Major problem for Ukraine now is to preserve territorial integrity

“Today, the question is not on the agenda whether Ukraine can become a part of any other state. Today, the question is whether the Ukrainian territorial integrity will be maintained. In this case, independence and threat acquire a kind of another meaning. For instance, many people believe that involvement of Ukraine into NATO is a threat to Ukraine’s independence. Others, on the contrary, think that if Ukraine remains outside NATO, it will fall under Russia’s influence again. There are many different notions,” the analyst concluded.

Oy. Thinking about what he just said makes my brain hurt.

First off, joining NATO doesn't make you not independent from anyone. For Chrissakes! If someone were to tell the French that they were an American sock puppet, first they'd be insulted rather badly and then mocked to the extreme! To take it even further, which I have heard from Ukrainians multiple times, joining NATO doesn't make you a colony of the United States either.

Unfortunately, there is a lingering xenophobic world view in Ukraine. They feel that The West, especially the United States and NATO, are out to kill them - not kidding here - or make them into a colony on the order of what the Europeans did in Africa or we did in the Philippines. The fact of the matter is that we don't want that. That we never wanted anything even remotely like that for Ukraine. However, a large number of their leaders and their managers have been beating that drum rather effectively. Blend that liberally with the automatic fear of things of the West that underlies a lot of their culture already because of the undispellable - understandably so - ghost of the Soviet Union and the Cold War. After all, they fell from an okay standard of living to a bit of crushing poverty...and this was the work of the West. Or so Western triumphantalists, Ukrainian wishers for the return of the Soviet Union say and Russian nationalists say. Its a vicious bit of work and would seem that its self feeding with little hope of escape. Yet there are a few signs that this hard shell is beginning to crack.

One of the more amusing bits that is driving this break is that there have been some Western companies that have been taking over local businesses. Banks are a good example. Another was the sale of that large steel company to the Dutch conglomerate. It turns out that some relatives of mine - by marriage - work there. For years, their managers had been telling them that the workers had better be glad that their company had Ukrainian owners because Westerners would fire all the workers and sell all the equipment to make a profit - something that a lot of privateers essentially did during the attempt to move from the state controlled economy to capitalism after the Fall of the Soviet Union - and so the workers better work twice as hard and twice as long with minuscule, irregular pay because there was no light at the end of the rainbow. On the contrary, it was a crocodile beneath their feet!!! Then came Yushenko...

As part of the Orange Revolution, they ripped the company from the Ukrainian owners because the deal smacked of cronyism and corruption. They put it back up for bid and sold it to the Dutch. The Ukrainians I knew expected that the world would end for the workers. On the contrary, according to the inside source here, they love the changes! The pay is higher and comes on time as promised. The crazy hours are done. The management is no longer acting as though they are Darth Vader's little Slavic understudies.

His one comment as he related it to my mother-in-law was: Why the hell didn't they do it sooner??? And when are they going to resell all the other big businesses?!?

Cracks are definitely showing.