukraine could rejoin Russia, while Galicia would act as a buffer state between Poland and Russia.
I wonder if you would also consider toppling of Soviet statues in Poland, Hungary etc. to be “cargo cult in reverse?”
Comment on history/culture:
Well, in pre-Soviet times only about 6% of Kiev region spoke Russian and only about 25% in so-called Novorossiya spoke Russian. These were not Russian-speaking but Ukrainian/Little Russian speaking areas, per the Russian census. So if you truly want to got back, Ukrainianization would have to become much more aggressive, even if the result would be named “Little Russian.”
The mid-19th century Little Russian idea that at the time enjoyed the patronage of the Russian government (it was seen as a counterbalance to Polish claims upon Ukraine) standardized the Ukrainian/Little Russian language and, while promoting loyalty to the czar, also demanded that local schools use the standardized Little Russian/Ukrainian language rather than Great Russian, viewing both as equal peoples and one as not more “Russian” or “better” than the other. The Little Russian activist Kostomarov, echoing Gogol’s quote, wrote in “Dvi Russkiy narodnsti” (1861) that northern and southern Russians were internally linked and that he wanted to see all Slavs under a benevolent tsar; he also noted that southern Russians inherited love of personal freedoms and federalization from Rus while northern Russians had inherited autocratic tendencies from their Mongol masters and teachers. When centralizing Russian cracked down on the Little Russians later in the 19th century, which backfired and radicalized the Little Russians against Russia, the Ukrainian idea wasn’t so different from the Little Russian from which it grew and whose proponents were often the same people.
Speaking of Gogol quotes:
http://feb-web.ru/feb/gogol/texts/ps0/ps9/ps9-083-.htm
“This power, this gigantic might, plunged the independent state [samobytnoe gosudarstvo] remaining merely under the protection of Russia, into despondency. The people that belonged to Peter as private property, demeaned by slavery and despotism, submitted, though with grumbling. It was not only necessity but need, as we shall see later, that led them to submit. Their extraordinary ruler strove to elevate them, but his medicine was too strong. But what could be expected of a people so different from the Russians, who breathed freedom and robust Cossackdom and wished to live their own way of life? They were threatened by a loss of nationality [Gogol’s word: natsionalnost] and by having their rights made to a greater or lesser extent equal with the people who were personally owned by the Russian autocrat.”
Gogol, “Vzgliad na sostavlenie Malorossii”:
http://feb-web.ru/feb/gogol/texts/ps0/ps8/ps8-040-.ht
Skip down to section six.
” And southern Russia, under the powerful auspices of the Lithuanian princes, completely separated from the north. Any connection between them was ripped apart; there came to be two states, by the same name – Rus. One under the Tatar yoke, the other under one scepter with the Lithuanians. But there was no intercourse between them. Other laws, other customs, another goals, other communications, and other feats created… two completely different natures.”
Excerpts from a letter by the Polish poet Zaleski: ““About 25 years ago the famous Russian writer Gogol visited Paris. He was very friendly with Mickiewicz and me…we gathered often in the evenings for literary and political discussion. Naturally, we talked about the Russians (moskalach) who were loathsome to us and to him. The question of their Finnish origin was frequently debated. Gogol confirmed this view with all his Little Russian fervor. He had with him a splendid collection of folk songs in different Slavic tongues. He wrote an excellent paper on the Finnish origin of Russians which he read to us. In it he showed on the basis of detailed comparisons between Czech, Serbian and Ukrainian songs with Great Russian songs the glaring differences in the spirit, customs and morals between the Great Russians and other Slavic peoples. He chose a diffeent song to characterize a different human feeling: on the one hand, our Slavic song, delightful and tender, and along with it a morose, wild and almost cannibalistic Russian song, just like a Finnish one. My dear countryman, you must imagine how pleased Mickiewicz and I were with this article.”
Comment on politics:
Popular revolt involving half the country’s support is not a “coup”, defined as “a sudden attempt by a small group of people to take over the government usually through violence.” If some pro-NATO generals had overthrown Yanukovich this wuld have been a coup. His falling after mass street protests involving 100,00s of people is not a coup.
Poroshenko’s low approval rating doesn’t mean any sort of swing towards Russia; it simply means other pro-Western figures have eaten into his popularity. In contrast, Yanukovich’s fall in popularity coincided with the Russian idea being discredited.
Ukrainians still prefer a European trajectory. NATO would still win in a referendum. According to recent polls the most popular country in Ukraine is – Poland.
Removing Crimea and urban Donbas removed the pro-Russian heartland of what had been an almost evenly divided country. The remaining pro-Russian regions are less pro-Russian than Crimea and Donbas had been, and well outnumbered.
Does it? It seems to correspond to backwardness relative to what would have been had Bolshevism not triumphed, shoddiness, and a legacy of poverty in addition to cruelty.
Bandera is a bit of a figurehead – a symbol representing violent resistance to Russia and/or Communism. Actual Banderist ideology is absent from mainstream politics.
Just as most of the 53% or so of Russians who have positive feelings towards Stalin are not actually Stalinists, most Ukrainians who like Bandera are not actually Banderists. Svododa and Right Sector (now just named after Yarosh) come closest to Banderism, and their collective popularity in the latest poll among likely voters is about 8%, compared to 20.5% for Tymoshenko’s Party, 12.1% Opposition Bloc, 11.6% Lyashko’s Radicals, 11.4% Samopomich, 10.9% Poroshenko’s Solidarity, and 5.6% Hyrytsenko’s party (a center-right pro-NATO party led by Yushchenko’s former defense minister).
The parties with most of the actual popular support in Ukraine are different flavors of center-right parties, as in neighboring Poland.
Relax, Russian wishful thinkers have predicted Ukraine’s demise since 1991. It took massive Russian intervention to separate the two most pro-Russian, and Russian-inhabited regions in Ukraine from the country. Wars – even in defeat – are often good for nation-building (ask the Serbs about 1389, or Poles about their failed uprisings) so Putin has helped Ukraine from this perspective. Kiev and central Ukraine have become as Galicia once was, Dnipropetrovsk and the south (other than Odessa) have become as central Ukraine had once been. Putin’s intervention has removed from Ukraine it’s most pro-Russian and thus disruptive regions. It’s telling that Russia now insists on Donbas returning to Ukraine, under terms that would give it disproportionate power within Ukraine. He needs that anchor, which is gone.
The only weak spot is Kharkiv (Odessa also has mixed sympathies but unlike Kharkiv it is not on the Russian border) but it was never as pro-Russian as the Donbas was, and many of its most pro-Russian elements have fled to Donbas, replaced to some extent by pro-Ukrainians who have left Donbas.
So in your twisted world Kiev which voted something like 90% for anti-Russian parties ought to rejoin Russia? It’s less than Galicia’s 97% or so anti-Russian vote, but still.
EV is an abhorrent creature.
Ukraine needs all migrants it can get.
It can’t afford being choosy.
Several 100,000 residents of Lvov and selo that were bused into Kiev did not topple Yanukovych. Few hundred thugs under the control of the opposition chased Yanukovych out of Kiev. Yanukovych was in fact pro-Western and did not hold on to any Russian idea. It could be said, Crimea and Donbass separated because Yanukovych and the Regionnaires lost control. Otherwise they would have sold these regions to the Kiev regime as Mogilev in Crimea attempted.
Evidently your “standards” of being not in the state of demise are such that you see no difference.
It does not matter to AP as long as his western Ukraine is doing “fine”.
Galicians were over-represented among protesters (they were about 30% of them) but majority were actually locals, and the city supported them. My cousin in Kiev had a few Galician strangers use the apartment during the protests; this was very common. It seems that most of the failed counter-demonstrators were bused in though. Perhaps that explains your confusion?
Without the support of most of the capital and participation of 100,000s “a few hundred thugs” would not have toppled Yanukovich.
Well, truth to be told, ancient Polish city of Lemberg eventually should be returned to Poland. As per “standards”–it is difficult to explain to those selyuki (even if from Lvov) what is the difference between growing potatoes and building modern passenger jet, as an example. Have no concept.
Ukraine’s economy per capita PPP is still better than it had been in the 1990s or early 2000s:
http://www.indexmundi.com/ukraine/gdp_per_capita_(ppp).html
http://www.theglobaleconomy.com/Ukraine/GDP_per_capita_PPP/
Looks like it regressed to 2006 level in 2014, 2005 level in 2015 (not included in charts, but about 10% decline from 2014). Growth is expected for 2016.
The country is no longer divided in terms of general geopolitical orientation. So not much of a demise for Ukraine. But we may be hearing about hoped-for demise of some sort in 20 years.
Novorossiya (Donbas) is another matter…
Ukraine has now become Europe’s IT outsourcing leader, and Lviv one of the main centers of such (its the per capita leader, though Kiev has more):
http://itonews.eu/report-ukraine-powerhouse/
It’s not building passenger jets, but neither is it growing potatoes. You must not know the difference between Lviv and Volynia.
Perhaps when Finland gets Karelia, Germany East Prussia, Japan the Kurils, Volga Tatars their Khanate, Poland will regain Lviv with its 800,000 Ukrainian residents.
Hey, who am I to argue;-) I saw what present Ukraine “produces”–it would have been hilarious if it wouldn’t be so pathetic. I am sure West Ukrainian scientists will soon come up with some dazzling discoveries for space travel, energy sector or in material science;-) As per “not divided”, well, I sort of agree but I’d better stick to my judgement on this issue.
Really? I thought potatoes were a staple for most of Slavs and nothing wrong in growing them. So Lvov is not growing potatoes. All right, then.
Yes, in accordance to Ukrainian “info”. Sure;-) Internet commerce is such a vital part of the economy.
In 2015 Ukraine exported $2.5 billion worth of IT services (software R & D plus outsourcing), this has been growing despite the war and is expected to continue growing. Agriculture has also been growing. Cargill just committed to investing $100 million for grain terminals outside Odessa, a massive sugar refining complex supplying Nestle and other firms was completed in Ternopil, etc. Lviv is becoming a focal point of light manufacturing of stuff like electric cables used in auto electronics. A friend of mine in the USA works for a German company whose largest plant is in Lviv oblast. Note that most of this progress is occurring far from the Russian border.
As for the rest – who knows, maybe with Dnipropetrovsk Poland can finally into space, eventually. But it looks like places such as Zaporozhia or Kharkiv are economically suffering and will continue to do so, although Kharkiv still makes tanks and BTRs.
What is your opinion of this recent Kiev-developed and made grenade launcher, btw:
http://lk.com.ua/specials/armament/grenadelauncher-uag40.php?lang=en
I didn’t link to a Ukrainian source. You think they were fooled? Ultimately food, shelter and medicine are vital. But $2.5 billion worth of IT work in 2015 (up from 2.3 billion in 2014), with expected large-scale growth through at least 2020, is not bad.
Another source, saying the same thing:
http://blog.softheme.com/review-%E2%80%93-ukraine-high-tech-report-2015/
About the same as to anything currently produced in Ukraine;-)
Economically, Ukraine’s split from Russia has indisputably been an utter disaster, and the Maidan was doubling down on disaster.
According to World Bank estimates, in 1992 Ukraine had a GDP of $74 billion ($307 billion PPP), and Russia $460 billion ($1.1 trillion PPP).
In 2014, Ukraine had a GDP of $131 billion ($371 billion PPP), and Russia $1.8 trillion ($3.7 trillion PPP).
So in the first 23 years of independence, Ukrainian GDP went from 16% of Russia’s to 7% (or 28% to 10% adjusted for PPP). The World Bank doesn’t yet have figures for 2015, but the gap has likely only widened further.
It’s sad: Had Ukraine remained in union with Russia, today it would be part of a Great Power, with several times the per capita wealth. Ukrainian cosmonauts would be traveling into space. Instead, it is a dysfunctional Third World backwater, which the West only cares about when it can be used as a pawn against Russia.
But at least Ukrainians have been assured by European Commission President Juncker that they might be able to join the EU… in “20-25 years” .
You are using statistics supplied by Maidan baboon after they were accused of busing lowlives from Halychyna for 250 HRN. Hardly a credible source. And even 30% of Galicians is a staggering number.
The problem for AP is that Western Ukraine is stably the most downtrodden of Ukraine, and in fact getting worse under the current regime. Collapse of the Hryvnia, rises in household bills, ATO are felt just as much in Lvov as they are in Sumy. Check this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ihmjp-WkjRA
If you think that is what KIIS is, okay:
http://kiis.com.ua/?lang=rus&cat=background
Do you have other sources for your claim that the protests were just Galicians?
Why? It’s not too far, they enjoyed support back home for the journey (they didn’t risk getting fired, unlike would-be protesters from other regions) and local Kievans took good care of them.
Lviv oblast GRP declined a whole 1.4% in 2014. Haven’t seen Lviv figures for 2015, they may be similar (though increase for the oblast was predicted in January 2015). Ironically the poorest part of western Ukraine, Zakarpattiya, is also the least nationalistic. But you have a pattern of really laughing at more poor-Russian people when trying to laugh at Ukrainians. Ukraine’s awful economic figures are basically driven by the economic collapse in the more pro-Russian eastern areas. The poor people sitting in Kiev’s streets while locals enjoy the restaurants are often migrants from the East. Well, if their sorry plight serves the purpose of pro-Russian anti-Ukrainian propaganda, maybe they can be happy on some level.
The video you posted is the road to the train station where traders come into town. Nice try. Here is a video from 2015 showing a tram ride from the center of Lviv to the train station:
There are no traders in the center, but in the end towards the station (12:13) you see a few with their stuff on the railings and sidewalk (less than on the video you posted; a less-busy day).
So you failed again.
Here is a place outside Moscow in 2013 btw:
A dishonest propagandist would claim Russia got back into the 90s in 2013.
Svidomite enthusiasts should be kicked out of Kiev bag and baggage and sent to shit in the fields of Galicia with pigs and potatoes. Then the mother of Russian cities could again become what she was more than a hundred years ago, a leading centre of Russian nationalism. I think the great majority of the population will prefer to stay and enjoy the new Russian regime.
[It’s telling that Russia now insists on Donbas returning to Ukraine]
If Pedro Parasha and his gang don’t want it back, why do they keep shelling it (as much as they think they can get away with) and gallivanting around the world demanding its return? Seems like they are missing a great opportunity to keep still and shut up.
Poroshenko needs war to have a scapegoat for economic misery.
The best possible solution for Russia and Ukraine would be to embrace their Rus origins, and allow Sweden to directly rule over both states. Slavs seem unable to run societies, and need people of a higher nature to look up to.
Back in your cuck shed, Sven!
Ukraine is too populous to be saved by IT and agriculture.
Given that about 90% of Kiev’s residents voted for anti-Russian, pro-Western parties this would mean the total depopulation of the city. Good luck with that.
In the 19th century the city had a Polish mayor and was a center of Polish culture. For example, until restrictions were put in place by the Russian government in the 1860s most of its university students were Poles.
“Mother of Russian cities” was a myth invented by clever Ukrainian careerists to excuse their dominance vis a vis Russian natives within the Russian imperial and especially Church administration. This was the true function of Kiev’s Russian nationalism: to explain to Russians why these better-educated, more qualified foreigners from the more civilized former Rzeczpospolita were taking over much of the running of their country at the expense of the natives. “Sure, we speak Polish and Latin more than Russian, and look down on you, but we really are (better, freer) Russians, Kiev is our mutual Jerusalem, Southern and Northern Russians are complimentary”, etc. Reread Gogol’s quotes. He indeed made a great career for himself in Russia, too.
Once you clear out the 90% who support pro-Western or patriotic parties maybe this would be true of the remaining 300,000 people. That would be, approximately, Kiev’s population in 1900.
One must start somewhere, and these are the two bright spots in which Ukraine enjoys comparative advantage. The West is starting to invest in manufacturing also but it will be much more difficult for these other areas to catch up.
The inhabitants of each province in any state are apt to believe themselves the best and most authentic representatives of the nation. Russians from the Ukraine never had “dominance” over those from Great Russia in any administration, and “mother of Russian cities” refers originally to a distant historical period of which everyone but you has heard. If you think 90%, or more than a few, of Kievans will choose to go and crap in the potato patches rather than stay and recall that they are Russians, you must be … well, as deluded as you are.
Unfortunately it seems most of the Ukrainian public does not want Donbas, gangrenous as it is, to be amputated. Poroshenko does not want to be seen as a traitor, so he has to make a show of doing something. That being said, a front needs to be maintained, the rebels and invaders need to be contained, and this results in occasional inevitable artillery and small arms exchanges.
Here you made the mistake of trying to post facts rather than your usual empty insults. Predictably, you are wrong as usual.
In the 18th century the Russian Orthodox Church was dominated by churchmen from Ukraine. Vernadsky referred to this as the Ukrainianization of the ROC. For example the first president of the Holy Synod under Peter was this Ukrainian guy:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stefan_Yavorsky
His successor, Theophan Prokopovich, was born in Kiev (and like Yavorsky, a former Uniate). The Ukrainian Volchansky followed Prokopovich, Ukrainian Platon Malinovsky came next, then came Sylvester, a nephew of the Ukrainian Cossack Hetman Danylo Apostol etc. Native Russian Old Believers were persecuted, as you probably know.
For such people, the idea of Russians and Ukrainian being one people despite speaking in different languages (Yavorsky was Polish-speaking) and coming from foreign countries excused their takeover of Russian institutions from the natives.
In the secular world, Catherine II’s chancellor Alexander Bezborodko was a Ukrainian. I don’t have numbers for civil servants but Ukrainian seem to have been overrepresented in St. Petersburg.
You wrote “svidomite enthusiasts should be kicked out.” 90% of Kievans voted for anti-Russian parties, so according to you 90% should be kicked out.
[90% of Kievans voted for anti-Russian parties]
How many of those putative voters won’t cheer when the professional svidomites have to pack their bags for good? Very few, I’ll warrant. The police will have their hands full dealing with the information that those “anti-Russian voters” will supply them on the blue-and-yellow vermin.
You expect the Ukrainians to stay put against Novorossiyan provocations? Russian advisors promoted the same tactics, 6 months of provocations, against the Georgians. So long as the Novorossiyans remain embedded in the civilian population they can provoke and defend without serious chance of retribution.
They are the intruders. They need the fight to justify their entire failed operation.
The only way for Russia to acquire Ukraine (if it even wants to) is to pay zero attention to it, and in the meantime work hard into making itself a rich, successful and visually/culturally attractive society. It may take 50-100 years, but that’s a historically short period of time. What we know about Ukies is that they always go where the money is, so all one needs to earn their affection is a wad of large-denominated dollar bills. On a recurring basis, of course, since they are extremely good at spending any amount and asking for more with a straight face.
Of course, if Russia becomes wealthy, it will also get all of the pathologies of a wealthy country: dreadful demography, waves of alien refugees, feminization, cultural decay and eventual collapse.
Poland is a dying country, and Ukraine is a dying country squared (400 000 births, 600 000 deaths, minus 100 000 outward migration per annum = hopeless basket case).
By combining the two you’ll get a bigger dying society in which two cheapskates are fighting for the scraps, trying to outwit each other. Not a recipe for a lasting joyful union.
Why, it’s another glimpse of Bizarro World, through the eyes of its leading citizen, lying troll Soarintothesky. Bizarro World, where every day is Opposite Day.
Such wishful thinking. Kievans have been voting Ukrainian nationalist since independence.
In the 2014 election in Kiev , 24% voted for Poroshenko, 22% for Samopomich, 22% for Yatsenuk’s National Front, 7% for Svoboda (higher % than in Lviv oblast!), 5% Tymoshenko’s party, 3.5% Lyashko’s Radicals, 4.3% pro-NATO Civil Position, and 3.2% Right Sector. A little over 90%.
The not anti-Russian Opposition Bloc, Communists and Strong Ukraine got a little under 9% of the vote in Kiev.
Are Russians bitter that the “mother” of their cities despises their country?
If you think svidomitism would have many foul-weather friends in the mother of Russian cities, that is truly wishful thinking.
You are doing great job putting a lipstick on the Ukrainian pig. It’s not easy.
There were plenty of collaborators and snitches in Commie-occupied Warsaw, East Berlin, Prague, Budapest, so Russia would find them in Kiev too. So?
Once you scum are gone, you ain’t never comin’ back.
Do not worry. They are working on “populous ” part.
The last time I was visiting Ukraine was January/ February 1992. I doubt I would recognize the country. From what i am reading in media and from my still living their cousin , I doubt I will ever have a wish to go and see it myslef.