U.S. To Pressure Ukraine to Cede Autonomy to Separatists?

Associated Press News reports in “NATO, Ukraine autonomy pose diplomatic challenges for Biden”:

Administration officials have suggested that the U.S. will press Ukraine to formally cede a measure of autonomy to eastern Ukrainian lands now controlled by Russia-backed separatists who rose up against Kyiv in 2014. An undefined “special status” for those areas was laid out in an ambiguous, European-brokered peace deal in 2015, but it has never taken hold.

For Biden, the challenge will be encouraging Kyiv to accept some of the facts on the ground in eastern Ukraine, without appearing to cave to Putin — a perception that could embolden the Russian leader and unleash a fresh line of condemnations by Republicans as Biden’s popularity is already in decline.

Ukraine may be asked “can you make some step forward on these areas,” said Steven Pifer, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine. That could include measures such as allowing the Russia-allied Donbas region to control its own health care, police and schools, he said.

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One man’s “separatist” is another man’s Freedom Fighter.

By all accounts, the corruption in Ukraine’s government exceeds even the institutional corruption in the DC Swamp. Who can say how popular Ukraine’s government is with the bulk of the Ukrainian people?

If President Putin was going to be emboldened by anything, it would be Biden’s catastrophic exit from Afghanistan – along with “General” Milley’s traitorous kowtowing to China. Plus Europe is heavily dependent on Russia for fuel – and it is winter-time. Further plus that Europe and large noisy elements of Biden’s Democrat Party are virulently anti-war. The deck is heavily tilted in Russia’s favor.

Likely outcome once the captains and the kings depart – a Finlandized somewhat reduced Ukraine under a new government.

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This is a bit like interservice rivalry. We Marines will quip with the best of the other services, but no one outside the services has that privilege. I don’t believe there is much love lost between Russians and Ukrainians. No matter how corrupt, they are “our” corrupt government, not Russia’s.

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