Why Does Ukraine Matter?
History hinges on such critical moments
Thanks to a mixture of ordinary human stupidity and persistent Russian propaganda, hundreds of thousands of Europeans regularly turn out for street protests against Western support of Ukraine and in favor of “negotiated peace” which in reality means simply appeasing Putin today in order to permit Russian forces to regroup and rebuild for their next invasion. Meanwhile, in the USA, Republican politicians and the gullible saps who vote reliably vote for them at every opportunity are agitating for a cessation of aid to Ukraine, largely because the creature Trump hates the Zelensky administration for failing to fabricate evidence against Hunter Biden during the last US presidential election.
For a great many people, the war in Ukraine is at best vaguely understood and of far less interest than energy prices, sporting events, celebrity gossip, and the whatever happens to be on TikTok this morning. So it’s worth asking: why does Ukraine matter?
There’s no doubt that Ukraine as a nation, prior to Putin’s unprovoked multiple invasions, was as corrupt as Greece and Italy and even slightly more corrupt than the USA. Its politics were less dysfunctional than those of Greece, Italy, and the USA but were far from the Nordic ideal of truth-based transparency, being closer to the kinds of absurd…
