At the Fence of Metternich's Garden. Mykola Riabchuk
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and perceived by the West. Independent Ukraine proved to be the “unwanted step-child” not only of Soviet perestroika (as Martin Sieff put it) but also of the 1917 Russian revolution. Every Ukrainian student knows today from his/her historical textbook that the US established diplomatic relations with the USSR in 1933, exactly when Moscow was starving to death at least five million Ukrainian peasants. And from the same textbook, they know how in the same year the British Foreign Office strove to silence any information about the man-made famine in Ukraine so as not to irritate the valuable trade partners in Moscow [Subtelny 2009: 416].
Against such a background, many Ukrainians cannot but suspect that the West still has not come to terms with Ukraine’s existence, and still tends to treat it as a legitimate zone of vaguely defined but widely applied Russian ‘interests’: “Most European governments would very happily leave Ukraine in Russia’s orbit, rather than worry about the problems of a large, backward and fissiparous country” [Barysch & Grant 2004].
Such a perception has been skillfully exploited by the post-Soviet elite to invigorate old anti-Western stereotypes in Ukrainian society, to justify the lack of a coherent, comprehensive and responsible foreign policy driven by national rather than clannish or personal interests, and to divert public attention from the real and fundamental reasons that made crypto-Soviet Ukraine incompatible with and non-admittible to the EU. The rhetorical strategy under Kuchma [1994–2004] was designed to persuade the people that we are excluded not because we are unreformed and our leaders are crooks and liars but just because we are different, we are Ukrainians, Eastern Slavs, the ‘worse’ brand of human beings.
Unfortunately, Europeans did little if anything to disperse these impressions. On the contrary, in many cases, they fueled fears and biases deeply rooted in Ukrainians’ inferiority complexes.
Perhaps the best example of blind and, alas, firmly institutionalized West European Russocentrism comes from a classified report drawn up by the German and French foreign ministries in 2000: “The admission of Ukraine would imply the isolation of Russia. It is sufficient to content oneself with close cooperation with Kiev. The Union should not be enlarged to the East any further …”1
To some West European EU members [an American expert comments on this whimsical logic] Ukraine is still seen as ‘semi-Russian’, a factor that reinforces the tendency to place the fate of all three eastern Slavs together … Linking the destinies of Ukraine and Russia places them both beyond ‘Europe’ … This suits Russia, which is seeking to develop a ‘strategic partnership’ with the EU but not membership. It does not suit Ukraine that seeks membership” [Kuzio 2003: 6, 14].
There are, of course, many reasons to prioritize relations with Russia as the biggest country on the continent, with rich natural resources, primarily gas and oil, the largest nuclear arsenal, and a permanent seat in the UN Security Council. But the reasons why Russia is overtly favored at the expense of its neighbors are less clear. Partly it can be explained by an imperial likeness between the large European nations and Russia, embedded historically in modes of thought and behavior, in national psyche and ‘habits of the heart’. A more credible explanation, however, is a heavy dependence of Western thought and Western ideas about Russia on Russian imperial myths elaborated, by and large, in the 18th century and firmly established as the ‘scholarly truth’ and ‘common knowledge’. Ukraine unfortunately has been a central part of this historical and cultural mythmaking, its major target and victim.
In brief, the myth consists of three major narratives. The first one blurs and washes away any difference between two very different historical entities—Ruś and Russia. The linguistic similarity is successfully converted into a historical, geographical and political similarity and, eventually, sameness. By the same token, modern Romania can be identified with ancient Rome, and Britain identified with Brittany. The second narrative grants the modern name Russia, coined in the early 18th century, to medieval Muscovy and establishes mythical ties between the Moscow Tsardom and Kyivan Ruś. The fact is, however, that no idea of Moscow’s succession to the Kyiv Ruś legacy could be found in Muscovite thought until the end of the 17th century, when Left Bank Ukraine and the city of Kyiv were taken from Poland and when the Grand imperial myth began to be formed (ironically, by Ukrainian clerics hired by Peter the Great and seeking to enhance their country’s symbolic role as the cradle of the empire). And finally, the third narrative questions the very existence of the Ukrainian (and Belarusian) nations, misrepresenting them as incidental offshoots of the great Russian nation—despite the fact that these ‘offshoots’ came under full Russian control for the first time in their history only at the end of the 18th century, after the partition of Poland.
Any nation is largely built on ‘invented traditions’, and Russia is no exception to the rule. But very few nations center their identities almost thoroughly on historical myths, and very few national myths are so expansive, so militant and, alas, so broadly accepted as ‘historical truths’.
A ‘Russia first’ policy, based on these myths as well as on cynical Realpolitik, seems to be the main if not the only rationale for Western ambiguity about Ukraine and for Western reluctance to treat it as equal to any other nation on the continent, with the same rights, same chances and prospects for EU membership as Albania, Turkey or, say, Bosnia and Herzegovina. It does not mean that unreformed, stagnant, oligarchic Ukraine could and should be admitted to the EU. It means only that such a Ukraine should be rejected for that very reason articulated openly, and not because Russia might feel ‘isolated’ and perhaps ‘unhappy’, as some Western leaders equivocally suggest. “Tough love” (in Heather Grabbe’s words)—this is exactly what Ukraine needs: more ‘love’ for the nation, with clear incentives of future membership, and more ‘toughness’ for the political leaders, who should come in line with their domestic and international obligations.
So far, EU policy towards Ukraine has been nearly as ambiguous and equivocal as that of Ukraine towards the EU, although the reasons for this are different. From such a policy, probably no one can figure out whether Ukraine is barred from prospective membership simply because of its poor political and economic performance, or rather because of the nation’s assumed intrinsic inferiority and congenital Russian vassalage.
Some statements made by EU officials rather deepen the confusion than dispel it. Suffice it to mention Romano Prodi’s notorious remark that Ukraine “has as much reason to be in the EU as New Zealand” (because New Zealanders, in his words, also have a European identity). Or the no less controversial quip by Günter Verheugen that “anybody who thinks Ukraine should be taken into the EU should perhaps come along with the argument that Mexico should be taken into the U.S.”2
It does not matter that neither do New Zealanders strive to join the EU, nor Mexicans for U.S. accession. And that none of them stage an ‘orange revolution’ to assert their Europeanness. In both exemplified cases, grotesque and essentially absurd arguments were set forth by respectable politicians in such a way as to stultify their potential opponents, to mock and discredit their arguments in advance, and to thereby make any further discussion impossible. In other words, the goal was not to clarify anything whatsoever but just to convert political power into discursive or, as Michel Foucault would have put it, to monopolize the discourse of ‘normality’ and push all opponents beyond that discourse, into the realm of insanity and obsession.
The double standards will probably be ingrained in EU policy vis-à-vis Ukraine, and the duplicity will not disappear, as long as the EU does not decouple Ukraine and Russia and refuses to recognize their absolutely different strategic agendas. The EU still has to decide whether “it can agree in principle to Ukraine being inside the EU while Russia remains outside” [Kuzio 2003: 30]. This cannot come easily, and Ukrainians must recognize that ‘enlargement fatigue’ is a reality in Europe. And that the timing is really bad for their country after the decision to start membership talks with Turkey and the accession of 10 new countries in 2004. For too many Europeans, as Martin Wolf put it, Ukraine and Turkey, by virtue of their size and location, are “twin nightmares” haunting the EU (Financial Times, 1 February 2005). Too many of them perceive these countries