Ukraine serves as the boundary between East and West (the word “Ukraine” is probably derived from an earlier Slavic word meaning “borderland”). Ukraine is in many ways the dividing line between Catholics and Protestants on the one hand and Orthodox on the other. On the opposite side, it forms the border between the German, Austrian, Lithuanian, and Polish states and the Russian Empire. East and West have always been divided along the Dnieper River in Ukraine. Ukraine is a difficult place that needs to be handled with care, but the US viewed Ukraine as a prize for the West. Even though Ukraine itself was deeply divided ethnically, linguistically, religiously, and historically, in public opinion, the US kept wanting it all. So it kept pushing for Western control over NATO and saying that any Russian concern, whether it is economic links, military links, family links, linguistic links, or ethnic links, does not count for anything. Those are just the old evil Russian Empire. The US blew off any Russian concerns about Ukraine. Despite the fact that the US is thousands of km away from Ukraine, while Russia, on the other hand, shares a border of at least 2,000 km with Ukraine. The US is exceptionally arrogant as well as ignorant about all of this or they don’t give a shit because they think they are untouchables. From the mid-1990s onward, the US plan was Ukraine was ours. NATO, together with the EU membership is seen as a selling package to the Ukrainian elites and the Ukrainian nationalists.

So, the US continued to meddle in the internal affairs of Ukraine, support Ukrainian nationalists, and push for NATO membership, and it did so in 2004 during the fictitious “Orange Revolution.” It did it even more disastrously in 2008 at the NATO summit in Bucharest when Bush pushed for NATO expansion to Ukraine despite warnings from the Europeans about its dangers. However, Europeans naturally hesitate to speak in public when they feel comfortable doing so. Then in 2014, when Yanukovych was removed from power, the actual bomb went off. Yanukovych made a concerted effort to strike a compromise between the needs and goals of the West and Russia, but Ukraine still had serious financial issues. Each side pushed against Ukraine until, in February 2014, the US joined with the anti-Russian Ukrainian Nationalists to topple Yanukovych. Regardless of the Minsk agreements, the US aimed to arm Ukraine to such a degree that it would become fatally self-sufficient and join NATO and the EU without any intervention from Russia. NATO and the US have faith in what Russia would accomplish. And that was no action to their plans. They didn’t take Putin’s threats seriously. If he did something, sanctions would kill the Russian economy in addition to America’s amazing super-duper weapons that would destroy Russia and cause tens of thousands of young people to die in battle.

Of course, this was an illusion, a typical American arrogance because Putin mobilized in 2022. Russia proved to be far more capable militarily, with far more capable arms manufacturers than the US allowed, and technologically much more sophisticated than Americans imagined (very smart guided missiles and advanced digital technologies). Nobody can predict the war’s escalation or the domino effect at this moment, but Ukraine is cruelly being bloodied with hundreds of thousands of deaths, and the West doesn’t give a damn about the human toll. Instead, the West is arming the Ukrainians with more weapons in an effort to exterminate them. And no matter how much blood is spilled on the Ukrainian battlefields, the US perspective is that it’s them dying, not us. We keep our businesses expanding while selling our guns.                               

Overall, Western politicians played the game of chicken under American leadership. However, Russia demonstrated its ability to escalate, and it looks like the West had no strategy because it believed it could get away with things.  

Going back to February 2014, the plan was to install a new administration and have Ukraine join the West. Putin subsequently did as he had vowed to do and took control of Crimea. Oh, what a shocker! Then they violated the Minsk Accords. Oh, what a shocker!

Thus, the West continues to be startled. Unfortunately, the American and European politicians failed miserably as strategists, causing a terrible catastrophe for the well-being of the Europeans and Ukraine. Ukraine is being treated like a European Afghanistan by the US and NATO. Keep in mind that the US viciously, mercilessly, cynically, and ignorantly destroyed Afghanistan for 40 years. In the event that Ukrainians don’t wake up soon, in the end they will experience extinction.    

Georgios Ardavanis – 13/08/3023