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Alexander J. MotylWhy Reintegrating the Donbas Is Suicide for UkraineIf you’re wondering
why the Minsk
peace process isn’t leading to
peace, look no further than
a recent interview with Vladislav Inozemtsev, a highly respected Russian economist and director
of the Center
for the Study
of Postindustrial Society in Moscow.
The bottom line—surprise, surprise!—is this:
Vladimir Putin doesn’t want peace.
He wants to make Ukraine
into a permanent backwater state dependent on the
Kremlin. How? By forcing
Kiev to reintegrate
the now occupied,
politically poisoned, and economically ravaged Donbas into Ukraine, knowing
full well that this region,
now forever crippled by Putin’s
proxies, will condemn Ukraine to being a permanently
bankrupt puppet of the mafia
state next door. This would
be suicide. Tragically, although many Ukrainian policymakers understand it makes no
sense for Ukraine to infect
itself with this cancer, the
power of Ukrainian patriotic rhetoric—“The Donbas
is eternal Ukrainian land!”—may wind up
saddling the country with a burden so heavy
that it will
crush its sovereignty and its democracy, move it decisively
away from Europe and the
world, and succeed in achieving
what Viktor Yanukovych failed to do: transform
Ukraine into a backward hinterland of a backward imperialist
petro-state. Is Moscow planning
to annex the separatist Donbas enclave? Here’s Inozemtsev: It’s not. … Perhaps the Kremlin
considered this option at the
start of the shocks in
April-May 2014, but now, after the
war, when we have become
witness to enormous destruction, a dysfunctional system, and the region’s
transformation into an economic wasteland,
obviously Russia will not annex
it. … Much there has been
destroyed, much has been stolen,
removed to Russia and resold.
I believe this region represents no special economic
advantage. More than that, consider
what it used
to have: the coal and
metallurgical industries. Metallurgy remains in Mariupil, which
is, thank God, under Ukrainian
control, while the coal industry
is very unprofitable.
Ukraine’s budget subsidized the Donbas for many
years. … Russia knows this industry
is unprofitable and has no
intention of supporting the east of Ukraine…. So Moscow wants
the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk
People’s Republics to rejoin Ukraine? All of Russia’s
policies after the collapse of
the Soviet Union—and not
just Putin’s—have aimed at
creating a mess somewhere and leaving
it in that
condition. They tried to use
Transdnistria to undermine Moldovan statehood, but Transdnistria turned out to have
no benefit for Russia, while
annexing it was undesirable as it would
have facilitated Chisinau’s road to Europe. The
same happened in Georgia. Now
it’s Ukraine’s turn. Moscow doesn’t
need the Donbas or a strong
Ukraine. The Kremlin wants to
saddle Kyiv with permanent problems. So that
Ukraine won’t be able to
join the EU and NATO due to
its territorial conflict. So that
the so-called DNR and LNR will conduct
Moscow’s line in Ukraine’s parliament.
That’s the hook on which
Ukraine should hang. Economist Anders Aslund is quite
right to argue that Ukraine shouldn’t
pay for the
Donbas: Who should pay for the restoration
of the Donbas?
The obvious answer is the
aggressor, Russia. In a just world,
Ukraine would add a demand to
the Minsk negotiations for some $20 billion in war reparations
from Russia for the Donbas.
In reality, however, only losers
pay war reparations. For the foreseeable future, it is
unrealistic to expect that Ukraine
will be able
to finance the restoration of the Donbas.
Nor can the
already overindebted country borrow money to do
the job. It would have
to leave much of the
Donbas’ urban territories as industrial wastelands, which would make
it arduous to reintegrate the population. I fully agree with Aslund’s policy
recommendation, but can’t imagine that
it’ll happen anytime soon: The only sensible
solution is for the European
Union and the United States
to put up
substantial grant assistance to Ukraine
for the restoration
and reintegration of the Donbas.
For the sake
of stabilizing a former war-ravaged area in Europe,
$20 billion is no great amount.
Just compare it with the
$300 billion the European Union has spent on
the Greek financial crisis. If Russia and
the West won’t pay for
Russia’s criminal devastation of the DNR-LNR-controlled territories, then Ukraine will get
stuck with the bill. And
that’ll kill any hope that
Ukraine will become a viable and modern democratic
state. Kyiv must find the courage
to refuse the suicide option,
declare the Donbas enclave Russian-occupied territory, and wash its
hands of the mess. Here’s another reason to get
rid of that
cancer. I recently received the following
email from one “Andrei Poletaev.”
The subject heading was: Disgusting
Ukrainian Nazi. Here’s what he
said: You are a disgusting
miserable Ukrainian right wing propagandist
and extremist. You have no
idea what you are talking
about, go to Donetsk or
Lugansk and talk to people
and you will
see how much
they despise your Ukrainian Bandera murderous regime. I have a lot of friends
from Novorossia and i don’t [sic]
a single person who supports fascist
Kiev junta. Remember my words,
sooner or later, Donetsk, Luganks [sic] and
the entire Novorossia will be free. And you, dirty
Bandera Nazi apologist, will burn in hell. I don’t doubt that “Andrei Poletaev’s”
friends are exactly as he
describes them. But which should
Ukrainians prefer? Burning in hell
or breathing the same air
he and his
friends in the DNR-LNR breathe? http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/blog/alexander-j-motyl/why-reintegrating-donbas-suicide-ukraine |