Vladimir Putin is just the latest bully in the thousand-year struggle for Ukrainian nationhood

Who are the Ukrainians? More fundamentally, are there Ukrainians? These questions of national identity stand at the core of the struggle for Ukrainian independence that protesters are waging right now in Kiev's central square, as well as in other cities across the country. The current crisis began when Ukraine's President Viktor Yanukovych decided that his government would "suspend the preparations for the signing of the Association Agreement between Ukraine and the European Union." The agreement between the EU and Ukraine had already been negotiated and "initialed" but Yanukovych appeared to be choosing a path that would reduce Ukraine to little more than an economic and, in all likelihood, political satellite of Russia.

Moscow has offered significant cash as an inducement to bring Ukraine into its orbit. While Russia alone already has significant weight in the world, a Russia with Ukraine is far more powerful. Boris Tarasyuk, Ukraine's ex-foreign minister and the opposition's point person on international affairs, believes that Putin will put significant effort into bringing Ukraine into his Eurasian Union “by hook or by crook,” and that Putin's ultimate goal is "reincarnating some semblance of the Soviet Union." To be sure, even such an achievement would not return us to the Cold War. No matter how much he bullies his neighbors, Putin's Russia is not the Soviet Union, and is not the enemy of the United States. Nevertheless, there is clearly one side to root for here, not merely for America's national interest but in the interest of the liberal, democratic values we hold dear.

Polls of Ukrainians taken throughout recent months show solid pluralities or majorities in favor of the EU Association Agreement, and a strong preference for joining the EU over joining the Customs Union of Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan. In response to the government's decision, mass numbers of Ukrainians have taken to the streets and demanded that Ukraine choose Europe over Russia and, by extension, choose independence, democracy, and the rule of law over subordination as part of a Russian-dominated economic union, and a corrupt, semi-authoritarian system of government of the kind specifically prohibited by the EU Association Agreement. Twenty-three year old Anastasia Bondarenko—who has been protesting daily in Kiev since this whole thing began on November 21—captured these sentiments:

“We’ve always seen Ukraine as independent, and not as a small Russia. We understand Europe has lots of problems,” she said. “But they have a set of rules. They know how to follow the rules. We want to follow rules.” Please read below the fold for more on Ukraine's struggle.