Trib should tell rest of U.S. - Ukraine crisis story

The Trib editorial on the U.S. – Ukraine crisis (December 7), pins its case for Russian aggression against Ukraine on President Putin’s 2018 declaration of Russian-Ukraine solidarity as “one people.” That justifies the argument Putin “stole” Crimea and must not “be allowed to steal the rest of Ukraine.”

But any discussion of the crisis should begin with the February, 2014 coup cheered on; indeed, engineered by America, to align Ukraine with Europe politically and economically rather than Russia. The legitimate Ukraine government of Victor Yanukovych was prepared to align economically with Russia because he was getting a better deal from Russia than the EU. That was unacceptable to Europe and America.

The coup succeeded, realizing the West’s goal of aligning the Ukraine to the Europe. But it unleashed long standing historical tensions between the largely Russian speaking and aligned eastern Ukrainians in Crimea and Donbass, and the western aligned Ukrainians. This led to a devastating civil war still flaring today. The result? Over 15,000 dead with Russian annexation of Crimea and support of Russian aligned Ukrainians in the Donbass. The coup, combined with U.S. signaling NATO membership to Ukraine, including putting ABM’s on Russia’s border, was a provocation too far, setting up the Crimea and Donbass incursions.

Russia has set a ‘red line’ that the West must never grant NATO membership to Ukraine, putting NATO’s combined $1.1 trillion military behemoth on Russia’s doorstep. By contrast Russian military spending is a paltry $68 billion, 1/16th that of NATO. The economic disparity is even starker: Russia’s GDP of $1.6 trillion is 1/25 that of NATO’s $40 trillion.

A hostile NATO aligned Ukraine on Russia’s border seems perfectly OK to the U.S. But 59 years ago JFK risked nuclear war when he demanded Russia remove its missiles, not on our border, but 90 miles away in Cuba, that had requested them to prevent another U.S. backed invasion. Yet, the Trib wants us to believe Russia may be poised to seize the rest of Ukraine in its march to a new Russian empire. That is ‘threat inflation’ that does nothing to acknowledge the reality of valid Russian security concerns.

It also ignores Russia’s immense economic ties to the EU. Russian exports of $337 billion represents 20% of its economy. Half of those exports go to Europe. That underscores the reality that the current crisis represents U.S. imagining that woefully weak Russia, a pittance of the NATO-U.S. colossus, is poised to self-destruct attacking its economic gravy train.

The Trib should do a little more homework before weighing in on

the potentially explosive U.S. – Russia crisis over Ukraine. Its readership deserves a balanced view that doesn’t solely pit White Knight America against Darth Vader Russia.