Window on Eurasia: Russian Nationalist Says Ukraine is Finished Even If It Defeats Militants

Paul Goble

 

            Staunton, July 30 –Some Russian nationalists are already looking beyond the defeat of the militants in eastern Ukraine by the Ukrainian military and arguing that “even if the revolt in Novorossiya is suppressed, Ukraine will no longer exist,” an assessment now less about pushing Moscow to intervene than about trying to put the best face on a defeat.

 

            In an article on the Russian nationalist Forum-MSK.org today, Maksim Kalashnikov adds that “even if a time of troubles begins in the Russian Federation, Ukraine will not survive” in anything like what either Ukrainians or Russians expect and that “it is possible now to speak about ‘the former Ukraine’” (forum-msk.org/material/fpolitic/10444579.html).

 

            Ukrainians may think they are winning, Kalashnikov says, but “what will happen next?” The answer, he says, is a disaster. The IMF will impose serious requirements on Kyiv in exchange for loans. Those will lead to the closing of enterprises “the south-east of the ex-Ukraine.”  Even elsewhere in what he calls “Banderastan,” there won’t be work or aid and “the spiral of poverty” will become much worse. 

 

            At the same time, “in the former Ukraine, as a result of the low birthrate, the number of pensioners will grow while the share of young and working age people will fall.” In addition, he says, “millions of young people will leave to work as gastarbeiters in the European Union and cease to pay taxes or work in the former Ukraine.”

 

            To try to pay its bills, Kalashnikov continues, Kyiv will raise taxes on businesses which will lead the latter to close and cause foreign companies to shift their trade elsewhere, including to the ports of Romania. As a result of all this, “even a ‘victorious’ Ukraine faces the collapse of its economy and the impoverishment of its population.

 

            That in turn will lead to “new Maidans and revolts and to a rapid overthrow of one government after another … Separatism will again make an appearance: the South-East will again try to separate.” And that trend becomes even more likely because there will be witch hunts against the militants when the Ukrainian army marches in.

 

            That is what awaits “the new Ukraine,” Kalashnikov says, “even with the taking of Donetsk and Luhansk and even if the event of a time of troubles in the Russian Federation.”  In such a situation, “Bandera will no longer help,” regardless of “the banners under which they run.”

 

            Ukraine and the Russian Federation as well are on their way to becoming “failed states of the impoverished third world” because they like the other post-Soviet countries are, in Kalashnikov’s vision of the future, “condemned” to death.