New opportunities are appearing in Ukraine’s geopolitical strategy. Deepening economic and political cooperation with future new members of the European Union is singled out as a principal direction in terms of our strategy; this primarily address Central European (CE) countries forming the so-called Baltic-Black Sea axis. It would be a gross oversimplification if we tried to reduce the reasons for the situation to a mere conjuncture of circumstances, such as an abrupt (and unpredictable) strengthening of the CE positions during the Iraqi crisis or Ukraine’s decision to dispatch a brigade to the Polish stabilization sector in postwar Iraq. I will not deny the importance of any of these things. In reality, however, we have to deal with more substantial reasons, in particular that special mission which the CE countries, first of all Poland, could accomplish after becoming full-fledged EU members, in implementing our highest priority, European integration. One can predict a situation in which our relations with the EU would largely, perhaps even crucially, depend on the level of our relationships with the CE states; the latter might well assume the function of the main subject of EU Eastern policy after 2004. Ukraine would then be one of the subjects of that political course, so our stand in that interdependence would determine our future prospects. In fact, the European Commission statement, Greater Europe — Neighborhood: A Proposed New Framework for Relations with the EU’s Eastern and Southern Neighbors, has largely come down to this logic.
THE LOGIC OF EU-PLUS
First of all, consider the so-called discrepancies in the expansion of the EU and the negative effect of the process on our country, something now and then mentioned by our officials. Experts at the National Institute for Strategic Studies do not share this opinion. On the contrary, we proceed from the assumption that expanding the European Union opens up broader horizons for Ukraine, offering this country quite tangible opportunities to deepen its European integration policy. As a result of this expansion, Ukraine will find itself with the status of a direct neighbor of EU states, which will objectively enhance EU influence on our country. This, in turn, will objectively enhance EU influence on the democratic process, securing human rights and freedoms, strengthening the media, and asserting the key principles of civil society.
We should take into account the geopolitical aspects of EU expansion, regard this process within the context of carrying out the idea of Greater Europe, and the objective transformation from a unipolar to multipolar world. What this means is steps have to be taken to enhance the EU’s geopolitical self-sufficiency as an acknowledged leader of the world civilization process. The international community is interested in precisely this vector of development of the process of world civilization. This logic of transformations in terms of civilization also serves the national interests of the United States. Only short-sighted politicians can fail to understand this. Events in Iraq served to make this problem even more relevant.
Simultaneously, expanding the EU within the stated perimeters cannot finally solve the problem of European economic self-sufficiency, just as it cannot substantially enhance the EU’s economic potential, which is currently lower than that of the US. Such expansion may secure cooperation matching current US GDP indices. Experts, however, insist that the US may expect a higher rate of development (among other things owing to the priorities of scientific and technological progress, upgrading the defense industry, developing new missile defense systems, and accessing key global sources of raw materials). In this context, modernizing the Ukrainian economy and those of other countries neighboring the EU could be regarded as a real economic potential, whose gradual integration into the EU economic space would then act as that critical mass capable of triggering off appropriate transformations in Europe’s geopolitical status.
If one were to consider EU expansion from this angle, it would become clear that Ukraine’s aspirations as an eventual full-fledged member of that organization have substantial enough prerequisites. This is a process envisaging both internal and external interests. The EU is about as interested in having a civilized democratic Ukraine as Ukraine is in having EU membership. Such mutual interests promise to increase in the long run. The Western European countries need time to perceive this interrelationship. In this situation, the main thing is for us to constantly prove to the international community that we are consistently following this course, that we are asserting the principles of a democratic society, of the rule of law, and that our economy is socially oriented.
Simultaneously, it is necessary to show political restraint and understanding concerning the complexity of the process of expanding the EU, that this process cannot be artificially stepped up. Central European countries that considerable advantages over Ukraine, at the start of the integration process, required almost 15 years to carry out complex systemic and sometimes unpopular reforms in order to approach the European standard. Those reforms called for both political will on the part of the political leadership and a Herculean effort on the part of society. Ukrainian society has not as yet been able to rise to that transformation level. This takes time and painstaking efforts. Above all, this calls for uniting our society politically.
In the this context, the European Commission’s stand, in terms of broader relationships between the EU and the neighboring countries (Ukraine included), should not be regarded as a move aimed at delimitation, building a new Berlin Wall or setting up a so- called gray zone. Actually, the reverse is true, forming a Great European ideology, an attempt to lay the economic and political foundations of a broader European integration zone, compared to the EU. The point in question is the eventual creation of a joint European economic space based on the principle of concentric circles with varying stages of integration, where neighboring countries are seen not as antipodes, but as the actual subjects of a given formation. Proceeding from this, it is possible to assume that Greater Europe is not an ideology of separation. It is an EU-Plus ideology, meaning the European Union plus an area in which the integration process is less manifest. Russia could emerge in that area in addition to Ukraine and other countries. This process would be exceptionally favorable for Ukraine in the geopolitical sense. The European Commission’s Broader Europe document, adopted in March, should be considered in precisely this context. The European Commission’s Broader Europe statement does not imply a vehicle to isolated an expanded European Union form the neighboring countries; on the contrary, it offers a mechanism providing for a more effective cooperation with countries outside EU.
THE US-POLISH-UKRAINIAN AXIS
The emphasis, in the introductory section of this publication, on that special mission, which the EU states could accomplish in the implementation of Ukraine’s European integration strategy, has important objective preconditions. They address several aspects. Experts at our institute have singled out the problem of retaining in conjunction with EU membership the specific identity of those countries that played a sufficiently important role in the assertion of all-European values, and which are simultaneously different in terms of their special cultural legacies, traditions, and mentalities that are close to the corresponding values of the Ukrainian people.
The notion of Central Europe was altered by World War II. Professor T. Kyiak notes that “Central Europe was pressed to the limits of the Berlin Wall. It was precisely for this territory and its assimilation that the Soviet Union confronted Western Europe.” Recent transformations in Europe have basically changed this situation, although the problem of reproducing the specific identity of the CE countries and their regional self-assertion has not become less topical. In the historical context, these problems emerge extremely close to the problems of European self-identification of the Ukrainian people which has, at all stages of its development, maintained the closest [possible] contact primarily with the CE countries.
In addition to the mentioned objective stimulus for deepening the integration process between the CE states and Europe, we must also consider the adequacy of economic transformations. Here we need consider the pressing need to master that innovation development model and use it as the basis for establishing postindustrial production systems, carrying out a structural reform of the agrarian sector, socializing the economy, thus overcoming the profound differentiation of the population’s incomes, securing quick economic growth.
Another thing that must be taken into account is that Ukraine lags behind the CE counties in terms of per capita GDP income and buying power indices, yet this status should not be regarded as critical. In 2001, it was some Euro 4,500 per capita in Ukraine, and Euro 10,700 in the countries seeking EU membership (including Euro 7,750 in Latvia, Euro 8,960 in Lithuania, Euro 9,240 in Estonia, Euro 9,410 in Poland). Among the second-wave candidate EU members, it was Euro 5,710 in Bulgaria, Euro 5,560 in Romania, and Euro 5,230 in Turkey. If we took into account the shadow sector, such indices in Ukraine would be considerably higher. We further must consider the higher Ukrainian growth rate over the past three years (2000-03). In the G-10 countries, the average annual ratio does not surpass 2.5% (including 1.6% in Poland, 2.7% in the Czech Republic, 3.5% in Hungary). In Ukraine, it is 7.1% and 7.3% in the first half of 2003. Also, the Ukrainian currency is more stable, we have a lower level of foreign debt, a positive balance of payments, and lower budget deficit.
Also, the Central European states do not seem to have a significant potential for extending their trade westward. This potential has been vastly depleted. Accordingly, these countries seek to utilize the Ukrainian market potential — and this potential is rather large. We could also count on expanding the investment process, with a number of export-oriented production facilities in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, and Poland being transferred to Ukraine to make the most of its advantages in market competition, as well as (and nonetheless importantly) to rid themselves of all those rigid EU regulatory requirements. Hungary can serve as a vivid example. It is currently inclined to regard Ukraine as a strategic territory whence to access other post-Soviet markets. In the same context deepening cross-border trade exchanges with other countries appears most important.
These circumstances determine the natural interest shown by the CE states in the implementation of Ukraine’s European integration strategy and their public support of that strategy. This provides objective prerequisites for the deepening of sub-regional integration efforts in Central Europe, involving Ukraine. Nor should we rule out the possibility of formalizing the appropriate relationships and rendering them into an institutional form, in keeping with the existing international practice.
Deepening Ukrainian-Polish strategic partnership is in every way especially important in carrying out this process. Poland has recently acquired a fundamentally new geopolitical status, turning into a most serious European partner of the United States, assuming the role of an international integrator of sorts in Central and Eastern Europe. At present, Poland is in a peak situation, being raised to the crest of the wave in world politics by the war in Iraq, yet its political and economic capacities are far from adequate for this. This explains Ukraine’s and Poland’s being objectively interested in deepening the comprehensive cooperation between them . The US-Polish-Ukrainian link should be used most effectively for the movement of Ukraine toward Europe.
There is an actual opportunity to enhance this link, turning it into a steady geostrategic interdependence, something Ukrainian diplomats should bear in mind at all times.
Within this context, Ukrainian-Polish cooperation in implementing the Odesa-Brody oil pipeline (subsequently to reach Gdansk ) is of fundamental importance, regarded by analysts as the most promising European business project in the next decade. After Poland got access to Iraqi oilfields, the importance of the said oil pipeline is increasing substantially. The point in question is not only the prospect of transporting Caspian oil to Europe, but also oil from the Middle East. Here a special role could be played by the deepening of economic cooperation between Ukraine and Turkey. The substantial recent rapprochement of interests between our countries and our mutual aspiration for European integration provide substantial prerequisites for Turkey also joining in an appropriate project. Ukraine’s general multi-vector integration into the European system of oil transport could become one of the key factors in creating a mutual interest in the speeding up Ukraine’s process of European integration process.
In this new situation, special importance is also assumed by the position of Ukraine’s initiative with regard to strengthening the position of GUUAM intensifying interaction with the countries of Central Europe and Caucasus, specifically in the development of international transportation and communications networks as well as in developing hydrocarbon deposits in the Caspian basin. Deepening cooperation here corresponds fully with the interests of the European Union. In these and other matters, Ukraine can become an important link between the East and West.
STEPS TOWARD NATO
Within the context of the practical implementation of the tasks of the European integration process, it is necessary to also consider the significantly more active pursuit of the Euro-Atlantic vector of Ukraine’s foreign policy and its clearly defined orientation toward reforming the nation’s military potential in accordance with European standards as a step toward full-scale Euro-Atlantic integration. The point in question is one of the motive forces in our official policy relating not only to the prospects of our external security, but also the philosophy of our future. WTO accession, on the one hand, and our active efforts to become a full-fledged NATO member, on the other, are today the two positions worked out in the greatest detail concerning the assertion of our country’s European strategy. Strengthening the leadership of the Ministry of Defense is one confirmation of this. What Ukraine is doing in these matters indicates a new qualitative level of the European integration process — its being transferred from the plane of purely political assertions to that of practical decisions.
The adoption in 2002 by the National Security and Defense Council of a political decision concerning the prospect of Ukraine acquiring full NATO membership became a turning point in the relations of our country with the alliance. This fateful decision reflected a profound awareness of the fact that not only Ukraine’s NATO membership, but also the very process of its integration in this direction would help solve a number of important strategic tasks, namely:
