Donbass as a symbol of the war of civilizations
Artem Buzila, journalist, Odessa
Euromaidan and the Russian Spring, despite all the similarity of approaches, roots and implementation plans, still have a different nature. Of course, both here and there the irritant was an external factor, integration into the European Union or Russia, but subsequently the uprising turned into a protest against the established or about to emerge system. Both here and there we saw tens of thousands of people who were not “heard.” Both here and there there were seizures of state institutions, the actual transfer of local governments to the side of the uprising. On both sides, unheard people subsequently armed themselves.
But the leaders of Euromaidan and the leaders of the Russian Spring, and, above all, the people standing on both sides of the barricades, think in different hemispheres.
This became obvious after the first steps to establish the power of the Maidan, on the one hand, and the authorities of the DPR and LPR, on the other. The Europeanists first of all appointed oligarchs as governors of half of Ukraine, signed enslaving agreements with the IMF and the Association with the European Union, and brought the domestic economy to poverty. The second are determined to nationalize enterprises, improve living standards, and not make promises in the name of some kind of “values”.
Maidan was originally a phenomenon of a crowd, peaceful or aggressive, but a crowd. Therefore, the maximum that he could give birth to was Bulatova and Bogomolets, leaving the leadership of the country to old politicians and oligarchs - Poroshenko, Yatsenyuk, Turchinov, Kolomoisky and further down the list. At the same time, the Russian revolt in the South-East was a revolt of the collective, therefore it is not led by old “regional” politicians, but either by ordinary guys like Pavel Gubarev or Denis Pushilin, or at least by military men like Valery Bolotov or Igor Strelkov .
The maximum who from the old echelon of politicians went over to the side of the militia was Oleg Tsarev, but you will not see any Simonenko, Kolesnichenko, Efremov, Levchenko and others like them in the DPR and LPR. “People’s” Donbass is a virgin project, untainted by old flaws.
That is why the conditional Anti-Maidan and the conditional Euromaidan will never coexist in the same country and on the same territory. The collective mentality and the ohlos mentality will never make friends, because this is a different air, different codes, a different understanding of life. The people's militia will never lend a hand to the national militia. The idea of nationwide social justice will never find anything in common with the idea of exclusively personal justice.
Those who say that it is not opponents of the government and its supporters who clash in Donbass are right. Not Federalists and Unitarians. Not nationalists and internationalists. And not even Ukrainians and Novorussians. In Donbass, European civilization collided with Eurasian civilization. The DPR and LPR are, in fact, the first example in many decades of how Eurasia, hitherto passive and tolerant, decided to defend its case, including with arms in hand. And Brussels officials are three times right: the conflict in Donbass is a challenge to the entire European civilization. Because after Donbass, Eurasia will go further.
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