Referendums in east Ukraine were a Russian farce

My man Mark Rachkevych at the Kyiv Post nailed it. I especially liked this paragraph [emphasis mine]:

When Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and other Kremlin officials say that Kyiv should negotiate with the “southeastern regions,” they mean with people that are under their control. They are not genuine leaders who enjoy popular, grass-roots support. They are lackeys financed and armed from abroad who kill, torture, and kidnap innocent people, and who have terrorized millions more. After all, recent surveys say that 70 percent of residents of southeastern Ukraine are for a united country.

Rachkevych concludes with this important warning [italics and emphasis mine]:

Still, Moscow’s pressure has already moved the goal posts in Kyiv’s policy. Ukraine’s interim government has signaled it is willing to allow for regional and local governments to set language policy, among other compromises. Decentralization is also on the table: letting local governments expand their tax bases, establish municipal police departments as well as other policy decisions that would be delegated to them.

And the calls for Crimea's return are muted as the interim government struggles for survival until the May 25 presidential election.

Some steps, such as the decentralization of government, are necessary to shed the Soviet legacy of governance, but not federalization, which is the Kremlin’s code wor for dismembering Ukraine.  Federalization is a powerful, unifying force when a nation-state is being formed. It has the opposite effect when one exists like Ukraine.

That’s precisely why the May 11 mimicry of a vote is a farce. It was the latest, unequivocal Russian step to dismantle Ukraine. 

That is why the West -- and the U.S. especially! -- cannot play dumb or give in to Putin's cynical gambit to dismantle Ukraine as a functioning state.

Why the poll on self-rule was a farce

By Mark Rachkevych

May 12, 2014 | Kyiv Post

Acting President Oleksandr Turchynov rightfully called the May 11 ballot in eastern Ukraine's Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts a “farce.”

But it wasn’t a travesty because it violated the constitution, or that more than 100,000 pre-completed ballots were seized in favor of secession ahead of the vote. Or that there was a dismally low turnout, multiple voting occurring, or that proof of residence wasn’t a criterion to cast a ballot.

It was a sham because Moscow was behind the vote, just as it was behind the annexation of Crimea and now, the slow-motion invasion of eastern Ukraine, and the recent unrest in Odesa, Kharkiv and other regions.

It is all a Kremlin charade to impose its will on and cover up a foreign policy debacle on Ukraine after the democratic EuroMaidan Revolution in February toppled the criminal regime of disgraced ex-President Viktor Yanukovych. Putin and his minions in the state-controlled press corps had defended Yanukovych’s corrupt government until the very end.

EuroMaidan signaled the second slap in the face of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who ended up on the wrong side of history – again – after twice backing the ex-convict Yanukovych (the first time was during the 2004 presidential election that led to the Orange Revolution and Viktor Yushchenko's election as president).

So, the former KGB colonel, in his unabashed contempt for Ukraine as a nation, had to create an alternative, make-believe reality to invade.

Eschewing accepted policy norms, and institutions like the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe or the United Nations to voice his grievances – primarily that his “Russian compatriots” were under threat of violence and were being discriminated – Putin primitively used force. And he’s shown he is willing to expend more resources than the West to get his way despite a looming third round of sanctions that would hurt Russia’s economy. Those resources include a cadre of media hounds who not only distort the news, but also manufacture it to shameless depths of bawdiness.

Just as the world has watched Russia transform into a fascist state, there is mounting evidence that the unrest in eastern and parts of southern Ukraine are led from Moscow and financed either through state-owned banks or Yanukovych and his inner-circle. Ukraine’s Security Service has captured Russian agents and military officers, as well as other subversives who were trained and received instructions from their handlers in Crimea and elsewhere. Russian sleepers have been activated and mercenaries with combat experience in the Russian military are on Ukrainian territory using Russia-supplied arms and weapons.

When Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and other Kremlin officials say that Kyiv should negotiate with the “southeastern regions,” they mean with people that are under their control. They are not genuine leaders who enjoy popular, grass-roots support. They are lackeys financed and armed from abroad who kill, torture, and kidnap innocent people, and who have terrorized millions more. After all, recent surveys say that 70 percent of residents of southeastern Ukraine are for a united country.

Kyiv has made it clear that it won’t engage with armed terrorists hiding behind masks and human shields, and likewise, whose chief handlers are sheltered behind the Kremlin’s walls. Still, Moscow’s pressure has already moved the goal posts in Kyiv’s policy. Ukraine’s interim government has signaled it is willing to allow for regional and local governments to set language policy, among other compromises. Decentralization is also on the table: letting local governments expand their tax bases, establish municipal police departments as well as other policy decisions that would be delegated to them.

And the calls for Crimea's return are muted as the interim government struggles for survival until the May 25 presidential election.

Some steps, such as the decentralization of government, are necessary to shed the Soviet legacy of governance, but not federalization, which is the Kremlin’s code wor for dismembering Ukraine. Federalization is a powerful, unifying force when a nation-state is being formed. It has the opposite effect when one exists like Ukraine.

That’s precisely why the May 11 mimicry of a vote is a farce. It was the latest, unequivocal Russian step to dismantle Ukraine. Sadly, Russia is succeeding. It still has the initiative and Ukraine's government, the European Union and the United States will have take tougher actions quickly to reverse the Kremlin tide.