History Of Ukraine

The name "Ukraine" literally means "Borderlands".

Origins of Ukraine: 19th century and World War I[edit]

In the 19th century the Ukrainian was a rural area largely ignored by Russia and Austria. With growing urbanization and modernization, and a cultural trend toward nationalism inspired by romanticism, a Ukrainian intelligentsia committed to national rebirth and social justice emerged. The serf-turned-national-poet Taras Shevchenko (1814-1861) and the political theorist Mykhailo Drahomanov (1841-1895) led the growing nationalist movement. Nationalist and socialist parties developed in the late 19th century. Austrian Galicia, which enjoyed substantial political freedom under the relatively lenient rule of the Hapsburgs, became the center of the nationalist movement. The first Ukrainians were Carpathian Russians in Austria-Hungary who denounced Orthodox Christianity for Roman Catholicism in 1893.^[1] Before 1917, one could walk on foot from Kiev to Moscow without noticing any linguistic differences. Defeat in World War I and the Russian revolutions of 1917 destroyed the Hapsburg and Russian empires. The Ukrainian elite declared statehood: the Ukrainian People's Republic was proclaimed at Kiev on Nov. 20, 1917, becoming independent on Jan. 22, 1918. The West Ukrainian People's Republic was proclaimed at Lviv on Nov. 1, 1918. A rival Ukrainian Soviet Republic was established at Kharkiv on Dec. 24, 1917. On Jan. 22, 1919, the two people's republics united. Lenin gave Ukraine Kharkiv, Donbass, and the coastal oblasts, making it an artificial state in the style of the EU.^[2][3][4][5] By then, however, the military situation was desperate, as Polish and Bolshevik armies pressed the Ukrainian nationalists from west and east and the peasant anarchists led by Nestor Makhno took control of large areas. Because communist theory denies the existence of race as the adherents flip flop to favor one group over another, Lenin made the Soviet Union autonomous republics so not one ethnic group will have too much power.

1917-1922[edit]

After the February Revolution in Russia and the creation of the provisional government 1917 the Ukrainian nationalists assumed the control of many institutions and on April 3, 2017 (Gergorian calender) they constituted the National Council or Central Rada, while Bolshevik groups created the Soviets of Soldiers and Workers. The Rada requested full autonomy on April 26. On July 13, with the nationalists growing stronger and stronger, it was proclaimed the autonomous territory of Ukraine within Russia and a provisional government was formed. The Russian government (Kerensky regime) sent delegates to negotiate the future status, but no agreement had been reached when the Bolsheviks took the power. The Rada refused to recognize the Soviet government and on November 20, 1917, it was proclaimed the Ukrainian Peoples Republic with the governments of Kiev, Podolia, Volinia, Chernigov, Poltava, Karkov, Yekaterinoslav, Kerson and Tauride (Zaporozhye). The yellow and blue flag was adopted on December 29, 1917.

Soviet Republic of Ukraine (December 1917): On December 23 the Bolsheviks took Karkov in eastern Ukraine. They also controlled Shmerinka in the west. The first Congress of all the Soviets of Ukraine gathered in Karkov on December 12, 1917, and decided the establishment of the formally proclaimed Soviet Republic on December 25 (Ukrainian Peoples Republic of the Soviets of Workers and Peasants, or Soviet Federal Republic of Ukraine or Soviet Peoples Republic of Ukraine) that had as its capital Karkov. The Soviet Republic encompassed theoretically all the Soviets of Ukraine, each one having established their own republic. It subsisted until May 1918. It used red flag with the national flag in the canton, adopted at the beginning of January 1918. In this month Yekaterisnoslav was occupied. In February 2018 the Bolshevik forces entered in Kiev, but the arrival of German forces (March) forced them to vacate it, losing practically all Ukraine. The Republic of Donetzk-Krivorog was established simultaneously with capital in Karkov, probably as one of the constituent subrepublics.

On December 17, 1917 Lenin recognized the Republic. France also recognized in December, and in January England recognized it. Nevertheless, the Ukrainian government declared that its aim was a federation of republics emerged from the ancient Russian Empire.

The Bolsheviks of the Soviet Republic of Ukraine occupied Kiev (February 2, 2018) thanks to the fact that many Ukrainian forces changed sides and other refused to fight. The government of the Rada, chaired by Binechenko, that was negotiating a separate peace with the Central Powers, was arrested. The Ukrainian forces concentrated in Pechek, south of Kiev, and the government of the Rada moved to Zhitomir under the presidency of Golubovich. On February 9, 1918, they signed the peace separately with Germany and Austria: Ukraine kept its frontiers and got the territory of Kholm. The German armies broke the ceasefire with Russia on February 18 and entered in Ukraine on February 19. Golubovich, who was in Zhitomir in a desperate situation due to the unstoppable Bolshevik advance, requested help from Germany (February 19). The German troops crossed the Dnieper on March 1 and advanced in all fronts and headed to Kiev that was occupied the following day. On March 3 Bolshevik Russia signed an armistice (that led to the peace of Brest-Litovsk on March 8) and the combats stopped in Russian territory but not in Ukraine. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk assigned to Ukraine a part of Belorussia (8 March 8), that however lost part of Kholm. On March 12 practically all Ukraine was under Austrian or German control.

The President of the Rada, Golubovich, collaborated with the Germans but they favored the landowners and conservative classes while the government was Social democratic. As the anti-German agitation was increasing and the Rada was expressing more and more opposition to the occupation regime, the German Army performed a coup d'état. On April 29 the Parliament or Rada elected Michael Hrushewsky as first president of the Republic. The following day the German forces, with the collaboration of the Cossacks of the Hetman Skoropadsky, performed a coup d'état. Hrushevsky and other members of the Rada were jailed. Martial law was proclaimed. At the head of the government was put the Hetman Paulov Skoropadsky.

Led by the anarchist Nestor Makhno, in the area of Guliay-Pole an 'anarchist state' was proclaimed. Makhno fought against the Germans, against the monarchist White armies (on the side of the Red Army), and against the Bolsheviks. The flags of the 'makhnovtzy' were black with inscriptions "Anarchy is the mother of order" [Anarkhiya - mat' poriadka] and other inscriptions, or plain black or red-black.

Bolshevik Ukraine[edit]

The war in Ukraine continued for another two years; by 1921, however, most of Ukraine had been taken over by the Soviet Union, while Galicia and Volhynia were incorporated into independent Poland.

A powerful underground Ukrainian nationalist movement rose in Poland in the 1920s and 1930s, led by the Ukrainian Military Organization and the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN). The movement attracted a militant following among students and harassed the Polish authorities. Legal Ukrainian parties, the Ukrainian Catholic Church, an active press, and a business sector also flourished in Poland. Economic conditions improved in the 1920s, but the region suffered from the Great Depression in the 1930s.

The situation in Soviet Ukraine under Communist control were sharply different. The communists gave a privileged position to manual labor, the largest class in the cities, where Russians dominated. The typical worker was more attached to class identity than to ethnicity. Although there were incidents of ethnic friction among workers (in addition to Ukrainians and Russians there were Poles, Germans, Jews, and others in the Ukrainian workforce), industrial laborers had already adopted Russian culture and language to a significant extent. Workers whose ethnicity was Ukrainian were not attracted to campaigns of Ukrainianization or de-Russification in meaningful numbers, but remained loyal members of the Soviet working class. There was no significant antagonism between workers identifying themselves as Ukrainian or Russian; however, anti-Semitism was widespread.

Moscow encouraged a national renaissance in literature and the arts, under the aegis of the Ukrainization policy pursued by the national Communist leadership of Mykola Skrypnyk (1872-1933).

Reconstruction proceeded rapidly in the late 1940s and the 1950s, as the Soviets needed the food and raw materials of Ukraine. Political repression of nationally conscious Ukrainians also intensified. The widespread acculturation and assimilation of the Soviet Jews by the 1930s led Stalin to consider the "Jewish question" as settled; he now viewed the Jews as a national rather than a religious group. With the influx of Jews into the Ukraine and Russia from Poland, the Baltic states, Bessarabia, and Bukovina following the Hitler-Stalin Pact of 1939, there followed an intensification of Jewish religious activity, and the reopening of many synagogues. However, political unrest preceding the creation of the state of Israel unleashed Stalin's massive repression against Jews during the "black years" of 1948–53. Suspected of Zionism and cosmopolitanism, Jews were systematically removed from positions of leadership in culture, science, medicine, politics, and economics. The anti-Semitic campaign ended only with the death of Stalin in March 1953.

Holodomor[edit]

see Ukrainian Famine

With Stalin's change of course in the late 1920s, however, Moscow's toleration of Ukrainian national identity came to an end. Systematic state terror of the 1930s destroyed Ukraine's writers, artists, and intellectuals; the Communist Party of Ukraine was purged of its "nationalist deviationists"; and the peasantry was crushed by means of collectivization, resulting in the Great Famine or "Holodomor" (Голодомор) of 1932–1933, which claimed some 3-7 million lives as crops failed and remaining food wtocks were forcibly removed by the government. Besides Ukraine, Kazakhstan and the Volga region were also hit by the famine. Stalin had full knowledge of the destructive force of the famine. It was a by-product of his war on the peasantry that began with collectivization and dekulakization and as an attempt to eradicate peasant culture in its entirety. Ellman explains the causes for the excess deaths in rural areas of Russia, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan during 1931-34 by dividing the causes into three groups: objective nonpolicy-related factors, like the drought of 1931 and poor weather in 1932; inadvertent result of policies with other objectives, like rapid industrialization, socialization of livestock, and neglected crop rotation patterns; and deaths caused intentionally by a starvation policy. The Communist leadership perceived famine not as a humanitarian catastrophe but as a means of class struggle and used starvation as a punishment tool to teach peasants to work well in the collective farms.^[6]

It was largely the same groups of individuals who were responsible for the mass killing operations during the civil war, collectivization, and the Great Terror. These groups were associated with Efim Georgievich Evdokimov (1891-1939) and operated in Ukraine during the civil war, in the North Caucasus in the 1920s, and in the Secret Operational Division within General State Political Administration (OGPU) in 1929–31. Evdokimov transferred into Communist Party administration in 1934, when he became Party secretary for North Caucasus Krai. But he appears to have continued advising Joseph Stalin and Nikolai Yezhov on security matters, and the latter relied on Evdokimov's former colleagues to carry out the mass killing operations that are known as the Great Terror in 1937–38.^[7]

Nazi colloboration: 1941-1945[edit]

See also: Volhynia massacre

In 1939, after Germany and the Soviet Union invaded Poland, Galicia and Volhynia were annexed to Soviet Ukraine. Northern Bukovina, formerly part of Romania, was incorporated into Ukraine in 1940, as was formerly Czechoslovakian Subcarpathian Ruthenia (the Transcarpathian Oblast) in 1945.

Ukrainians girls welcome soldiers of the Third Reich with the traditional bread and salt peace offering.^[8]

By mid-1941, the Ukrainian SSR had the largest population of Jews in Europe. The addition of the eastern provinces of Poland in late 1939 as well as the seizure of sections of Romanian territory in June 1940 led to some 2.7 million Jews living within the borders of the newly enlarged republic. About 85% lived in cities. By 1944, 1.6 million of these Jews had died at the hands of the Germans and their allies and auxiliaries. Unlike the majority of the Holocaust's victims who died in the industrialized mass murder of the death camps, the overwhelming bulk of Ukraine's Jews died in mass shootings during the initial stages of the war.

The German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 was welcomed by many Ukrainians at first; the OUN even attempted to establish a government under German auspices. Nazi ideologue Alfred Rosenberg (1893-1946) considered Ukraine a strategically important region that should be occupied through capturing the hearts and minds of the Ukrainians. According to Rosenberg, everything should have been done to make the Ukrainians view the Germans as liberators. Though he presented his views on different occasions, Adolf Hitler's anti-Slavic racial views prevailed and overrode strategic considerations, leading to a harsh occupation. Very soon the realization that Nazi policies were brutal toward all the Ukrainians, and not only the Jews and Communists, drove most Ukrainians into opposition to the Nazis. Germany forced many Ukrainians to work within the so-called Reichskommissariat Ukraine (RKU) on tasks such as agriculture, road and railway building, and the construction of fortifications. The German authorities soon faced a serious local labor shortage, especially among skilled workers, as a result of Soviet evacuations before the invasion, the ongoing murder of the Jewish population, and the brutal recruitment, arrest, and deportation of other groups, usually with the cooperation of the local civilian, military, and police authorities. The pool of labor was further reduced as the Germans lost territory in the later stages of the conflict. Nazi administrator Fritz Sauckel's labor recruitment measures strained relations with local officials responsible for selecting the deportees, leading to bribery and corruption. The Kiev area was the main focus for recruitment and deportation, along with the Vinnitsa region of central Ukraine. Over a million locals and prisoners of war were forced into labor in the Ukrainian coal mines in the Donbas region (Donets Basin). The forced laborers endured fines, starvation, imprisonment, beatings, and hanging, but also had better chances for more food, money, and mobility.

In Ukraine, Belarus, and western Russia the first stage of partisan development, from 1941 to the fall of 1942, was uncoordinated and resulted in a great many losses. The second stage, late 1942 to 1944, was better coordinated; partisan groups were better defined, and relatively large-scale operations were carried out, often in cooperation with the Red Army. Organized leadership and cadres were created, various forms of actions (such as diversions, sabotage, and direct attacks) were developed; the Germans responded with vicious punitive activities against the partisans. In all, more than 1.3 million partisans took part in actions in Germany's rear in 6,200 units; more than 300,000 received decorations for their actions. The OUN created a nationalist partisan fighting force, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA); many Ukrainians also joined the Soviet partisans and fought in the Soviet Army against the Germans. After World War II, the OUN and the UPA continued a hopeless guerrilla struggle against Soviet rule until 1953. The devastation caused by the war included major destruction in over 700 cities and towns and 28,000 villages.

Fascist insurgency: 1944-1954[edit]

Ukrainian nationalist leader Stepan Bandera.

In the June 1944, when Canadian, British and American soldiers were landing on the beaches of Normandy, their Soviet allies rolled into the German-occupied Western Ukraine. The Red Army soldiers and officers quickly noticed a stark contrast in the attitude of locals compared to other recently liberated regions of the Soviet Union. Instead of cheering crowds of peasant women and children who would offer them water and the traditional Slavic greeting of bread and salt, there was an eerie silence in many villages, and few locals would even talk to the new arrivals. Soon, chilling rumors started about murdered Red Army soldiers found hanged or decapitated in the woods. Rumors were soon followed by orders issued to troops stationed in the allegedly safe rear, far behind the frontline, to increase their vigilance, never to venture anywhere alone or unarmed, and to look out for “bandits” hiding in the forests. The NKVD (People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs – as the law enforcement agency of the Soviet Union between 1934 and 1946 was known) units that followed close behind the Red Army quickly proceeded with their routine practice of rounding up numerous suspected Nazi collaborators, as well as members of the Polish anti-Nazi underground, in Lviv and other west Ukrainian cities. However, a number of feared Soviet secret policemen were soon found dead in Ukrainian villages and Galician forests, and in some areas of the countryside those who dared to venture there had to be heavily armed and in large numbers. This was the start of a brutal insurgency that lasted almost ten years in rural Western Ukraine and resulted in one of the toughest counterinsurgency challenges the Soviets ever faced.

In 1948, the CIA report NSC 20/1, section 4: “US objectives with respect to Russia” warned that separating Ukraine from Russia will not work.^[9]

Denazificatrion and reconstruction: 1954 to 1991[edit]

Stalin's death finally brought relief in many ways. The thaw initiated by Nikita Khrushchev, who had served as Ukrainian party chief in the 1930s, led to the emergence in the late 1950s and the early 1960s of the "sixties generation" of writers, artists, and intellectuals. In order to mark the 300th anniversary of the Treaty of Pereyaslav, Khrushchev gave Crimea to Ukraine in 1954. Following Khrushchev's downfall in 1964, Moscow, under Leonid Brezhnev initiated a series of crackdowns on Ukrainian dissidents, including Ivan Dziuba (b. 1931), the author of Internationalism or Russification?; Vyacheslav Chornovil (b. 1938), the editor of the underground Ukrainian Herald; and Valentyn Moroz (b. 1936), the author of stinging attacks on Soviet policy. In 1972, Petro Shelest, the national-Communist Ukrainian party chief, was replaced by hardliner Volodymyr Shcherbytsky.

The Number Four reactor at Chernobyl exploded during a routine power test in April 1986. Radioactive contaminants from the Chernobyl disaster fell on northern Ukraine and several neighboring countries, reaching as far as Japan and the United States, causing casualties, sparking a major embarrassment for the Soviet Union, and inciting fears of nuclear energy.^[10]

The arrival of Mikhail Gorbachev in 1985 started a slow revolution. The Chernobyl nuclear accident in 1986 undercut trust in Moscow. "Glasnost" permitted Ukrainian intellectuals to discuss the "blank spots" in their history, and growing political liberalization led to the reemergence of dissident groups and the emergence of nationally minded cultural organizations. A major turning point occurred in late 1989, with the founding of Rukh and the removal of Shcherbytsky from power.

Dissolution of the Soviet Union: 1991[edit]

In 1990 Leonid Kravchuk, formerly in charge of ideology in the CPU, was appointed chairman of the presidium of a revamped supreme soviet, one fourth of whose deputies were nationalists and "democrats" elected in the semifree elections of 1990. On July 16, 1990, Ukraine proclaimed its sovereignty, an ambiguous formula that meant independence to the nationalists and autonomy to the Russian minority. On Nov. 21, 1990, Ukraine and Russia signed a treaty recognizing each other's sovereignty and promising not to interfere in each other's affairs.

As the Communist system collapsed in 1991, Ukraine, Russia, and the other republics engaged in lengthy negotiations with Gorbachev over the form of a new union. In August 1991 an abortive coup by committed KGB operatives in Moscow destroyed Gorbachev's strength and impelled the republics to go their own way. The Ukraine national assembly declared independence on Aug. 24, 1991. Several days later the CPU was suspended and its property was confiscated. A popular referendum on independence was held on December 1, and over 90 percent of the voters supported the declaration. Most of the countries of the world recognized the new Republic of Ukraine in the months that followed. Ukraine became a member of the Council on Security and Cooperation in Europe, the International Monetary Fund, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and after much controversy a member of NATO's Partnership for Peace (PfP) program in 1994. As a consequence of the autonomous republics system, Ukraine became a second Yugoslavia.^[11]

Although not a member of NATO, Ukrainian contractors served as part of George W. Bushs "coalition of the willing" in the Afghan war. The Biden regime abandoned them in Afghanistan in August 2021, along with contractors from Bulgaria, Romania, and the Georgian Republic. The Russian Federation evacuated them.^[12]

The nominal successor to the Soviet Union was the Commonwealth of Independent States; Ukraine joined on Dec. 8, 1991. Serious tensions soon emerged with Russia as Moscow took possession of the Black Sea fleet anchored at Sevastopol, while some Russian politicians wanted the Donbas and the Crimea; the latter, being in Russian hands since 1783, had been transferred to Ukraine by the Soviet authorities without referendum or self-determination of peoples in 1954. The Ukrainian government responded by taking steps to create its own army and navy. Crimean secessionists elected Yuri Meshkov as president of the Crimea in early 1994. The Kiyv government established closer economic and political ties with Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary. Ukrainian nationalists fears of Russia led it to postpone action on its earlier promise to give up strategic nuclear missiles, prompting concern in the West. After the signing the Budapest Memorandum by the presidents of Ukraine, Russia, and the United States in early 1994, Ukraine began shipping these weapons to Russia. Thereafter, Ukraine's relations with the United States and western Europe improved.

Leonid Kravchuk, the most powerful politician, became Ukraine's first popularly elected president, with over 60 percent of the vote, on Dec. 1, 1991. His authority, like that of the legislature, declined precipitously, however, as he proved unable to solve the country's mounting economic difficulties. In contrast to Rukh, which had split into pro-Kravchuk and anti-Kravchuk factions in 1992, the former Communists remained strong, controlling many local government councils, industrial plants, and collective farms. The CPU was officially reconstituted as a powerful political force in late 1993. Ukrainian neo-Nazis also become more prominent. Elections for the supreme soviet in March 1994 yielded a legislature in which the CPU and its left-wing allies were the strongest bloc, followed by the center-right nationalists grouped about what remained of Rukh and the centrist pro-government "independents." Kravchuk ran for reelection in the presidential election in June 1994. No candidate won a majority, so a second round was held in July, pitting Kravchuk against former premier Leonid Kuchma. Kuchma won the election with 52 percent of the vote.

The national goal was the creation of a market-oriented economy and the establishment of stable democratic institutions and a system of laws. However the goals were partly frustrated by political deadlock, inexperience, an inefficient state apparatus, a collapsing economy, internal anti-Russian xenophobia, and external tensions with the Russian Federation. The Soviet culture of corruption continued after independence, and rampant criminality became even more widespread in the mid-1990s. In the latter 1990s, Viktor Yushchenko, as chairman of the National Bank of Ukraine, tamed rampant inflation and introduced responsible economic controls. From 1999 to 2004, Ukraine's GNP nearly doubled.

Official trade unions have been grouped under the Federation of Trade Unions. A number of independent unions, which emerged during 1992, among them the Independent Union of Miners of Ukraine, have formed the Consultative Council of Free Trade Unions. While the right to strike is legally guaranteed, strikes based solely on political demands are prohibited.

Ethnic tensions in Crimea during 1992 prompted a number of pro-Russian political organizations to advocate secession of Crimea and reincorporation to Russia. (Crimea was ceded by the RFSSR to the Ukrainian SSR in 1954, in recognition of historic links and for economic convenience, to mark the 300th anniversary of Ukraine's union with Russia.) In July 1992, the Crimean and Ukrainian parliaments determined that Crimea would remain under Ukrainian jurisdiction while retaining significant cultural and economic autonomy.

In July 1994, Leonid Kuchma was elected as Ukraine's second president in free and fair elections. Kuchma was reelected in November 1999 to another five-year term, with 56% of the vote. International observers criticized aspects of the election, especially slanted media coverage; however, the outcome of the vote was not called into question. Ukraine's March 2002 parliamentary elections were characterized by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) as flawed, but an improvement over the 1998 elections. The pro-presidential For a United Ukraine bloc won the largest number of seats, followed by the reformist Our Ukraine bloc of Viktor Yushchenko (who was then a former Prime Minister), and the Communist Party.

Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances: 1994[edit]

See also: Near abroad

At the time of Ukraine's independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, Ukraine held the third largest nuclear arsenal in the world, including an estimated 1,800 strategic warheads, 176 long-range ballistic missiles, and 42 strategic bombers.

To solidify security commitments to Ukraine, the United States, Russia, and the United Kingdom signed the December 5, 1994 Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances. The memorandum included assurances against the threat or use of force against Ukraine's territory or political independence. The countries promised to respect the sovereignty and existing borders of Ukraine.

The United States took custody and control of Ukraine's obsolete nuclear stockpiles for disposal in exchange for assurances by the United States and NATO to safeguard Ukraine's independence. Ukraine was coaxed to give up it nuclear weapons in exchange for a written pledge, should Ukraine ever be threatened or invaded, the United States would be there to intervene with military power.

By 1996, Ukraine had returned all of its operational nuclear warheads to Russia in exchange for economic aid and security assurances, and Ukraine became a non-nuclear weapon state party to the 1968 nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT). The last strategic nuclear delivery vehicle in Ukraine was eliminated in 2001 under the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START). It took years of political maneuvering and diplomatic work, starting with the Lisbon Protocol in 1992, to remove the weapons and nuclear infrastructure from Ukraine.^[13]

Failed color revolution: 2004[edit]

See also: Color revolution and Psyop

Kuchma's second term in office as president (1999-2004) was characterized by the collapse of the national democratic-centrist alliance, the "Kuchmagate" crisis, the rise of a non-Communist opposition in the 2002 elections, and the election of Viktor Yushchenko in 2004 following the Open Society Foundations' Orange Revolution. The deep divisions that have become evident under Yushchenko had their origins in Ukraine's regionalism, the "Kuchmagate" crisis, antiregime protests, and different attitudes to dealing with the past. The country is divided by linguistic and regional cleavages that appear sharply in regional polarization in national elections. These divisions have led to constant questioning of the viability of the Ukrainian state and predictions of violence and civil war. Secessionist movements have made few inroads, however, and violence has been nonexistent. Because the Russian "minority" group in Ukraine is actually quite large, it has immense influence in the state without resort to regional autonomy or secession. The balance of power between Ukraine's regions and ethnic groups has ensured that neither side has dominated. This does not make for rapid reform.

The campaign leading to the October 31, 2004 presidential election was characterized by widespread violations of democratic norms, including government intimidation of the opposition and of independent media, abuse of state administrative resources, highly skewed media coverage, and numerous provocations. The two major candidates—Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych and opposition leader (and former Prime Minister) Viktor Yushchenko—each garnered between 39% and 40% of the vote and proceeded to a winner-take-all second round. The November 21 runoff election was marred by credible reports of widespread and significant violations, including illegal expulsion of opposition representatives from election commissions, multiple voting by busloads of people, abuse of absentee ballots, reports of coercion of votes in schools and prisons, and an abnormally high number of (easily manipulated) mobile ballot box votes. Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets of Kyiv and other cities to protest electoral fraud and express support for Yushchenko, and conducted ongoing peaceful demonstrations during what came to be known as the "Orange Revolution."

The OSCE International Election Observation Mission found that the November 21, 2004 run-off presidential election "did not meet a considerable number of OSCE commitments and Council of Europe and other European standards for democratic elections…Overall, State executive authorities and the Central Election Commission (CEC) displayed a lack of will to conduct a genuine democratic election process." Other independent observers were similarly critical. On November 24, 2004, the CEC declared Prime Minister Yanukovych the winner with 49.46% compared to 46.61% for Yushchenko. The U.S. and Europe refused to accept the result as legitimate due to the numerous, uninvestigated reports of fraud. European leaders traveled to Kyiv to mediate a political solution between the parties. On November 27, Ukraine's Supreme Rada passed a resolution declaring that the election results as announced did not represent the will of the people. On December 1, the Rada passed a vote of "no confidence" in the government. On December 3, Ukraine's Supreme Court invalidated the CEC's announced results and mandated a repeat of the second round vote to take place on December 26. An agreement mediated by the European leaders resulted in new legislation being passed by the Rada and signed by the President December 8. The electoral law was reformed to close loopholes that had permitted pervasive electoral fraud. The constitution was amended, effective not earlier than September 2005, to transfer power, especially with respect to appointment of ministers, from the president to the cabinet. Yet another law was passed, in first reading, to devolve some powers of the central government to regional councils. In addition, Prime Minister Yanukovych requested and was granted a leave of absence, and Prosecutor General Hennadiy Vasilyev submitted his resignation.

The December 26 re-vote took place in an atmosphere of calm. While irregularities were noted, observers found no systemic or massive fraud. The OSCE Mission noted that "campaign conditions were markedly more equal, observers received fewer reports of pressure on voters, the election administration was more transparent and the media more balanced than in previous rounds…in our collective view Ukraine’s elections have moved substantially closer to meeting OSCE and other European standards." On January 10, 2005, after the CEC and the Supreme Court had considered and rejected numerous complaints and appeals filed by the Yanukovych campaign, the CEC certified the results: Yushchenko had won 51.99% of the votes, with 44.20% for Yanukovych. President Yushchenko was inaugurated January 23, 2005.

Ukraine held parliamentary and local elections on March 26, 2006. International observers noted that conduct of the Rada election was in line with international standards for democratic elections, making this the most free and fair in Ukraine's history. Unlike the first rounds of the 2004 presidential election, candidates and parties were able to express themselves freely in a lively press and assembled without hindrance. There was no systemic abuse of administrative resources as there had been under the previous regime. The Party of Regions and the bloc of former Prime Minister Tymoshenko, whose government the President dismissed in September 2005, finished ahead of the pro-presidential Our Ukraine bloc. Other parties passing the 3% threshold to enter parliament were the Socialist Party of Ukraine and the Communist Party of Ukraine. No party held the majority of Rada seats needed to form a government. Following four months of difficult negotiations, a government led by Prime Minister Yanukovych and including representatives from the Party of Regions, Our Ukraine, and the Socialist Party took office on August 4, 2006. This, the first government formed after the extensive constitutional amendments brokered as part of the Orange Revolution, has been the focus the Prime Minister's growing influence, sometimes at the expense of the President. Amid shifting political alliances, the "Anti-Crisis Coalition" formed by the Party of Regions, Socialist and Communist parties has grown into a "Coalition of National Unity," as some members of the pro-presidential "Our Ukraine" bloc have moved into the Prime Minister's camp. Meanwhile, others have joined forces with Bloc Yuliya Tymoshenko.

Western-backed regime change: 2011/2021[edit]

See also: Euromaidan coup

Written on the wall is the Russophobic slogan “Ukraine for Ukrainians.”

In 2010 Viktor Yanukovych and his pro-Russian "Party of Regions" won the free, fair, open and democratic presidential election certified by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).

On June 23, 2011, two emissaries of the Obama administration — the head of Google, Eric Schmidt, and his aide, and former subordinate to Hillary Clinton in the U.S. State Department, Jared Cohen — visited Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, pretending to be on his side, while deceiving him to reveal to them ways to reach out online to members of Ukraine's pro-nazi organizations in order to generate mobs for the demonstrations which were to be organized on Kiev's Maidan Square to overthrow Ukraine's President.^[14][15]

In the same month the Obama administration quietly put out for bid to American contractors their planned project to renovate a school in Sevastopol, in Crimea, in Ukraine, in the location where Russia since 1783 had (and still has) its largest naval base:

Federal Contract Opportunity for Renovation of Sevastopol School #5, Ukraine N33191-13-R-1240. The NAICS Category is 236220 - Commercial and Institutional Building Construction. Posted Aug 20, 2013. Posted by the Naval Facilities Engineering Command (DOD - Navy). The work will be performed at Sevastopol 99000.^[16]

This was before the Maidan coup, and there were 28 years still remaining on Russia's lease there. That part of their plan — to terminate that contract and replace Russia's largest naval base, by yet another U.S. naval base — got foiled by Russia's President, Vladimir Putin, protecting Crimeans when they (as soon as the coup occurred) demanded to have a referendum on becoming restored again to being a part of Russia, as they had been between 1783 and 1954 (when the Soviet dictator arbitrarily transferred Crimea, from the Russian part, to the Ukrainian part, of the Soviet Government).^[17]

Various Soros' international progressive and liberal front organizations (NGOs) organized and funded the Ukrainian coup.^[18]

Obama foreign policy shifted at this point forward from the "Russian Reset" of 2008 and the greater "flexibility" Obama promised Russian President Dmitri Medvedev in 2012, to rabid Russophobia, one factor being Vladimir Putin's lack of support for the homosexual agenda and gay marriage. The anti-Russian grip of Soros on American foreign policy reached a fever pitch in in coming years in efforts to destroy President Donald Trump who sought to mend relations with Russia after the Maidan coup crisis. With the Brexit movement, there was little widespread popular support for the European Union. Yet the United States and NATO peddled the myth of popular support among Ukrainians to join the EU.

Tech training camp[edit]

On March 1, 2013, the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv held its first “Tech Camp”^[19] in a series of Tech Camps to teach Ukraine's leading pro-nazis how to reach out to their followers so as to get as many people as possible trained and prepared to follow their instructions on what to do when the Euromaidan 'anti-corruption' demonstrations would be held.

Simultaneously, under Polish Government authorization, the CIA was training in Poland the military Right Sector leaders how to lead the coming U.S. coup in neighboring Ukraine. As the independent Polish investigative journalist Marek Miszczuk headlined for the Polish magazine NIE (“meaning “NO”) (the original article being in Polish): “Maidan secret state secret: Polish training camp for Ukrainians”.^[20]

86 fighters from the then prepared Euromaidan protests flew over the Vistula River into Poland in September 2013 at the invitation of the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The pretext was to start cooperation between the Warsaw University of Technology and the National University of Technology in Kyiv. But they were in Poland to receive special training to overthrow Ukraine's government. The schedule included such specialized training in:

• Day 3 and 4 – theoretical classes: crowd management, target selection, tactics and leadership.
• Day 5 – training in behavior in stressful situations.
• Day 6 – free without leaving the center.
• Day 7 – pre-medical help.
• Day 8 – protection against irritating gases.
• Day 9 – building barricades.

And so on for almost 25 days. The program included:

• classes at the shooting range (including three times with sniper rifles), tactical and practical training in the assault on buildings.^[21]

On November 20, 2013, Ukraine member of parliament Oleg Tsarev accused the US Embassy in Kyiv of preparing a coup in Ukraine on the floor of the Ukrainian parliament. The nationalist faction in the Verkhovna Rada, the Ukrainian parliament, attempted to shout Tsarov done.^[22] Tsarov said:

On November 21, 2013, the Yanukovych administration rejected the European Union association agreement in favor of maintaining relations with the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU). The covert path to securing a NATO naval base in Sevastopol on the Black Sea was effectively cut off. Soros-sponsored^[24] Euromaiden riots erupted.

John McCain with Oleh Tyahnybok during the Euromaidan coup.

November 30, 2013, protesters were ordered to leave Maidan Square.^[25] In response, radicals began to throw glass, stones, pipes, bottles and burning logs at police officers and Berkut special forces. This provoked the security forces to violently disperse the protesters.

In December 2013, in a speech to the U.S.-Ukraine Foundation, Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Victoria Nuland said: “The United States has supported Ukraine’s European aspirations. … We have invested over $5 billion to assist Ukraine in these and other goals that will ensure a secure and prosperous and democratic Ukraine.” On December 14 Sen. John McCain met with fascist leader Oleh Tyahnybok and Arseniy Yatsenyuk in Kiev.^[26]

Protesters at the CIA backed neo-Nazi Euromaidan torchlight march carrying tiki torches and the "Blood and Soil" flag of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army.

People started talking about the Pravy Sector on December 1, 2013, when the radicals staged battles with the police guarding the Presidential Administration. They seized several buildings and settled on the 5th floor in the Kiev House of Trade Unions. At that time, the group was formally a hundred of the "Maidan Self-Defense".^[27] Militants organized rallies outside Maidan Square. They monitored the protesters and carried out their self-protection. But the PS didn't stop there. They attacked law enforcement officers, tried to seize the parliament and government buildings, beat the security forces with truncheons, threw cobblestones, smoke bombs, Molotov cocktails at them, set fire to buses and trucks. In the battles on the streets, extremists used catapults built like the medieval type. The terrorist frenzy caused shock and dismay even among peaceful advocates of change.

On 1 January 2014 a torchlight mob celebrated the 105th birthday of Ukrainian nationalist and Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera in the streets of Kyiv^[28][29] Protesters carried the fascist black and red "blood and soil" flag of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army.

The Chalupas and DNC[edit]

See also: Russiagate

Alexandra Chalupa is a Ukrainian-American operative who was consulting for the Democratic National Committee (DNC). The DNC paid Chalupa $412,000 from 2004 to June 2016, according to Federal Election Commission records. In 2014, the U.S. United With Ukraine Coalition was founded by Alexandra Chalupa. According to the Ukrainian Weekly,^[30]

Paid DNC Russiagate hoaxer Alexandra Chalupa.

Swastika on display in a Kyiv mall, February 2019.^[31]

In a Huff Post article September 1, 2016, Andrea Chalupa described Sviatoslav Yarosh as one of Ukraine's important “dreamers.” He is a young activist that founded Euromaidan Press. Beyond the gushing glow what she doesn't say is who he actually is. Sviatoslav Yarosh was Dmitri Yarosh’s spokesman just after Maidan. He is a hardcore Ukrainian nationalist and was rewarded with the Deputy Director position for the UWC (Ukrainian World Congress) in Kiev . In January, 2014 when he showed up at the Maidan protests he was 17 years old. He became the foreign language media representative for Vitali Klitschko, Arseni Yatsenyuk, and Oleh Tyahnybok. All press enquiries went through Yarosh. To meet Dimitri Yurash you had to go through Sviatoslav Yarosh as a Macleans reporter found out.

At 18 years old, Sviatoslav Yarosh became the spokesman for Ministry of Defense of Ukraine under Andrei Paruby. He was Dimitri Yarosh’s spokesman and can be seen either behind Yarosh on videos at press conferences or speaking ahead of him to reporters. From January 2014 onward, to speak to Dimitri Yarosh, you set up an appointment with Yarosh.

Andrea Chalupa has worked with Yarosh’s Euromaidan Press which is associated with Informnapalm.org and supplies the state level hackers for Ukraine.^[32]

Nuland-Pyatt phone call[edit]

On January 28, 2014 Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and US ambassador to Ukraine, Geoffrey Pyatt discussed details of planned overthrow of the democratically elected government of Ukraine.The two discussed which opposition officials would make up the new regime, agreeing that Arseniy Yatsenyuk should be in charge. Nuland referred to as “Yats”. It was also agreed that someone “high profile” be brought in to "make this thing stick". That someone was Joe Biden. Nuland made disparaging remarks about the EU, and thought the UN would give better cover to make the new US-installed regime appear legitimate. On February 6, an audio recording of the January 28 call between Nuland and Pyatt was leaked.

At the time the call leaked, media were quick to pounce on Nuland's saying “F**k the EU” when Pyatt asked if the EU should be advised. Member states of the EU, particularly France and Germany, were deeply involved in negotiating a peaceful resolution to the civil strife. But the United States acted alone without consultation of its allies, presenting them with a fait accompli. The comment dominated the headlines (Daily Beast, 2/6/14; BuzzFeed, 2/6/14; Atlantic, 2/6/14; Guardian, 2/6/14), while the evidence of US regime change efforts was downplayed. With the headline “Russia Claims US Is Meddling Over Ukraine,” the New York Times (2/6/14) put the facts of US involvement in the mouth of an official enemy, blunting their impact on the audience. The Times (2/6/14) later described the two officials as benignly “talking about the political crisis in Kiev” and sharing “their views of how it might be resolved.”

Victorias Nuland (center) with neo-Nazi party founder Oleh Tyahnybok (left), coup prime minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk (right) and Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko (rear).

The Washington Post (2/6/14) acknowledged that the call showed “a deep degree of US involvement in affairs that Washington officially says are Ukraine’s to resolve,” but that fact rarely factored into future coverage of the US/Ukraine/Russia relationship.^[33]

On February 6, 2014, Nuland met with neo-Nazi leader Oleh Tyahnybok and other ringleaders who assumed power after the coup.^[34] Tyahnybok leads the Svoboda party. In 2004 Tyahnybok was kicked out of the ruling parliamentary faction after giving a speech calling for a fight against the "Muscovite-Jewish mafia." In 2005 Tyahnybok signed an open letter to Ukrainian leaders calling for the government to halt the "criminal activities" of "organized Jewry", which was spreading its influence through organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League which ultimately wanted to commit "genocide" against the Ukrainian people.^[35] DCLeaks published Soros emails arranging a meeting between George Soros and Tyahnbok. Soros, an 84-year-old self-admitted collaborator with the Nazi deportations of Jews from Budapest to Auschwitz organized by Adolf Eichmann,^[36] parlayed his looted property of Holocaust victims' into a $25 billion personal fortune after World War II.

Heavenly Hundred[edit]

See also: Heavenly Hundred

Pravy Sektor snipers atop the Music Conservatory building as reported by the BBC.^[37]

Key neoconservatives, such as Victoria Nuland and Sen. John McCain, began pushing for the violent coup that in February 2014 ousted Ukraine's democratically elected President Viktor Yanukovych and touched off the new Cold War with Russia. Senior U.S. government officials reportedly told the leaders of the Svoboda party that the deaths of a few protestors would not be enough to change Western support, but the Yanukovych government would only change if the number of victims was greater than one hundred.^[38] As in Syria and other "Arab Spring" uprisings, agent provocateurs began shooting and killing people on both sides to provoke a civil insurrection. Almost 100 Soros-backed activists and 17 police officers were killed.^[39] George Friedman, chairman of Stratfor, called it "the most blatant coup in history."^[40][41]

On February 16, 2014, members of parliament passed a bill toughening penalties for participation in mass riots. After that, the Headquarters of the National Resistance (the coordination center of Euromaidan) announced a "peaceful offensive" on the parliament building. On February 17, the Pravy Sektor put its metropolitan and regional units on alert.

The participants of the picket led by people's deputies Oleg Lyashko, Andriy Parubiy, Oleh Tyahnybok, Andriy Illienko planned to demand an urgent decision on the settlement of the conflict in the country. On the morning of February 18, several thousand activists headed from the Maidan to the parliament building, the Verkhovna Rada. But 100 meters from the parliament building, the path was blocked by trucks placed there by the police. In an effort to break through to the Verkhovna Rada, extremists of the Pravy Sector and "Maidan Self-Defense" began to throw stones and Molotov cocktails at the security forces. Cars caught fire. Police used tear gas and stun grenades to suppress the rioters. The peaceful action for stabilization in the country turned into massive bloody clashes.

Leafets with instructions handed out to Soros-backed terrorists in Euromaiden Square, Kiev were identical to those handed out in Tahrir Square, Cairo three years earlier. On the left printed in Arabic, on the right in the Ukrainian language. 117 people were killed by Obama and Soros' terrorists.

On February 20, 2014, snipers firing from a building controlled by the Pravy Sektor shot and killed 25 people, both police and protesters. More than 350 citizens were injured, more than 250 were hospitalized. Riots in the center of Kiev continued in the following days. In connection with the tragic events, February 20 was declared a day of mourning. However, on this day, the clashes intensified. Dozens of people were killed by Pravy Sektor snipers atop the Music Conservatory and Hotel Ukraina buildings.^[42] According to official data of the Ukrainian Ministry of Health, from February 18 to February 21, 2014, 77 people were killed. The organized mass killing of both protesters and the police had the goal of delegitimizing the Yanukovych government. Western media blamed Yanukovych and the Berkut police. The mass murder in fact was carried out by the Pravy Sektor, the group Nuland and John McCain were promoting to take over the new regime.

Eyewitnesses[edit]

A female Maidan medic during the massacre was pointing to the top of a building and shouting about snipers. But her words were translated in a BBC report as referring to six protesters killed by the snipers in that area. A Maidan protester and another Maidan medic, who were wounded near the same spot where two protesters were killed, both testified at the Maidan massacre trial that they were shot from this building. Government ballistic experts confirmed this during on-site investigative experiments.

These revelations were not reported by any Western media. This includes The New York Time, which on April 5, 2014, profiled this wounded protester against the backdrop of an unquestioned report by the acting Kiev regime that blaming “former President Viktor F. Yanukovych, his riot police and their suspected Russian assistants for the violence that killed more than 100 people in Kiev in February.” It also includes CNN, which filmed the shooting of this medic and attributed it to the government forces.

The Maidan regime investigation simply denies that there were any snipers there and in other Maidan-controlled buildings, and refuses to investigate them. This is done despite videos of such snipers and testimonies of the absolute majority of wounded protesters at the trial and investigation and more than 150 other witnesses about snipers in these locations.

The official investigation in Ukraine simply denies that there were any such snipers in Maidan-controlled buildings, even though the Prosecutor General Office of Ukraine previously stated that snipers massacred many protesters from the Hotel Ukraina and other buildings. ^[43]

Testimonies by five Georgian ex-military members in Italian, Israeli, Macedonian and Russian media and their published depositions to defense lawyers of police from the former regime in the Maidan massacre trial have also been ignored. They stated that their groups received weapons, payments, and orders to massacre both police and protesters from specific Maidan and Georgian politicians. They also said that they received instructions from an ex-U.S. Army sniper and then saw Georgian, Baltic States, and Praqvy Sektor-linked snipers shooting from specific Maidan-controlled buildings.

Western media silence also ignored a statement by Anatolii Hrytsenko, who was a Maidan politician and minister of defense, that the investigation of the massacre was stonewalled because of the involvement of someone from the current leadership of Ukraine in the mass killing.^[44]

Investigation[edit]

The official investigation by the coup regime was fabricated and stonewalled.^[45] The forensic investigations which were made public at the Maidan massacre trial revealed that on February 20, 2014, the absolute majority of the protesters were shot from side and back directions and from top to bottom directions, while videos and photos of the massacre showed them facing the Berkut special police force on the same ground level. In January 2015, a forensic ballistic examination conducted upon the request of prosecution concluded that bullets extracted from killed protesters did not match the bullet samples from any Kalashnikov assault rifle which members of the Berkut special police force were then armed. The findings of this computer-based ballistic examination and results of the other 40 ballistic examinations were reversed in a couple of ballistic examinations conducted manually in the very end of the investigation. Such unexplained reversals which contradicted other evidence, such as testimonies of wounded protesters and results of forensic medical examinations, suggested that the findings of the new examinations of bullets were unreliable and likely falsified. The forensic ballistic examinations also found that many protesters were killed on February 18–20 by hunting pellets and expanding hunting bullets, in particular, with caliber that did not match calibers of weapons used by the special police company, whose members were charged with killings these protesters.^[46]

Yanukovych compromise agreement and flight[edit]

On February 21, 2014, President Vikto Yanukovych signed an agreement with the leaders of the parliamentary opposition that he would not seek re-election the following February since his removal was the protesters primary demand. German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski, a head of department of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and Russian observer Vladimir Lukin were witnesses. It was hoped the agreement with opposition leaders would bring ton an end the crisis situation in Ukraine.^[47]

In the evening of the same day, on Maidan Square, the Pravy Sektor rejected the agreement. Threatening an armed offensive, the extremists demanded that Viktor Yanukovych leave the presidency before 10 a.m. on the morning of the 22nd. The leader of the neo-fascist Pravy Sektor, Dmitri Yarosh claimed that his militants would continue the violent uprising until Yanukovych resigned.

Soon the security forces were withdrawn from the government quarter. This was taken advantage of by revolutionary militants, deciding not to wait for the expiration of their announced deadline. Neo-nazi activists and participants of the Maidan Self-Defense stormed the Presidential Administration, Parliament, the Cabinet of Ministers, and the Ministry of Internal Affairs. On the evening of February 21, 2022 Yanukovych, together with the heads of the Verkhovna Rada and the presidential administration – Volodymyr Rybak and Andriy Kliuyev – fearing for their personal safety fled Kiev to Crimea. Yanukovych called the overthrow a coup.

On February 27, 2014, Nuland's choice, Yatsenyuk, became prime minister. In the deal, the fascist and neo-Nazi forces, which could not poll 2% in a nationwide election, were awarded six major cabinet ministries, including the Ministry of Defense and Ministry of Interior due to their longstanding ties with Western intelligence services.

On February 28, 2014 BBC Newsnight reported on the Neo-Nazi threat in new Ukraine.^[48] Throughout Ukraine, massacres unfolded between supporters and opponents of the U.S.-appointed Maidan junta. Oligarchic and Ukrainian nationalist elements were involved in these massacres.

Unconstitutional impeachment[edit]

According to the procedure of impeachment defined in Article 111 of the Constitution of Ukraine, the Rada must establish a special investigatory commission to formulate charges against the president, seek evidence to justify the charges and come to conclusions about the president's guilt for the Rada to consider. To find the president guilty, at least two-thirds of Rada members must assent.

Prior to a final vote to remove the president from power, the procedure requires

• the Constitutional Court of Ukraine to review the case and certify that the constitutional procedure of investigation and consideration has been followed, and

• the Supreme Court of Ukraine to certify that the acts of which the President is accused are worthy of impeachment.

To remove the president from power, at least three-quarters of Rada members must assent.

The Rada didn't make any pretense of following this procedure. No investigatory commission was established, and the Courts were not involved.^[49] On 22 February 2014, the Rada simply passed a resolution purporting to remove Yanukovych from office in accordance with the Constitution.

The constitutionality of Yanukovych's removal from office has been questioned by constitutional experts.^[50] According to Daisy Sindelar from Radio Free Europe, the impeachment may have not followed the procedure provided by the constitution: "[I]t is not clear that the hasty February 22 vote upholds constitutional guidelines, which call for a review of the case by Ukraine's Constitutional Court and a three-fourths majority vote by the Verkhovna Rada -- i.e., 338 lawmakers." The vote, as analyzed by Sindelar, had ten votes less than those required by the constitutional guidelines. The decision to remove Yanukovich was supported by 328 deputies. Article 11 maintains that a vote on impeachment must pass by two-thirds of the members, and the impeachment itself requires a vote by three-quarters of the members. In this case, the 328 out of 447 votes were about 10 votes short of three-quarters.^[51][52]

Two days later Ukraine's parliament dismissed five judges of the Constitutional Court for allegedly violating their oaths, who were then investigated for alleged malpractice.^[53]

Crimean annexation[edit]

See also: Crimean Annexation

The NATO organization was founded on the solitary premise of collective security to contain Soviet expansion in Europe. With the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1992, many questioned the need for it's continued existence against an enemy that no longer existed. Several former Soviet satellite states (East Germany, Poland, Hungary, Romania, the Czech and Slovak Republics) as well as newly independent former Soviet Republics (Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Georgia and Ukraine) wanted EU membership, which of coarse would ultimately mean NATO membership, as well (military alliances exist to protect economic alliances). Russia under Boris Yeltsin wanted EU and NATO membership. The NATO powers that be made clear they had no interest in going out of business, and Russia argued how unfair it was that they should dissolve their defense alliance (the Warsaw Pact) and be thrust into another arms race against a growing NATO, which was swallowing up many of Russia's former military allies.

But the case of Ukraine was unique. Ukrainian nationalists wanted out of the Russian orbit. But some the territories of Ukraine are inhabited by a significant majority of ethnic Russians, too, who wanted to maintain close ties to Russia. The official US State Department's position under President George Herbert Walker Bush at the time was that the Ukraine should remain a sovereign republic within the Russian Federation. Bush argued as much in a speech written by Condoleezza Rice to the Ukrainian parliament. But the Clinton's took over in early 1993, and caved in to Ukrainian nationalists. In exchange for US recognition of a Ukraine independent of the Russian Federation, Ukraine would give up its nuclear stockpile from the Soviet era, and the US would guarantee Ukraine's security, should the Russians ever invade. The agreement reeked a lot like the assurances Great Britain and France gave Poland at the Treaty of Versailles in 1919 that bound them to war with Hitler in 1939 when Hitler invaded Poland.

Like the Treaty of Versailles, the 1994 Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances negotiated by Bill Clinton lasted exactly 20 years. Unlike Great Britain and France who went to war with Nazi Germany when the agreement was violated, Barack Obama broke the pledge that Clinton had committed the United States to. US/Russian relations have deteriorated ever since. And converting NATO from a purely defensive alliance based on the idea of collective security to a military machine waging aggressive wars - as it had done in Libya - fulfilled many people's worst nightmare. No longer can negotiation and diplomacy be used to keep the peace, as the Obama administration had thrown American promises on the dunghill. Gaddafi ceased terrorism, gave up his WMD, and became an ally, all predicated on accepting American promises, only to be brutally murdered at the hands of Hillary Rodham Clinton and NATO. Ukraine had given up its Soviet-era nuclear stockpile based on assurances given by Bill Clinton, ignored by Barack Obama. Military force now is the only option remaining to remove nuclear weapons from the hands of Kim Jong-un.

Since the Battle of Stalingrad in 1942 it should be clear to anyone,^[54] Russia will never allow an aggressive and hostile military force, such as NATO transformed itself into in the Obama era, to ally itself or encamp within the Ukraine.

Billboard advertising the March 16, 2014 Crimean referendum to apply for admission to the Russian Federation.

On February 27, 2014, Russian soldiers landed in Crimea.^[55] Because some of the people currently living in Crimea are ethinic Russians, there was a dispute whether Crimea belongs to Ukraine or to Russia.^[56] On March 11, 2014, Crimea declared its independence from Ukraine.^[57] The Crimean Peninsula—82% of whose households speak Russian, and only 2% mainly Ukrainian—held a plebiscite on March 16, 2014, on whether or not they should join Russia, or remain under the new Ukrainian government. The Pro-Russia camp won with 95% of the vote. The UN General Assembly, led by the US, voted to ignore the referendum results on the grounds that it was contrary to Ukraine's constitution. This same constitution had been set aside to oust President Yanukovych a month earlier.^[58]

In response to the annexation, Sen. John McCain introduced the Magnitsky Act granting the president power to impose sanctions against persons anywhere in the world at his discretion. On March 6, 2015, the German government expressed concern over Washington warhawks aggressive stance toward resolving crisis in Ukraine, and accused Obama's NATO commander of using false data to inflate and exaggerate size of "Russian threat".^[59]

Odessa Trade Unions House massacre[edit]

Left Ukrainian girls mixing Molotov cocktails Right Ukrainian girls carrying Molotov cocktails to the Odessa Trade Unions House in Ukrainian flag.[60]

With particular cruelty, 48 people protesting against the "Maidan" were brutally killed.^[61] They were primarily Russians born in Ukraine who believed in the ideas of Western liberal democracy and non-violent protest. According to unofficial data, there are about 300 dead people, including women and children. About 3,000 Nazis were organized and placed at the site of the provocation in advance. As of 2022 when the Special Military Operation commenced, no perpetrators were ever prosecuted. There was a complete indifference to the lives of civilians. "Those who are not Ukrainians burned down," was commonly heard in Kyiv.

On April 16, 2014 Forbes reported Obama CIA Dir. John Brennan's visited the new undemocratically elected Obama administration-backed regime in Kyiv.^[62] Two weeks later on May 2, 2014, Ukrainian nationalists murdered at least 48 Russians, in the Odessa Trades Union Building.^[63]

Pregnant strangled Russian woman, left. Victorious Ukrainian Nazis in the next room over, right.

According to eyewitnesses the Maidan fascists outnumbered the anti-Kyiv protesters 10 to 1. First the Maidan activists burnt down the tents of anti-Kiev regime protesters outside the building. The anti-Kiev protesters retreated into the building and tried to blockade the door. A group of Maidan girls filled up Molotov cocktails.^[64] The Maidan protesters began throwing Molotov cocktails. Soon the building was engulfed in flames. The Maidan fascist crowd began cheering as they set the building ablaze and beat those who tried to escape. A Maidan activist was shooting at people trying to escape from the windows.^[65] A fire station less than a kilometer away couldn't respond. The Maidan activists blocked the lone fire truck and wouldn't let the firefighters operate.

Some eyewitnesses claim the real number is over a hundred. The bodies were removed and buried in secret. Survivors of the fire inside the building were executed with bullets to the head. Some were beaten to death with clubs when they jumped from windows of the burning building. A pregnant woman was strangled.^[66] The Western-backed Kyiv regime covered up the atrocities, most victims being ethnic Russian citizens of Ukraine.

Vladimir Suchan reported on Facebook:^[67]

Burnt victims of what the Western media and diplomats call the "Revolution of Dignity."^[70]

The Kiev regime took over the investigation and reported 46 dead in the building. However, Voice of Russia reported, "The interim Ukrainian authorities are hiding from the public the true death toll in Friday's tragedy in the House of Trade Unions in Odessa, which actually claimed 116 lives, a member of the Odessa regional council told RIA Novosti Monday. "According to our data, there were 116 people killed in the House of Trade Unions in Odessa. Killed, not just "dead". "We don't use the word "burned" or "suffocated", because autopsies are not being performed, since the people have bullet wounds to the head," Vadim Savenko said.^[71]

Luc Michel cites Oleg Tsarev: "We believe that in the House of Unions there are more than 100 corpses. The police let nobody in so that the corpses are not counted. We know exactly there are there minor children. We are sure that those in power will do everything possible to conceal the traces of this horrible crime. We want to conduct an investigation and prosecute those responsible for this crime, he told RIA Novosti."^[72]

On July 31, 2014, Democratic Sen. Mark Udall called for CIA Director Brennan's resignation.^[73]

On September 18, 2015, the United Nation's Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights condemned the cover-up of the mass murder of 48 Ukrainians at the Odessa Trade Unions Building.^[74]

Donbas war[edit]

See also: Donbas war

The Maidan lawlessness gave rise to unprecedented crimes of neo-Nazis and various radicals – from the Pravy Sektor to the Ukrainian Ultras soccer hooligans. It was during the short-lived Turchynov administration from February 2014 to June 2014 that the mass murder of civilians in the Odessa House of Trade Unions was committed. Most importantly it was Turchynov who ordered the use of military force against the civilian population of Donbas on April 14, 2014.

On May 26, 2014, after Petro Poroshenko's victory in the presidential race, the Ukrainian Air Force began to carry out airstrikes on the cities of Donbas.^[75] And on June 2, 2014, the "Bloody Pastor" gave the order to conduct an air raid on Lugansk.

The Alley of Angels commemorates children killed by Ukrainian shelling of Donetsk during the 8 years of the Donbas war.^[76]

On July 31, 2014, Ukrainian Nazi journalist Bogdan Boutkevitch^[77] appears on Hromadske TV discussing genocide in Donbas. Boutkevitch says Donetsk:

Nazification had already gotten to the point where there was a willingness to destroy cities, and physically exterminate the population of one's own country with the tacit approval and complete indifference of people outside Donbas. By 2022 Nazi ideas continued to live on and influence not only the minds of Ukrainian political leaders and activists, but also a very significant part of the population in the central and western Ukraine regions. The so-called "simple but conscious" everyday people absorbed a pathological hatred of Russia, blaming Russia for all their troubles, spreading Russophobia into the social and information space.

Since 2014 and the Kyiv regime's policy of ethnic cleansing of the Donbas, more than 14,000 people have been killed, mostly civilians.

Ukrainian collusion: 2016[edit]

Main article: Ukrainian collusion

The government of Ukraine in collusion with the Democratic National Committee colluded to interfere in the 2016 United States Presidential Election and to subvert American democracy. In so doing, they sought to blame Russia for foreign influence.^[79]

Paul Sperry of Realclearinvestigations documented how the Ukrainian government, working with both the Obama administration and the 2016 Clinton campaign, Ukrainian officials intervened in the 2016 race to help Hillary Clinton and hurt Donald Trump in a sweeping and systematic foreign influence operation. The improper, if not illegal, operation was run chiefly out of the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington, D.C. where officials worked with Alexander Chalupa, a Ukrainian-American Banderist and Clinton campaign operative, to attack the Trump campaign. The Obama White House was also deeply involved in an effort to groom their own favored leader in Ukraine and then work with his government to dig up dirt on and investigate their political rival.

Alexandra 'Ali' Chalupa (left) and Col. Alexander Vindman (right), two Ukrainian Banderists deeply involved in the plot to remove President Trump and drive the United States to war with Russia.

Ukrainian and Democratic operatives also huddled with American journalists to spread damaging information on Trump and his advisers – including allegations of illicit Russian-tied payments that, though later proved false, forced the resignation of his campaign manager Paul Manafort. The embassy actually weighed a plan to get Congress to investigate Manafort and Trump and stage hearings in the run-up to the election. As it worked behind the scenes to undermine Trump, Ukraine also attacked him publicly. Ukraine's ambassador took the extraordinary step of attacking Trump in an Op-Ed article published in The Hill, an influential U.S. Capitol newspaper, while other top Ukrainian officials slammed the GOP candidate on social media.

The Ukrainian mischief is part of Special Counsel John Durham’s broader Trump-Russia inquiry, as of 2022 a full-blown criminal investigation with grand jury indictments – into efforts to falsely target Trump as a Kremlin conspirator in 2016 and beyond.

Nine days after the U.S. presidential election, the Russian Federation sponsored a U.N. Resolution entitled Combating glorification of Nazism, Neo-Nazism and other practices that contribute to fueling contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance aimed at condemning the neo-fascist groups openly displaying Nazi symbols and regalia in Ukraine and Donbas. The Obama administration voted against the resolution.^[80]

Crowdstrike[edit]

See also: Murder of Seth Rich

CrowdStrike is a cyber security company founded founded by Dimitry Alperovitch, a Ukrainian oligarch and senior fellow at the Atlantic Council. Another owner and senior manager of Crowdstrike is a former senior FBI man Shawn Henry, who was promoted by Robert Mueller to be the FBI's Head of Cyber Security in the 2000s.

Crowdstrike is funded by Google,^[81] the arms industry, NATO, the US Military, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and another Ukrainian oligarch who donated $10 million to the Clinton Foundation named Victor Pinchuk.^[82] Pichuk hosted the September 2013 confabulation in Yalta, Crimea attended by Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, and Tony Blair to discuss how Ukraine's assets would be carved up after the forthcoming Ukrainian coup.

Accusations of Russian hacking DNC servers in the Spring of 2016 rely entirely on a report by CrowdStrike.^[83] Despite repeated requests from the FBI, Crowdstrike and the DNC refused to turn over evidence.^[84] The Obama administration never examined the DNC servers to determine if indeed they were hacked, or attempted to identify who the hacker might have been.^[85] On July 25, 2019, President Trump requested President Zelensky of Ukraine to assist in recovering evidence from Crowdstrike, which contracts with the Ukrainian military.^[86]

• According to journalist and DNC activist Andrea Chalupa on her Facebook page “After Chalupa sent the email to Miranda (which mentions that she had invited this reporter to a meeting with Ukrainian journalists in Washington),^[87] it triggered high-level concerns within the DNC, given the sensitive nature of her work. “That’s when we knew it was the Russians,” said a Democratic Party source who has been directly involved in the internal probe into the hacked emails. In order to stem the damage, the source said, “we told her to stop her research.”” July 25, 2016
• If she was that close to the investigation Crowdstrike did how credible is she? Her sister Alexandra was named one of 16 people that shaped the election by Yahoo news. The DNC hacking investigation done by Crowdstrike concluded hacking was done by Russian actors based on the work done by Alexandra Chalupa? That is the conclusion of her sister Andrea Chalupa and obviously enough for Crowdstrike to make the Russian government connection.
• How close is Dimitri Alperovitch to DNC officials? Close enough professionally he should have stepped down from an investigation that had the chance of throwing a presidential election in a new direction. According to Esquire.com, Alperovitch has vetted speeches for Hillary Clinton about cyber security issues in the past. Because of his work on the Sony hack, President Barrack Obama personally called and said the measures taken were directly because of his work.
• Alperovitch’s relationships with the Chalupas, radical groups, think tanks, Ukrainian propagandists, and Ukrainian state supported hackers [show a conflict of interest]. When it all adds up and you see it together, we have found a Russian that tried hard to influence the outcome of the US presidential election in 2016.

Impeachment 2.0: 2019-2020[edit]

See also: Impeachment sham

In December 2016 Sens. Lindsey Graham and John McCain visited the Azov Battalion. Graham told them "Your fight is our fight, 2017 will be the year of offense" to retake Crimea.^[88] However, the election of Donald Trump a month earlier interrupted the neocon globalist agenda for war with Russia. When the Trump-Russia collusion hoax and Mueller investigation failed to remove President Trump, undeterred, Ukranian nationalists and their American collaborators attempted to impeach President Trump in the fall and winter of 2020 for not enthusiastically supporting war with Russia over Ukraine.

NATO war in Ukraine[edit]

See also: NATO war in Ukraine

Former comedian, now President Volodoymr Zelensky (second from left), chest exposed, tight leather pants, wearing high heels depicted as the modern "Churchill";[89] (right) Vladimir Putin's "My Pet Goat" moment, receives briefing on Zelensky.

In the run up to the war, both the United States and NATO rejected without consideration two treaty proposals by the Russian Federation to avoid war.^[90][91][92] The treaty proposals would require NATO to pledge not granting Ukraine and the Republic of Georgia NATO membership; U.S. missiles in Poland and Romania to be removed; and NATO deployments to Eastern Europe reversed. The U.S. and NATO rejected the proposals without consideration and instead sent more NATO forces to Eastern Europe and continued to heavily arm Ukraine.^[93]

In early December 2021 it was reported that the Armed Forces of Ukraine deployed 125,000 troops against the Donbas against 15,000 separatist forces.^[94] NATO-backed neo-Nazis attacked the Donbas on February 14, 2022.^[95][96][97] In Donetsk region, between the evenings of 18 and 20 February 2022, the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine recorded 2,158 ceasefire violations, including 1,100 explosions. In the previous reporting period, it recorded 591 ceasefire violations in the region. In Luhansk region, between the evenings of 18 and 20 February, the Mission recorded 1,073 ceasefire violations, including 926 explosions. In the previous reporting period, it recorded 975 ceasefire violations in the region.^[98]

With a diplomatic solution rejected out of hand by the United States and NATO, the Russian Federation entered Ukraine on February 24, 2022, to put a stop to the eight-year war against the people of the Donbas by the Kyiv regime which had already claimed 14,000 lives. After more than two weeks fighting claiming more civilian lives with NATO-supplied weapons, on March 11, 2022, EU external minister Josep Borrell back peddled on EU policy which provoked the war saying, "I am ready to admit that we made a number of mistakes and that we lost the possibility of Russia’s rapprochement with the West. There are moments that we could do better, there are things that we proposed and then could not implement, such as, for example, the promise that Ukraine and Georgia will become part of NATO."^[99] The following day NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg began walking back NATO threats to Russia by saying membership for Ukraine was not relevant or on the agenda.^[100]

NATO-backed neo-Nazi proxy forces attacked the Donbas again on February 14, 2022.^{[101][102][103]} Military forces of the Russian Federation (RF) entered Ukraine on February 24, 2022, to put an end to the ethnic violence and de-nazify the areas where the children and grandchildren of World War II Nazi collaborators had been carrying an ethnic hatred of Russians since the Holodomor of the 1930s and earlier. A wave of patriotism swept over Russian society, viewing the operation as a second Great Patriotic War.^[104] Soldiers felt they were sent to finish the job of de-nazifying Ukraine that their grandfathers left unfinished after World War II. The use of civilian human shields by the U.S-trained Armed Forces of Ukraine led to civilian casualties and was a primary strategy of the NATO proxies. Ukrainian security forces committed reprisal actions and atrocities against ethnic Russians and Russian speakers in areas which Russian forces vacated. Numerous attacks by Ukrainian forces on its own citizens, which had been ongoing in the Donbas region for the eight previous years, spread outside the Donbas to create false flag images of attacks by Russians. Efforts to rehabilitate the image and reputation of Nazis and Nazism by Western and Ukrainian media and psyops were non-stop since the beginning of the Russian incursion, with permanent and debilitating damage to the West's educational system and image throughout the civilized world. By early April 2022, the Armed Forces of Ukraine had been so degraded and decimated, or were out of fuel and unable to retreat, the Maidan regime doubled down on soft power, psychological operations and propaganda to garner sympathy from the West for continued support.

Ukraine missile attack on Poland[edit]

On November 15, 2022, two Ukrainian S-300 missiles, alleged to have been launched to shoot down a Russian cruise missile, were fired westward and hit a Polish grain storage facility, killing two civilians. The Polish government, Ukrainian government, the Associated Press,^[105] most of all Western propaganda media and so-called national security and intelligence experts called for invoking NATO Article 5.^[106] Zelensky advisor Mykhailo Podolyak declared that the strikes came from Russia. Ukrainian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba claimed Russian denials were a conspiracy theory and that “No one should buy Russian propaganda or amplify its messages."^[107] Ukrainian dictator Volodymyr Zelensky tweeted that the “Russian attack on collective security in the Euro-Atlantic is a significant escalation” of the conflict.^[108]

However an AWAC radar plane and other ISR aircraft (intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance) aircraft regularly flying in the region, and ground radar, tracked the missiles' trajectory and determined the Kyiv regime had launched the missiles. That did not prevent an anonymous "senior U.S. intelligence official" from reporting to the Associated Press that Russia had fired the missiles at Poland. The fake news story was disseminated globally, as all fake news stories emanating from Kyiv, and its CIA counterparts in Kyiv, have been disseminated globally to world media for the entirety of 2022 and late 2021.

When called out on the lies, Ukrainian dictator Volodymyr Zelensky doubled down. Both socialist premier Joe Biden and NATO chief warlord Jens Stoltenberg blamed Ukraine for the attack. Zelensky refuted the Western leaders' statements that the missile which killed two innocent civilians in Poland was Ukrainian. "I have no doubt that it was not our missile or our missile strike." Zelensky insisted that he received reports from the corrupt Armed Forces of Ukraine command that told him the missile attacks did not come from Ukraine," he told the people in a live nationwide address on Ukrainian state-controlled media.^[109] The Russophobic Financial Times of London quoted a diplomat from a NATO country in Kyiv saying: “This is getting ridiculous. The Ukrainians are destroying [our] confidence in them. Nobody is blaming Ukraine and they are openly lying. This is more destructive than the missile.”^[110]

Historiography[edit]

The scholarly study of the Ukraine's history emerged from romantic impulses in the late 19th century. The outstanding leaders were Volodymyr Antonovych (1834-1908), based in Kiev, and his student Michael Hrushevsky (1866-1934).^[111] For the first time full-scale scholarly studies based on archival sources, modern research techniques, and modern historical theories became possible. However, the demands of government officials—especially Soviet, but also Czarists and Polish—made it difficult to disseminate ideas that ran counter to the central government. Therefore, exile schools of historians emerged in central Europe and Canada after 1920.^[112]

Strikingly different interpretations of the medieval state of Kievan Rus' appear in the four schools of historiography within Ukraine: Russophile, Sovietophile, Eastern Slavic, and Ukrainophile. The Sovietophile and Russophile schools have become marginalized in independent Ukraine, with the Ukrainophile school being dominant in the early 21st century. The Ukrainophile school promotes an identity that is mutually exclusive of Russia. It has come to dominate the nation's educational system, security forces, and national symbols and monuments, although it has been dismissed as nationalist by Western historians. The East Slavic school, an eclectic compromise between Ukrainophiles and Russophilism, has a weaker ideological and symbolic base, although it is preferred by Ukraine's centrist former elites.^[113]

Many historians in recent years have sought alternatives to national histories, and Ukrainian history invited approaches that looked beyond a national paradigm. Multiethnic history recognizes the numerous peoples in Ukraine; transnational history portrays Ukraine as a border zone for various empires; and area studies categorizes Ukraine as part of Eurasia, or more often as part of East-Central Europe. Plokhy (2007) argues that looking beyond the country's national history has made possible a richer understanding of Ukraine, its people, and the surrounding regions.^[114]

After 1991, historical memory was a powerful tool in the political mobilization and legitimation of the post-Soviet Ukrainian state, as well as the division of selectively used memory along the lines of the political division of Ukrainian society. Ukraine did not experience the restorationist paradigm typical of some other post-Soviet nations, including the Baltic states, although the multifaceted history of independence, the Orthodox Church in Ukraine, Soviet-era repressions, mass famine, and World War II collaboration were used to provide a different constitutive frame for the new Ukrainian nation. The politics of identity (which includes the production of history textbooks and the authorization of commemorative practices) has remained fragmented and tailored to reflect the ideological anxieties and concerns of individual regions of Ukraine.^[115]

See also[edit]

• Ukrainian Sich Riflemen
• Essay: Understanding the organization of Ukrainian forces

References[edit]

External links[edit]

• CIA Factbook
• Ukraine page at The Economist
• www.ukraine.org
• Ukraine magazine, English edition
• Ukrainian Collaboration with Germany in World War II (1941 – 1945)
• "Between Hitler and Stalin: Ukraine in World War II," a 2003 Canadian film produced and directed by Slavko Nowytski and narrated by Jack Palance.
• U.S. State Department Background Note: Ukraine (2008), the source for several sections of this text
• 2014 Mariupol. Crimes of the Ukrainian regime . The war in Ukraine has been going on for 8 years. – YouTube