It’s inconceivable to much of the Russian psyche that Ukraine is independent. (And to the Ukrainian psyche, that we aren’t.)
Excerpts by Casey Michel: https://twitter.com/cjcmichel/status/1506317658001588231
Right before his death, Andropov began putting together plans to completely change the internal structure of the USSR—scrapping national territories, and creating states organized around “population and economic rationale”.
The first “alarm bell” about the nationalism that would eventually dissolve the USSR was not in Eastern Europe or the Caucasus, but in Kazakhstan in 1986.
Fascinating bit on how Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s rank Russian nationalism influenced Yeltsin, convincing him that Russians and Ukrainians (and Belarusians) were actually “one nation divided by geopolitical calamities and foreign conquest”:
How late Soviet/early Russian officials communicated their visions of Soviet collapse to American partners—part Confederate secession, part “something like the early United States”:
The rhetoric from Yeltsin’s office about Russian claims to Ukrainian territory is honestly indistinguishable from Putin’s.
Truly wild how Russian leaders have spent decades misunderstanding Ukraine—here’s Yeltsin railing that there’s no way Ukrainians would declare independence in their 1991 referendum (when 90% of Ukrainians voted for independence).
Two things are crystal clear from Zubok’s book on the Soviet disintegration:
1) From the outset, there was little appetite (or even ability?) in Moscow to recognize post-Soviet republics as independent actors. Independence was always nominal. Superficial, almost.
2) Putin isn’t an anomaly—and this imperial hangover doesn’t end with his downfall. Centuries of chauvinism regarding Ukrainian independence doesn’t end overnight. And whoever, or whatever, comes next will have to confront that legacy head-on.
One other bit Zubok’s book highlights: In the 1991 referendum, a majority of Crimeans (54%) voted for Ukrainian independence. (Plus 84% of those in Luhansk/Donetsk regions.)
