Former PM who came to power after the anti-Moscow Orange Revolution fears her country is turning into a ‘disenfranchised colony’ that is losing its sovereignty
It has been in flux for many years and then a lot after the full-scale war began in 2022.
Before:
A survey by the Democratic Initiative Foundation in April 2021 found that one out of three Ukrainians, 32%, considered Bandera’s acts as positive, and just as many took the opposite view.
After:
In April [2022], researchers from the Rating group, a Ukrainian research organization, found that 74% of Ukrainians now view [Stepan Bandera] favorably.
First monument to Bandera was erected in iirc 1998, it’s not a knnejerk, it’s part of the US program of supporting neonazis in former eastern bloc countries.
Western Ukraine moment. What you said is true, there’s no disagreement here.
What I meant to say is that outside of Western Ukraine, few people were buying into the rehabilitation campaign because they had no interest in a crusade against Russia that would just rock the boat. Foreign propaganda campaigns only work if the populace is interested in the narrative.
Then the invasion/SMO happened “anyway” in their eyes and people went: “Maybe the nationalists talking about Russia as an existential threat were right after all”. I called it “knee-jerk” because it’s grounded in little other than “Russia bad, Ukraine good”. This is my explanation for the sudden surge between the 2021 and 2022 polls.
Domestic efforts with support or tolerance from Western governments have engineered the parameters of political debate since 1991, that’s of course undeniable. I’m just a little wary of chalking it all up to Western interference as it makes the average Ukrainian sound like a gullible dupe without agency.
I thought Ukrainians loved Bandera?
Most Ukrainians aren’t fascist freaks, there’s just a big faction of them that seized control of the state’s violent apparatus in 2014.
It has been in flux for many years and then a lot after the full-scale war began in 2022.
Before:
After:
Source: https://www.dw.com/en/stepan-bandera-ukrainian-hero-or-nazi-collaborator/a-61842720
My guess is that it’s part successful propaganda by the Ukrainian government, part a knee-jerk reaction to Russian hostility towards him.
First monument to Bandera was erected in iirc 1998, it’s not a knnejerk, it’s part of the US program of supporting neonazis in former eastern bloc countries.
Western Ukraine moment. What you said is true, there’s no disagreement here. What I meant to say is that outside of Western Ukraine, few people were buying into the rehabilitation campaign because they had no interest in a crusade against Russia that would just rock the boat. Foreign propaganda campaigns only work if the populace is interested in the narrative.
Then the invasion/SMO happened “anyway” in their eyes and people went: “Maybe the nationalists talking about Russia as an existential threat were right after all”. I called it “knee-jerk” because it’s grounded in little other than “Russia bad, Ukraine good”. This is my explanation for the sudden surge between the 2021 and 2022 polls.
Domestic efforts with support or tolerance from Western governments have engineered the parameters of political debate since 1991, that’s of course undeniable. I’m just a little wary of chalking it all up to Western interference as it makes the average Ukrainian sound like a gullible dupe without agency.