The Revolution of Dignity in early 2014 is an event we will never have all the details of, however what we can decipher from it is that there was a considerable shift in Ukraine's position internationally after the ousting of President Yanukovych. Yanukovych was ousted by the Euromaidan coup which was backed by both US and
NATO interests to the tune of billions of dollars. According to the press there was strong public opposition to Yanukovych’s hesitancy on EU membership and subsequent NATO relations, which at that time may have upset Ukraine’s existing relationship with Russia. However it need not be stated here of the dubious nature of “grass roots” movements that support global American hegemony. Countless intelligence memos from the early and mid 2000’s made it clear that the international community realised that both domestic and international tensions would continue to grow as Ukraine’s possible NATO membership became an ever more present reality. Yanukovych must have known this all too well himself, having been elected in 2010 with a slim majority in a nation divided in part by loyalty to Russia. It is no wonder then that Yanukovych wasn’t particularly hasty in the signing of a number of EU trade and political agreements, which would have undoubtedly put Ukraine in a position closer to NATO, and further from its neighbour Russia.
If anything this attempt by Yanukovych to be the mediator in a very tense setting, amongst his own populace and the international community, should have been commended as an act of great statesmanship that sought to represent each side of the demos. Instead the international community, that always bays for the blood of its enemies, moved as much money, arms and manpower as was required to remove Yanukovych and his government, so that a truly democratic government could be installed, without a drop of irony. Even to the degree that institutions like the European Investment Bank ceased all operations under the excuse that Yanukovych’s attempt to crackdown on a genuine insurrection was “barbaric”. A great humanitarian effort to remove the financial rug from under the feet of an already crippled nation, with its GDP still below levels reported in the 1990’s. Interesting point to note here, in less than a year after the Euromaidan coup, 8 of Yanukovych’s top advisors had reportedly all committed suicide.
This general formula of “brave freedom fighters” ousting foreign leaders who don’t fully comply with the diktats of NATO and UN forces is nothing new, Egypt, Libya, Syria and so on. Yet there is a uniqueness to the situation unfolding in Ukraine. Much like the position Cuba played during the missile crisis of the 1950’s. Ukraine is on the brink of becoming the next front for NATO to exude ever more stringent “soft power” on non-compliant states like Russia. Marching on Moscow is never wise, but doing so from Kiev, or Kyiv if you're into that sort of thing, is at least marginally wiser.
Unlike the 1950’s however the USSR is dead and what is left in its shadow is not the force that those who have to justify exuberant defence budgets would have you believe it is. The links between Russia and its “allies” are tenuous at best, long gone are the days of Marxist doctrine being pumped into the anti-imperialist nations of Africa, Asia and South America. Curiously that job has been overtaken by western forces, an issue best left for another time. Instead Russia relies on slim economic relations that are born more out of necessity than any imperialist sentiments. No one of any sense could argue that Russia is attempting to encroach or threaten western forces with its more recent movements into Ukraine. Nor is Russia in to even question or challenge western hegemony. This is possibly where the Cuba analogy begins to break down somewhat, as we can all be sure that if the USSR had boots on the ground in Cuba, then the bay of pigs would’ve been a minor fumble compared to the force that the US military would have unleashed upon Cuba, all argued as actions of the utmost important to national defence of course.
It is clearly NATO and American interests that have imperial goals in their sights, and that Ukraine, its people and any law order it may have had be damned. In the words of the dark lord himself Tony Blair, in discussion with John McCain, Russia should be made to “feel a little desperate” and henceforth run to China for assistance. Providing the perfect excuse for the “league of democracies” (McCain’s words) to become an ever more explicit organisation. NATO forces have both the ideological champion of democracy and the mass organisation of industrial western states behind them, in a sense one can only expect things to get worse for Putin, Russia and of course Ukraine in the course of making another corner of the globe “safe for democracy.”