Ukraine after the Fall of the Soviet Union - Cold War DOCUMENTARY

ukraine is one of the largest countries in europe renowned not only for its economic riches being one of the breadbaskets of the world but also for its long and complicated history over the centuries the region has been a part of some of the major polities of the world including the mongol empire the polish-lithuanian commonwealth the ottoman empire the austro-hungarian empire the russian empire and the soviet union arguably of all of these periods the 20th century has been amongst the most difficult for ukraine being on the front line of two world wars the russian civil war a major anarchist movement and a genocidal famine known as the holodomar over the course of the 20th century ukraine was briefly independent following the collapse of the russian empire but was then subsumed into the soviet union before becoming independent once more in 1991 after the soviet collapse i'm your host david and today we are looking at the modern history of ukraine from the dissolution of the soviet union up to ero maidan the revolution of dignity in 2012. this is the post-cold war we are proud to announce that this channel is one of the many collaborators in project ukraine hosted by kings and generals a playlist of videos shining a light on the rich history of the ukrainian land and people in an attempt to dispel the myths shared by propaganda your likes shares and donations will have a direct impact in helping the over 10 million displaced ukrainians through the tremendous efforts of the babinyar holocaust memorial center which will receive all of the revenue from this video we'll start this episode somewhere in the mid-1980s to say that the soviet union at that time despite its superpower status had trouble at home would be an understatement the glaring failure of the war in afghanistan falling oil prices growing corruption and the erosion of trust in the communist party in general required action the man to introduce the necessary changes was mikhail sergievich gorbachev elected general secretary of the communist party in 1985. he introduced a platform of reforms glasnost or openness and perestroika or rebuilding as a method to liberalize both political and economic life in the soviet union but instead of revitalizing and solving the issues faced by the ussr these reform packages only helped to magnify and exacerbate the rooted problems that had been swept under the rug and then forcibly kept there for decades one of the single largest challenges posed to the union was that of nationalism the soviet union was a federated state composed of a multitude of ethnicities whose loyalty to the russian center was often accomplished by means of both coercion and threat as the center loosened its grip through gorbachev's reform packages however many of the national groups of the union began to demand increased rights and even independence in the ukrainian ssr protests demanding ukrainian independence began to appear first in the western city of lev but soon spread to keefe the people's movement of ukraine ruch emerged as the leading political force for ukrainian independence drawing much of its support from the western and central ukraine the southern and eastern parts of the republic were more quiet remaining more loyal to the center a divide that would remain in the years to come vladimir cherbicki who had been the head of the ukrainian communist party since 1972 represented a more conservative wing of the party and he was unhappy with the reforms being introduced by gorbachev so much so that he resigned from his position in 1989. by the summer of 1990 the top position in the ukrainian communist party was filled by leonard kravchuk a moderate from western ukraine now by this time the ussr was in dire crisis as its various constituent republics began to declare their own sovereignty including ukraine on the 16th of july 1990 by proclamation of the vergna rada the ukrainian parliament over the course of the next year the center continued to lose credibility momentum and the ability to influence the course of events all amidst rapidly growing concerns about the viability of the soviet union in august of 1991 the last attempt at restoring the old conservative order in the ussr was brushed aside when an attempted coup by communist hardliners was defeated in the ukraine ssr the moderate kravchuk waited to act until it was clear that the putch had failed at which time he gave his full support on august 24th for a ukrainian parliamentary declaration of full independence this was despite international urgings including from u.s president george bush

senior to find a way to establish autonomy within the soviet union on december 1st 1991 ukraine held its first ever presidential election as well as an independence referendum on whether to secede from the ussr an overwhelming 92 percent of voters cast ballots in favor of independence and crowd chuck won the presidency with 62 percent of the vote in a sign of things to come though some analysis of the votes by region showed that while the vast majority of the new country voted in favor of independence including the southern and eastern regions crimea with long historical ties directly to russia and its large concentration of ethnic russians only showed a 54 approval for ukrainian independence the final nail in the coffin of the ussr came a week later when gorbachev met with the leaders of russia represented by boris yeltsin and gennady berbulas ukraine represented by leonard krautchuk and vitold falken and belarus who was represented by stanislav and vyacheslav cabbage the beloved accords that were signed on december 8th declared that the soviet union had effectively ceased to exist and formed the commonwealth of independent states in its place ukraine a national polity of almost 50 million people one that was viewed by many russians as an integral extension of russia itself was now independent landon kravchuk began the process of building ukraine as a functional state a national army was established as were state ministries and other bodies responsible for implementing state control and well it is very fair to say that ukraine in 1991 was still a very long way away from being a true institutionalized democracy all elections that took place during crowdchuck's time in office are considered to have been free and fair this included separate referendums held in crimea and in donbass the referendum held in crimea which was actually done before the referendum regarding overall ukrainian independence resulted in an overwhelming majority of voters wanting crimea to remain a part of the ussr this was happening alongside a campaign to have the 1954 transfer of crimea from the rsfsr to the ukraine ssr abolished the russian parliament in 1992 even passed a resolution calling the 1954 transfer illegal in donbass 1992 saw a campaign calling for the declaration of russian as a second official language and in 1994 a referendum was held in donetsk and luhansk oblasts where voters called for the federalization of ukraine closer integration to the cis and again the adoption of russian as an official second language the government and keith largely ignored all of these referendum results viewing them as advisory but not binding signs of things to come as an independent ukraine emerged two geostrategic issues drew attention what to do with the stockpiles of nuclear weapons present on ukrainian soil and the status of crimea and the port of sevastopol home of the russian black sea fleet in 1992 kravchuk and yeltsin came to agreement on joint control of the black sea fleet for a three-year period the eventual partition of the fleet itself was settled in 1997 but the status of sevastopol would be a continual thorn in relations between the russian federation and ukraine for the next two decades as you might expect the status of nuclear weapons stationed in ukraine drew a great deal of international attention january of 1994 saw the signing of the trilateral statement by the leaders of ukraine the russian federation and the united states in exchange for the transfer of all ukrainian nuclear weapons to the russian federation ukraine received written recognition of its territorial integrity from russia the united states pledged its own security assurances as well as economic aid in exchange for the goodwill shown by the other two nations the negotiations that extended from the trilateral statement resulted in the december 1994 budapest memorandum reiterating the provisions from the trilateral statement but this time also included the support from the united kingdom kravchuk had managed to resolve the breakup of strategic soviet forces on his territory by peaceful means while still maintaining his country's territorial integrity no small accomplishment but the question of crimea was still far from resolved domestically krav chuk had the herculean task of introducing and establishing a market economy into ukraine it didn't take long to realize that this was going to be a very difficult and extremely painful process while this was true for all of the post-soviet states ukraine under crowdchuck is a particularly standout example of a poorly run economy the economist anders asland writes economic policy could not have been more disastrous no post-communist country was hit by such hyperinflation and such a huge decline without war as ukraine no market economy was built and a sheer minimum of privatization was undertaken an entrenched machine of rent seeking was established by 1993 the inflation rate in ukraine was over 10 000 its gdp had shrunk by 40 and real wages had fallen by 63 since 1990. while 15 of ukrainians were deemed as living in poverty in 1989 that number had risen to 50 by 1992 with elderly and rural ukrainians being particularly impacted and why this massive economic collapse well ukrainian industry was very much integrated into the old soviet union reliant on supplies coming from other regions regions that were now independent countries supply disruptions as well as the general economic collapse in other post-soviet states largely destroyed ukrainian industry one of the regions particularly affected was donbass which had been a major industrial center we should also mention that ukrainian agriculture was also hit particularly hard as a result of these economic hardships many ukrainians emigrated abroad particularly to russia where they were engaged in seasonal work like construction or would buy goods abroad in order to bring them back to ukraine for resale the state-run industries did go through a process of privatization which it was hoped would revive the economy and create jobs and stabilize the economy however the results from privatization did no such thing like in many other post-soviet states the old soviet nomenclatura that is the administrative class as well as their friends and supporters used the privatization process to not only transform themselves into a new class of wealthy oligarchs but also to find their way into the new ukrainian political elite largely alienated from an increasingly hostile population yavin zakharov a soviet-era dissident gave this description having waited some time and looked around the ukrainian nomenclature the political elite understood that nobody was seriously threatening to usurp their position and began to organize the state to suit their aims and interests principally that of increasing their personal wealth meeting with practically no opposition from society the numen platura which was closely linked to business and state bodies became more and more powerful providing stark confirmation of the old rule the state can do nothing with people if the people let them do it a young initially quite passive state began to gradually stagnate into a form that was increasingly unacceptable for the general population it became more and more concerned with serving those in power while increasingly indifferent to the fate of all others and aggressive to anyone who expressed dissatisfaction with the system of relations which was developing the economic collapse of ukraine like in many other states led to a resurgence in the popularity of leftist groups including the communists while there had been a genuine desire for independence and democracy it was predicated on the somewhat naive hope that the transformation process would be both quick and easy the failure of this created not only disillusionment but even nostalgia for the soviet era this in turn translated itself into support for groups who were opposed to open markets and westernization who often happened to be pro-russian in nature their support in ukraine was significant enough that the communist party won the 1994 parliamentary election in presidential elections held the same year kravchuk lost in the second round to the pro-russian candidate leonid kuchma for what it's worth we should give credit to kravchuk for allowing the peaceful transfer of power to happen a seemingly rare feat in the post-soviet world okay so kuchwa he had been an industrial boss in the soviet union and had then served as kravchuk's second prime minister he ran for president on a pro-russian platform but once in office he attempted to walk a more balanced line the 1996 constitution which he introduced did not allow for dual citizenship it did not recognize russian as a state language and at its core maintained ukraine as a unitary state kuchma also adopted laws which ensured ukrainian ownership of broadcast frequencies in ukrainian territory thus significantly decreasing russian control over ukrainian information spaces kuchema also attended to the situation in crimea in 1996 he neutralized the pro-independence leader in crimea as well as abolished the office of the presidency in the peninsula 1997 saw kuchma come to an agreement with russia over the status of the black sea fleet a 20-year lease on the naval facilities at sevastopol was arranged in exchange for the elimination of some debts owed to russia by ukraine kuchwa's time as president is also significant because of his stance on ukrainian sovereignty he was able to find some common ground with russia but held off increasing his nation's involvement in the commonwealth of independent states preferring a more western approach in 1997 ukraine signed the charter on a distinctive partnership with nato and in 2002 he announced ukraine's desire to join nato this was echoed in 2003 in ukraine's revised military doctrine built around a commitment to join both nato and the eu this commitment was demonstrated by joint deployment of troops with poland to the peacekeeping mission in kosovo but kuchima's time in office was not all sunshine and roses sunflowers anyway during his almost 11 years as president the power of the oligarchs rapidly expanded and entire industries were sold to rich and often corrupt businessmen who then transformed that economic clout into political power funding ensuring that men loyal to them became members of parliament and other significant positions of influence men like pablo lazarenko ukraine's fifth prime minister used their office to extort money from business dealings lazarenko has been accused of extorting up to 200 million dollars during his year in office and was even arrested and convicted of money laundering offences in the united states of course on the flip side kuchma's time in office brought inflation under control down to single digits by 1997. kuchma's greatest parliamentary opposition remained the communists who did what they could to stop the process of privatization this opposition was countered by kuchma by ruling largely by presidential decree simply ignoring what happened in the verkhovna rada kuchma's economic policies growing private industry from 10 of gdp in 1992 to 60 by 2002 resulted in him being branded a reformer in the west helping to secure imf loans from the mid-1990s onwards presidential elections held in 1999 saw couchman defeat the communist party candidate petrossimenyenko kuchma's support was largely based in the western portion of ukraine although not exclusively december of that year also saw the pro-western viktor yushchenko become prime minister yushchenko used his short time in office only a year and a half to begin implementing anti-corruption measures which naturally were strongly opposed by the oligarchs and their minions this opposition led to yushchenko being sacked by may of 2001. kuchma his authoritarianism increasing held a referendum in 2000 asking voters if they would approve of a constitutional change increasing presidential powers and introducing an upper house to the rada the results although overwhelmingly in favor of these changes were largely considered fraudulent sparking public protests which were violently dispersed the autumn of 2000 saw further scandal following the disappearance and death of the journalist gyorgy gongadze when tapes implicating koochim's complicity in the murder were revealed kuchma's standing in the west took a severe blow meaningful prospects of joining nato and the eu were all but scuppered and kuchma began shifting his stance towards russia in order to maintain his power in response to these moves by kuchma a strong opposition movement began to emerge led by some of his former allies like viktor yushchenko and julia timoshenko now despite a two-term limit on the presidency the constitutional court of ukraine allowed kuchima permission to run again in 2004 an option he declined he instead threw his support behind victor yanukovych a pro-russian candidate yushchenko leader of the national block ran against him on an anti-corruption pro-democracy and generally pro-western platform yushchenko despite being very ill as a result of being poisoned allegedly by russian intelligence operatives was the frontrunner in the election the results of the november runoff election however declared yanukovych the winner despite exit polls and international observers deeming the elections fraudulent what resulted was a massive protest movement across western and central ukraine what has become known as the orange revolution named after the color which yushchenko had used while on campaign the protests forced the government to cancel the results of the election and reschedule a new vote of course what was seen as a victory in the west and central regions of ukraine was deeply unpopular in the eastern and southern portions of the country who largely supported yanukovych and his pro-russian stance they began to talk more openly about seeking closer integration with russia and the federalization of ukraine these voices gained a great deal of traction and support from yanukovych's party of regions as well as from russia itself the new elections held in january of 2005 saw yushchenko declared the new president of what was becoming a more deeply divided ukraine there were widespread hopes of a fundamental transformation of the ukrainian state following the orange revolution and pledges to fight corruption in order to improve people's lives unfortunately for the people of ukraine these hopes were assumed dashed as corruption remained a widespread issue with yushchenko even choosing to include oligarchs in government like petro poroshenko as head of his national security council constant infighting between yushchenko and timoshenko eventually led to a collapse of the coalition with timoshenko who was replaced by the pro-russia party of regions bringing victor yanukovych back into government as prime minister at this point all the major parties were controlled or supported by oligarchs creating a stalemate in ukrainian politics yushchenko was certainly not the man to break this stalemate corruption ran amok with even yushchenko's family being accused of corrupt practices between 2005 and 2009 ukraine dropped from 122nd place on the corruption perception index of international transparency to 146th for ukrainians however this was considered just business as usual and what of relations with russia at this time well despite putin's russia having supported yushchenko's opponent in 2004 he chose to make russia the first official destination of his presidency despite this and the withdrawal of ukrainian troops in iraq these overtures to russia were doomed the result of yushchenko's openly stated desire to join the eu and nato their growing dispute between the two countries was borne out through an ongoing gas dispute russian natural gas supplies were sold to europe and transited through ukraine for which ukraine received payment for allowing the transit beginning in 2005 russia began to agitate for a new deal with more favorable prices for russian companies at that time they accused the ukrainians of stealing gas supplies and although the matter was resolved at the time the dispute was by no means over [Music] in 2008 the gas dispute flared again with the russians demanding repayment of debts from the ukrainians as well as the renegotiation of the prices involved in transit when the two sides were unable to reach a settlement the russians took the step on january 7 2009 to halt the transit of gas through ukraine cutting many in europe off during what has become known as a particularly harsh winter a resolution was achieved by the 19th of january and the gas was turned back on but the reputations of both russia and ukraine had been harmed with both being seen as unreliable partners with which to do business we should also keep in mind here that yushchenko had also been vocally supportive of georgia when russia had invaded in 2008 as well as his calls for international recognition of the holodomor as a genocide the russian president at the time dmitry medvedev accused yushchenko of falsifying history now despite the desire to move forward with nato and eu membership yushenko was unable to achieve any significant progress towards either although the us was supportive of nato membership other member nations like france and germany opposed the adoption of the membership action plan for ukraine put forward at the 2008 bucharest summit the eu also refused to commit to ukrainian membership despite the significant diplomatic work that yushchenko had done to put ukraine on the european path unfortunately geopolitical realities intervened specifically the unwillingness of western european nations to support ukraine at the expense of good relations with moscow and the natural gas it provided yushchenko's run in the 2010 election provided a dismal result where he came in fifth place with only 5.4 percent of

the vote victor yanukovych the man who had lost in the re-held election in 2005 was elected as the new president of ukraine yanukovych had been born in donbass and grew up speaking russian as a result his ukrainian language skills have often been deemed as less than perfect in his youth he had been jailed for robbery and assault but had gone on to an established management career before entering politics in donetsk oblast yanukovych has often been described as unremarkable and his rise to the presidency was likely due to the disorganization in the pro-western camp and the dismal showing of ishchenko his presidency saw a deepening of corruption as well as his own authoritarian rule yanukovych became a key patron to many doling out favors to his cronies often those from donetsk and eastern ukraine from which he would often personally profit as a result he manipulated the electoral process and results to ensure that favorable results were obtained something that was well noted by both local and international observers he also consolidated the state apparatus and the bureaucracy around him especially the legal system which he then began to use to prosecute political opponents this included the arrests of yulia timochenko and yuri lutsenko both of whom were considered personal vendettas yanukovych's term as president is notable for changes he made to the language laws ukrainian remained the sole official national language but he provided local authorities the ability to make other languages official in a region as long as 10 percent of the population in the area considered it their native language this was a huge boost for russian language speakers especially in the east and in the south but fueled protests in kiev against the law the protests were violently dispersed internationally yanukovych pursued a pro-russian policy although he did acknowledge that ukraine would continue to further integrate itself to europe his good relationship to moscow helped to secure a favorable deal of continued gas transit prices in exchange for an extension on the lease for the black sea fleet facilities at sevastopol when he spoke openly of at least a desire to join the eu he also openly rejected nato membership which included a 2010 law passed through the rada forbidding ukraine from joining any military blocks yanukovych pursued instead the goal of signing to the association agreement with the eu a key stepping stone for eventual membership one of the preconditions of that signatory process however was the release of prisoners like julia timochenko despite a pledge that he would do what was needed for ukraine to join the eu in 2013 yanukovych facing heavy pressure from moscow made a u-turn on the association agreement instead proposing the creation of a tripartite commission between ukraine the eu and russia which would be used to discuss and agree on trade matters the reaction to this from many ukrainians was massive disappointment as they saw their futures as a part of europe a massive protest movement began to form the largest since 2004 and converged on maidan niez al-jnosti independence square in kiev the protest that was being kicked off would result in a fundamental change in ukrainian history and has led to the events in headlines today we hope you've enjoyed today's episode and to make sure you don't miss all of our future episodes please make sure you subscribe to our channel and have recognized the bell button for the suffering and trauma which it has been subjected to as a result of the things we do to it every week i'd like to take this opportunity to thank all of our sponsors and if you aren't a patron please consider supporting us at patreon.com the cold war or through youtube membership we can be reached via email at thecoldwar channel at gmail.com this is the cold war channel and as we think about the cold war i will leave you with the words of jfk in the final analysis our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet we all breed the same air we all cherish our children's future and we are all mortal

2022-04-26 16:02

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