The most dangerous person in Europe is Arseniy Yatsenyuk, a British political scientist blamed Brussels and Washington for the Donbass
London - Kyiv, March 09 (PolitNavigator, Vasily Ablyazimov) - Well-known British researcher of Russia and political scientist Richard Sakwa believes that the blame for the escalation in Ukraine lies with Washington and Brussels. He also believes that Putin does not need a war in Ukraine at all, and the most dangerous person in Europe is Arseniy Yatsenyuk. He spoke about this in an interview German economic news.
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The publication quotes a political scientist: “Putin has no interest in war - that was the last thing he needed.” Sakwa calls on the West to put pressure on the government in Kyiv to ensure that Ukraine becomes a federal state with broad representation of the interests of the people of Donbass. He writes about this in his book about the war in Ukraine.
Sakwa criticized the lack of an independent European foreign policy, as well as ill-considered and unrestrained criticism of Russian President Vladimir Putin. The political scientist states that even during the most tense times of the Cold War, Soviet political leaders such as Brezhnev and Andropov were not as massively insulted as they are now in the Western media space during the current conflict.
German Economic News NEN (NEN): In your book about Ukraine, you explained the current dilemma with the history of the country. The Russians gave up their empire without war. They did this because they saw in such a step development, success for both sides. They expected mutually beneficial success from partnership with the West. Americans, however, saw the fall of the Soviet Union as a one-sided victory. What of this historical background called the Cold War is returning to Europe?
Richard Sakwa: It's right. The turning point was the conference in Malta in December 1989, when a new post-war system was formed. US President George W. Bush did understand that the power of the Soviet Union was declining, but he did not understand that Mikhail Gorbachev was planning a new kind of politics in which, in his opinion, there should be no winner or loser. Instead, the United States interpreted the events as a victory for its policies. Today, 25 years later, we understand the depth of the strategic defeat. The bad thing about the Malta Conference was that there was not a single European politician there who, like Churchill in Yalta, would represent the interests of Western Europeans. Our fate on our side of the continent was determined without our participation.
Nan: Can we consider that there is a new cold war going on now?
Richard Sakwa: It all leads to this conclusion, and I have been warning about this for years. We had 25 years, we lived in Europe like in paradise. But it did not raise any of the fundamental security issues. Now the fragile order has collapsed through the Cold War.
Nan: NATO appears to be very cautious and in no hurry to act radically. Isn't the existence of NATO in its current form in a unipolar world part of the problem?
Richard Sakwa: NATO could have either been dissolved since 1989, or Russia had to be included in the reformed organization. Instead, we have the worst of all possible options - expanded NATO, which is now beginning to surround Russia on all sides, but at the same time excludes Russia. It doesn’t take a strategic genius to understand that Russia will sooner or later be alarmed by such a development.
Nan: You argue that Europe has failed to formulate its own independent foreign policy at this historical moment. Was this crisis activated accidentally or intentionally?
Richard Sakwa: The EU has a weak sense of strategy and little understanding of the consequences of its actions, as the example of Ukraine has amply demonstrated. Stupidity was displayed there on a large scale, driven by Poland and the Baltic countries. I'm talking about the new Atlantic Pact, in which NATO, the US and the EU are actually merged together. This does not mean that countries such as France and Germany cannot take separate, independent proactive decisions. But everything they do is closely linked to the transatlantic partnership. Germany under Merkel lostоmost of its former signs of global independence. This was the price Germany paid for being allowed to lead European politics and economics. The consequences are catastrophic, as we now see.
Nan: How do you assess the position of Russian President Vladimir Putin?
Richard Sakwa: Putin’s position is well known and was voiced back at the Munich Security Conference in February 2007. There he stated that Russia is not happy with the current strategic situation. But no one heard him. You must remember that any Russian leader will not act differently than Putin. It's not a problem that Putin lives in a different reality, the problem is that no one in the West wants to see this reality.
Nan: Is it beneficial for Putin in a conflict to present an external enemy as a factor for uniting his people?
Richard Sakwa: No, I think this is a false argument. He doesn't need this war. He did everything to avoid her. The responsibility lies entirely with Washington and Brussels. It successfully hosted the Olympic Games in Sochi. What's happening now is the last thing he needs. He is not a revisionist (“USSR-restoring”) leader, and therefore the Western assessment of his actions is, as a rule, completely wrong.
Nan: How do you explain the fact that the current conflict in the West is shown from only one point of view, namely, that it is exclusively Russian aggression, although we know for sure from intercepted telephone conversations of American diplomat Victoria Nuland that Washington took an active part in the overthrow of Yanukovych?
Richard Sakwa: I find the predominance of a completely unified Western view of things to be the most alarming aspect of the entire crisis. It is scary to see how Western social elites have subscribed to this erroneous opinion. It's always easy to blame Russia for all the troubles. Russia, of course, is far from perfect. But this, of course, is not an absolute evil, as it is represented by the West now. It is very shocking to me how easily Western business leaders have been misled by this misinterpretation.
Nan: What kind of state structure do you think would be best for Ukrainians??
Richard Sakwa: A federal and decentralized state would be best. Although this is not very likely to be achieved in the short term, it is the only way for Ukraine to survive. Donbass will never be part of a nationalist and centralized Ukrainian state again.
Nan: Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk repeated several times that those who want to be Russian should emigrate to Russia. Is there an idea behind this demand of some kind of ethnic cleansing in Eastern Ukraine?
Richard Sakwa: Yatsenyuk is a dangerous man in Europe today. I don’t understand how such an outspoken nationalist can be treated with respect.
Nan: How do you assess the emergence of American citizens in the Ukrainian government, such as Finance Minister Natalya Yaresko?
Richard Sakwa: This is shocking. The people of Ukraine do not need such people. This was a purely populist step by Poroshenko and Yatsenyuk.
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