Peter Zalmayev, a Ukrainian American political analyst, director of the Eurasia Democracy Initiative (EDI – an international non-profit organization dedicated to the promotion of democracy and human rights in post-communist transitional societies of Eastern and Central Europe, the Caucasus and Central Asia), has frequented Ukrainian channels since last September. He is currently one of http://prm.ua/ hosts. Remarkably, Mr. Zalmayev volunteered for an interview with The Day.
He started by explaining what the EDI, founded in 2008, based in NYC, was all about. “In view of Russia’s aggression against Ukraine, we have been paying closer attention to Ukraine. I’m spending half my time in Kyiv, acting as an EDI official. I have to fight on two fronts, telling Americans what’s happening in Ukraine, then telling Ukrainians what’s happening in the States. I was born in Donbas and stayed there until I was 18, so [Russia’s] aggression against the Crimea, followed by the war in the east of Ukraine, has cost me lots of nerve cells.”
LACK OF DEDICATION TO THE INDEPENDENCE CAUSE
You were born in Donbas. Why do you think people there fell prey to separatism so easily? Separatism is severely persecuted in Russia, with Chechnya serving as graphic proof.
“As a sober-minded individual, I flatly reject all insinuations concerning the so-called civic conflict in Donbas, that the populace was, allegedly, so displeased [with the Ukrainian regime], they took up arms to ‘defend human rights,’ including the right to speak Russian. Might makes right. Now it is clearly apparent that what happened was an operation, planned and triggered from the outside. People were hired to head Project Russian Spring. In fact, such people can be found everywhere, in any society. Given enough money and brainwashing experts, such a campaign will succeed in making the man on the street believe that an act of aggression was actually a civic conflict. I suspect that the ideas of separatism in Donbas are far less popular now than they were at the beginning – just as I strongly suspect that this ‘popular support’ at the time was largely overstated by the Kremlin-controlled media. Disinformation is the key weapon in this proxy war – and it is being waged not only against Ukraine. This war is being waged against the West at large. This is a case study in information warfare, with the Ukrainian channels blocked in Donbas, leaving only Russian channels. As a result of this ‘cold’ information war, the ‘hot’ one is echoing across Europe.”
Vitalii Nakhmanovych, a noted Ukrainian historian, told The Day that the Russian World could’ve taken root only where there wasn’t enough Ukraine.
“To see Ukraine’s northern neighbor as the sole perpetrator would be biased and unfair. Over the past several decades of national independence, Ukraine has failed to show its determination to become a strong and united country. After visiting Donetsk, Lviv or Uzhhorod, you realize that you have met with absolutely different ethnic communities, with polarized moods, philosophies, and so on. Clannishness in Ukraine is on a scale where everyone cares only for his well-being and that of his clan, to the detriment of the national idea. I could be stating self-evident facts, but they were anything but self-evident before the first Maidan. I vividly remember meeting with Arsenii Yatseniuk, then Minister of Foreign Affairs, during his visit to Columbia University in 2007. I asked him why Ukraine was so divided. All I heard was this motto: ‘East and West Together!’ [i.e., the pro-Russian east and the anti-Kremlin ethnic Ukrainian west]. As a Donbas native, I’ve always felt that Ukraine isn’t a solid multi-ethnic state. I’ve tried to broach the subject on several occasions [on various official levels], but no one would listen. This is proof of our shortsighted politics over the years [of national independence]. The same is true of the army. No one has lifted a finger to upgrade its defenses, to make this army capable of protecting a sovereign territory. Result: Crimea seized by Russians without a single shot fired.”
DARK PAGE IN THE NYT HISTORY
Not so long ago, many in Ukraine who could read English regarded The New York Times as a standard of journalism in the West. Then something happened. Walter Duranty was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for a series of features dealing with events dating back to 1932-33 in Ukraine. The celebrity apparently overlooked the most tragic event, the Holodomor in Ukraine. Den/The Day called the NYT office, explaining the situation and asking to cancel the prize. There has been no response. And then NYT came up with a North Korea missile scandal allegedly involving Ukraine and its supplies of ICBM engines. Note that this happened at a time when US military supplies were badly needed in Ukraine to fight the Russian aggressor. How can one discuss the responsibility of the US media under the circumstances?
“Nobody’s perfect. The truth about the Holodomor marked a dark page in the NYT history. My friends there, people from the Ukrainian, Russian, and Jewish ethnic communities, urged me to take part in a campaign to force the NYT to revoke the prize. In the end, we found out that revoking was impossible, that the award procedures precluded cancellation. Once you get the prize, you keep it, no matter what. As for the missiles, the NYT carried an expert opinion to the effect that Russia could be involved. Personally, I wouldn’t treat the NYT as an [journalist] idol. They keep doors open for their good old Russian spies. Therefore, I wouldn’t pass this harsh judgment on the matter. All I can say is that Ukraine should make every effort in investigating into the case – and do this pronto! This and a detailed report that would rule out any allegations and offer hard facts.”
The NYT also wrote about cyber-attacks and that they could’ve affected Mr. Trump’s election results. In fact, Mr. Trump wrote on his twitter page that Ukraine had sabotaged his election campaign. Any comment?
“You see, he uses any insinuations against Ukraine the way he sees fit. They are ‘automatically helping’ him. He was fed up with accusations of collaboration with Moscow, then Leshchenko, et al. and Manafort broke the surface, along with the bank records with payments allegedly made by Ukraine’s Party of Regions; along with the stories about Mrs. Hillary Clinton being aided by Ukraine. He wanted to hit once, then again – it was convenient for Donald Trump to establish this kind of equivalence. Personally, I see no such equivalence. One has to figure out the degree of Russia and Ukraine’s involvement. Ukraine remains an ally and Russia – the baggressor state. However, I see this as the end result of a series of efforts made by certain individuals who loved Ukraine and realized that Donald Trump [as President of the United States] would be bad news for their country.
“Any Trump-Poroshenko direct relationship is out of the question now. Mr. Trump is busy trying to cope with all sorts of problems, especially on the international arena. His campaign team members are being interviewed by the FBI, with the emphasis on the possibility of having tampered with the presidential election results. World politics are now formulated and implemented by Generals McMaster, Mattis and Kelly. They want to re-establish discipline within the White House then try to do something about Mr. Trump’s spontaneous statements addressing foreign political issues. As it is, he makes a statement followed by ones made almost to the contrary by the generals and Vice President Mike Pence. His statements concerning NATO, European Union, Russia, and Ukraine are graphic proof.”
RUSSIA VS. UKRAINE: SOVIET EMPIRE DECAY SYNDROME
The Editors believe that the Minsk process has been deadlocked from day one, that it was imposed on Ukraine by Europe. Now we have President Trump’s special envoy, Mr. Kurt Volker. Mr. Trump previously signed a bill imposing sanctions on Iran, North Korea, and Russia. Yevhen Marchuk wrote on his Facebook that the United States was entering Phase Two of the Proxy War [between Russia and Ukraine], in keeping with the Budapest Memorandum, and that this was another world security landmark.
“Changes are maturing within the world security system, no matter what bill is signed. Instability has been there for the past several years. There was a glitch and the PaxAmericana unipolar-world structure collapsed. Vladimir Putin and his sycophants keep saying that a unipolar structure will prove unstable, that there should be two hegemons. They are tampering with history. I’m not yelling bloody murder, for reasons that can be well understood. The bad news is that the current situation is strongly reminiscent of that before the outbreak of World War I, when that war should not have occurred. It occurred as a result of the fall of the Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman, and Russian empires – and in the presence of a crisis within Great Britain. Russia’s aggression against Ukraine is a Soviet empire decay syndrome. History appears to follow a cyclic route, but this doesn’t mean that certain events should happen again and again, at the right time, in the right place. We’re told that we’re on the verge of a global conflict, that the self-preservation instinct is the only way to survive, hopefully.
“North Korea. I don’t anticipate a [serious] conflict there. It’s a moth facing a giant, the United States. However, there is a dangerous pattern to be considered: China, Japan, Korea, and a bit of Russia. Beijing doesn’t want US military presence all over the peninsula, having used and still using North Korea as a buffer zone. No one wants a nuclear war – no one in North Korea, China or North America. Still, there is military logic with its notion of miscalculation. That’s when saber rattling begins. We have watched a situation verging on war over the Baltic Sea, the British Isles Turkey. Under the circumstances, any irresponsible move can trigger a war on the Korean Peninsula. The First World War began after the assassination of the heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary. Today, we have hot spots in the Donbas, east of Ukraine, and in Syria. We do have a dangerous situation.”
FIRST SEIZURE OF FOREIGN TERRITORY SINCE WW II
Do you think that Mr. Trump was advised of the US commitments under the Budapest Memorandum, particularly in regard to Ukraine’s territorial integrity? Europe’s security system was rooted in that memorandum and the 1975 Helsinki Act, including clauses securing the integrity of the national frontiers.
“Few if any remember or mention the Budapest Memorandum in the West. This is what makes the current situation dangerous. The problem is that there is no way to act when either of the conflicting parties ignores this instrument. This problem can’t be solved using military means and it sets a very dangerous precedent, with other such instruments losing credence. What we have is the first hostile takeover [using the military] of a foreign territory since the First World War [i.e. occupation and annexation of Crimea]. Russians are drawing parallels with Kosovo, but the situation was different there. At the time, the warring sides followed the basic rule: the best man wins and gets it all. In other words, laws are written for the weak; they are written by the strong and they can revise or dump any bill, any time. What would Russia have to do in accordance with the Budapest Memorandum? It would have to withdraw [its troops] from Donbas and Crimea. This will not happen for as long as Russia’s current tsar is on his throne. I’m having doubts about the possibility of settling the situation in Donbas while Vladimir Putin is in power. I can’t see him benefiting from solving the matter in a civilized manner. The political temperature in Donbas can be fixed all the way up or down. The whole matter is very useful [for President Putin], in that he can use it to distract the Russian people from complaining about all those domestic problems.”
Mr. Kurt Volker said that Russia should pay more for its aggression against Donbas, and that it would eventually realize that keeping this region occupied is too heavy a burden.
“Right. Vladimir Putin must’ve realized that the Donbas toy is too expensive to play with. Donbas is a separate expense item in Russia’s federal budget. It still seems easy enough to bear, as are the sanctions imposed by the West. They are effective, but unable to topple the Putin regime. According to some Russian economists, whom I respect, Russia’s economy has a safety factor that provides for several years ahead, even at the lowest possible oil price. Regrettably, I have to disapoint the opponents [of the current Russian regime], especially some political fugitives who said that Russia would fall apart after annexing Crimea.”
NORMANDY FORMAT: NOT WORTH THE PAPER IT’S PRINTED ON FOR RUSSIA
In Minsk, Mr. Volker first met with the Russian President’s Aide, Vladimir Surkov. The latter said after the meeting that he was satisfied with the results, that everything was OK. Mr. Volker denied comment. Why?
“The meetings in Minsk were held behind closed doors, so the Russian side made the most out of it [in terms of propaganda]. Something well to be expected. I think that the American side regarded the whole affair as part of protocol – they could also put out feelers, but I think that they weren’t prepared to make any major decisions, deals or concessions with Russia, not at this stage, not before the presidential election... They also realized that any deal made with Russia would damage Ukraine’s international reputation and that of the United States. If and when Vladimir Putin agreed, one should expect a trap. Americans have learned not to trust Russia anywhere, anytime – least of all now that the President is being investigated by the FBI and has to appear before the congressional committees in both Houses. We know that some members of the Trump family will be served subpoenas... Manafort and Flynn are being closely watched.”
The Normandy Format leaders held telephone conversations on August 22. President Poroshenko’s website reads that Ukraine’s initiative of a ceasefire starting on Aug. 25, allowing for the start of the school year [Sept.1], was supported. Can we expect Russia to keep the ceasefire and implement its Minsk commitments?
“Same as the Budapest Memorandum, with a superpower undertaking to do something, then forgetting all about it. Hardly anything to expect this time. Russia regards the Normandy Format agreements as worth less than the paper they’re printed on. This is especially true of the militants and Zakharchenko’s gang in Donbas. They will listen only a phone call from the Kremlin. In fact, I hate discussing anything that has to do with the Normandy Format and Minsk agreements. Everyone knows that they are for the birds. On the other hand, there is no denying the importance of their presence. Without them we would have Leviathan’s world of lawlessness and anarchy. Their presence is a restraining factor of sorts. The warring sides have to refer to these documents, now and then, and this is good. This allows one to hope to live to see this conflict resolved.”
