Explaining Ukrainegate

The election of the president of the United States in 2016 was shamefully overshadowed by the so-called "Russia collusion" hoax propelled by unscrupulous Democratic operatives and their henchmen in the media. Now that Robert Mueller's report has exonerated the president, the attention has switched to those who really colluded. Anyone who knew Ukrainian or Russian and could navigate freely through the Ukrainian segment of Twitter and Facebook could observe the echoes of the information war started by Ukrainian officials against the Republican nominee back in 2016. The pretext behind these actions was Trump's statement that a "good relationship with Russia is a good thing, not a bad thing." This statement was perceived with pain by the Ukrainian community because Russia had by then annexed Crimea and occupied part of the Eastern Ukrainian region called Donbas. Ukraine was afraid that the new president would not support it in the fight against Russian aggression. Furthermore, Paul Manafort happened to be a political adviser to President Yanukovych, who was overthrown during the revolution of 2014. Manafort also had continued to help the pro-Russian party, Opposition Bloc, to enter the Ukrainian Parliament until he joined Trump's presidential campaign.

This was the last straw. Ukrainian elites did not comprehend Trump's rhetoric; instead, they were biased against Trump because of his association with Manafort. That is why they had willingly colluded with the Democrats. Democrat interests had taken deep root in Ukrainian society during the Obama presidency, both through the government and non-governmental organizations. It would not be a big surprise that Soros and the funds affiliated to him played a significant role there. Under the auspices of the construction and strengthening of democracy and the fight against corruption, George Soros's people recruited and funded a plethora of young people — journalists and political activists — and permeated them with ideas from the Democratic Party cookbook. Ukrainian people jokingly called those activists "grantoedy," translated as grant-eaters. Of course, they did not understand all the nuances of American politics, but an extra penny was an excellent help for their economic lives. The information politics of Ukraine at that time was profoundly anti-Trump. Not only Ukrainian journalists and bloggers, but also officials took part in the campaign against Trump. As an example, I will cite these facts: secretary of the interior Arsen Avakov published a derogatory post about Trump. Ambassador of Ukraine in Finland Andriy Olefirov launched an intensive Twitter war against the Republicans and Trump personally. Newspaper and magazine articles were filled with analytics on the misfortunes that would be in store for Ukraine if Trump won. Moreover, the Ukrainian diplomatic corps was staffed mostly by individuals of the old Soviet school. Traditionally, they had a mutual understanding with the Democrats and were suspicious of the Republicans. Thus, it will not be an exaggeration to say almost the entire Ukrainian community (from laypersons to high-ranking officials) in Ukraine and abroad were pro-Democratic. Oddly enough, words of reason had sounded from representatives of the Opposition Bloc. On numerous political talk shows, which are popular in Ukraine, they stated that it was neither pragmatic nor diplomatic to support any of the candidates for the presidential race in the United States. However, their voices were drowned out by the powerful propaganda machine tuned by Democratic strategists. And what was unusual about this information campaign was that it was conducted pretty openly, as if Ukrainian politicians did not care about the consequences. Most likely, the Democrats had convinced Ukrainians that Hillary Clinton would surely win. The apogee of the Ukrainians' help to the Democratic Party was the initiation of a criminal case against Manafort in Ukraine. After this, Manafort asked to resign from his post in the Trump campaign. The criminal case was initiated after a prominent Ukrainian investigative journalist and parliamentary, a fighter against corruption and a former recipient of Soros's grants, Serhiy Leshchenko, unveiled pages from Yanukovych's "black" ledger where it was registered that Manafort received more than twelve million dollars in cash for his consultations. According to one story, those documents were found in a body of water near the country residence of Yanukovych. Apparently, someone from a law enforcement agency leaked those documents to Serhiy, aiming to use him blindly. Manafort said he never received off-the-book cash payments, and he was not convicted by the United States courts for that episode. Contrary to the Russian collusion hoax and Russian meddling in our election, Ukrainian involvement was real and had consequences. Trump lost a skilled campaign specialist, but, more critically, information propaganda on social networks; in periodicals; and on TV and radio broadcasts in Ukraine, the United States, and Canada shaped the public opinion of Ukrainians living in the U.S. There are no precise data, but the opinions expressed on social networks suggested that the Ukrainian community leaned toward Hillary Clinton. To the astonishment of many, except Trump-supporters, Trump won, fair and square. Ukrainian politicians immediately changed their rhetoric and tried to establish channels of communication with the Trump administration. At the same time, the opinions of Ukrainian bloggers and journalists have not changed much, even though their fears were not justified. They joined the ranks of the "Resist" camp even though the Trump administration has been much tougher on Putin than the previous administration ever was and supports Ukraine financially and militarily on a much bigger scale. Ukrainian politicians do not miss an opportunity to step on the same rake again. This time around, they decided to side with the Republicans against the Democrats. They are eager to pour dirt on the Democrats, in particular on former vice president Joe Biden, whose son was on the board of directors of Burisma, a company headed by Nikolay Zlochevsky, a former minister of ecology in Yanukovych's cabinet. Biden forced Ukraine to dismiss the attorney general who started investigating Burisma. He even publicly boasted that he had managed to get rid of the inconvenient prosecutor within six hours of making the request. Donald Trump can definitely handle "Sleepy Joe" himself, without cheap help. The Ukrainian people have tired of incoherent foreign and domestic politics of the old, Soviet-era, and most importantly totally corrupt politicians. In the recent presidential election, they overwhelmingly elected a young, 41-year-old president, Volodymyr Zelensky, of Jewish descent. There are many similarities between Zelensky and Trump. Both were not career politicians; both were in the entertainment business; both were elected to drain a swamp. But the most intriguing similarity lies in the opposition's reaction to their winning the presidential race. The Ukrainian "Resist" identified themselves as "quarters," or "25%." This is the percentage that voted against Zelensky. These "quarters" consider themselves the Ukrainian intellectual, patriotic, and moral elite, while the rest of the voters are characterized by them as a deplorable group. These are the same people who are equally poisoned by hatred of Trump and Zelensky. The opposition party started plotting an impeachment even before the elected president took office. The political elite of Ukraine try to postpone the presidential inauguration ceremony in order to prevent him from discharging the current parliament, suggested to pass a law restricting presidential power to make him a decorative figure, and passed a controversial language law that could split multi-ethnic Ukrainian society. President Trump was the first foreign leader who called and congratulated President-Elect Zelensky for his victory. Hopefully, the two presidents will share good chemistry, build mutually beneficial relations between our countries, and drain swamps.