Many ignored Ukrainians’ fight against Russia’s invasion, but the fallout from it will affect all of us

Three years after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, roughly 20% of the Ukrainian territory remains occupied by Russian troops. Before the invasion, there were 41 million people living in Ukraine; today, the UN Refugee Agency estimates that 3.7 million people still in Ukraine have been displaced from their homes, while almost 7 million refugees had to flee abroad. The war has severely damaged the Ukrainian economy and the living conditions for people in Ukraine.

Like everywhere else in the world, there is a class divide in Ukraine, and the impact of the war has not been equally felt: while the average Ukrainian was forced to migrate, lose wages, and fight on the front, the wealthy were able to escape conscription and put their money abroad. While economic elites reportedly took $35 billion out of the country since the start of the war, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelesnky not only refused to expropriate and nationalize their assets but, instead, chose to impose harsh anti-labor measures on workers and unions and make further cuts to social services using the national emergency laws. 

The fight to ensure Ukrainian people’s right to self-determination is not just about removing all Russian troops from Ukrainian territory and allowing the Ukrainian people to decide their own fate without fears of coups and invasions. It also has to do with stopping and reversing the encroachment of Western corporate and US imperial interests that seek to further exploit the country. However, prospects for this are growing darker by the day as President Donald Trump’s new administration engages in bilateral negotiations with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and without Zelensky, to end the war, all while suggesting that the US take ownership of 50% of Ukraine’s rare earth minerals. 

Solidarity with working people in Ukraine and their fight against Russia’s invasion never meant support for the Zelensky government, the US government, NATO, or the designs of rival imperial powers, but lack of international solidarity has left Ukrainians in an impossible situation.   

This is Solidarity without Exception, a new podcast series brought to you by The Real News Network, in partnership with the Ukraine Solidarity Network, hosted by Blanca Missé and Ashley Smith. In Episode One of this series, released on the three-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, we analyze the current state of the war and the last three years from an internationalist, working-class perspective. Cohost Blanca Missé speaks with Denys Bondar, a native of Ukraine, professor of Physics at Tulane University, and one of the coordinators of the Ukraine Solidarity Network in the US; and Hanna Perekhoda, a researcher at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland, a founder of the Switzerland-based Committee of Solidarity with the Ukrainian People and Russian Opponents of the War, and an ethnic Ukrainian who grew up in the Russian-speaking the city of Donetsk in the Donbas region of Eastern Ukraine. 

Pre-Production: Maximillian Alvarez, Blanca Missé, Ashley Smith, Kayla Rivara
Audio Post-Production: Alina Nehlich

Music Credits: 
Venticinque Aprile (“Bella Ciao” Orchestral Cover) by Savfk | https://www.youtube.com/savfkmusic
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com Creative Commons / Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

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Transcript

The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.

Blanca Missé:

Welcome to Solidarity Without Exception, a podcast series about working people’s struggles for national self-determination in the 21st century and what connects them and us. This podcast is produced by the Real News Network in partnership with the Ukrainian Solidarity Network. And I am Blanca Missé. We are releasing this episode on the third year anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24th, 2022. Today, roughly 20% of the Ukrainian territory remains occupied by Russian troops. Before the invasion, there were 41 million people living in Ukraine, but today the UN Refugee Agency estimates that 3.7 million people in Ukraine still remain displaced from their homes. While almost 7 million refugees had to flee abroad, official counts of the total number of Russian fighters killed or wounded in action oscillate between 550,000 and 800,000. And on the Ukrainian side, president Zelensky confirmed the more than 46,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed and some 380,000 wounded.

But independent Ukrainian war correspondent Yuri Bov said in December, 2024 that his army sources estimated some 70,000 dead and 35,000 missing. This war has severely damaged the Ukrainian economy and the living conditions for people in Ukraine. We all know that the country’s GDP fell almost 30% the year of the invasion, and since then, the IV economic schools calculate that the country has lost a total of $1.5 trillion. And we need to be very clear here, like everywhere else in the world, there is a class divide in Ukraine and the impact of the war has not been equally felt. While the average Ukrainian was forced to migrate, lose wages, fight on the front, and sometimes die, the wealthy were able to escape conscription and put their money abroad. It is calculated that the economic elites took 35 billion out of the country since the start of the war, and all of that was happening while President Zelensky refused to appropriate those who were betraying their country, nationalize their assets under workers’ control, and instead choose to impose harsh anti-labor measures on unions and workers and further cuts to social services using the National Marshall Emergency Laws.

As we’ll discuss in this episode, the fight to ensure Ukrainians people’s right to self-determination is not just about removing all Russian troops from the Ukrainian territory and allowing the Ukrainian people to decide their own fate without fears of coups and invasions. It also has to do with stopping and reversing the encroachment of Western corporate interest that seek to further exploit the country. This encroachment began more than a decade ago with US investors buying Ukrainian land and is advancing quickly with all the reconstruction loans that increase the country’s debt, and of course, come with strings attached. More privatization of state-owned companies, opening of the country to foreign investment and the very well-known austerity antisocial measures. The Ukraine debt has increased 60% between 2022 and November of last year. And in particular, its debt with the European Union has been multiplied more than eight times. More recently though, the Trump administration suggested that Ukraine should give the United States 50% ownership of the country’s rare earth minerals.

He has even asked for 500 billion worth of Ukraine’s rare Earths minerals. And this is because Ukraine has large lithium and titanium reserves in the eastern part of the country, precisely the part that Putin has occupied and wants to annex it, which is also rich in coal, gas and other metals. Since we recorded this episode, Trump made another bold move. He initiated bilateral negotiations with Putin to end the war and normalized diplomatic relations with the Russian government without the Ukrainians and also ditching the European leaders. In this context, we are going to discuss what it means today to stand in solidarity with the Ukrainian people and how we do so without falling into the traps of rival imperial powers starting with the US, but also the European Union. And for this the best is to give a voice to our Ukrainian comrades of struggle. Today we discuss all these issues with Denys Bondar, a native of Ukraine, a professor of physics in Tulane University, and one of the coordinators of the Ukraine Solidarity Network in the us, and a supporter of the socialist group, so Niru social movement, and also with Hanna Perekhoda, an ethnic Ukrainian who grew up in Russia speaking city of esque in the Donbass region in the east of Ukraine.

Hanna is a researcher of the University of Lausanne in Switzerland and a founder of the Swiss-based committee of solidarity with the Ukrainian people with the Russian occupants of the war. She’s also a member of social rule. Welcome both to our podcast and let’s get started. When Putin invaded Ukraine in February, 2022, most of the anti-war activists in the Western Europe and the US were kind of caught by surprise. I was caught by my surprise myself. I thought Putin is not really going to do this. I had a sense that folks in Ukraine were not so stunned by this invasion. Can you tell us why you were kind of expecting this invasion and what was your reaction to this very brutal military aggression? Denys, you want to get started?

Denys Bondar:

First of all, I have no questions. I have no problem with people, ordinary working people’s reactions. I mean, they are ordinary people. They have plenty of things to be worried about. And in fact, I have to say since I live in New Orleans, and I was in New Orleans at this time, which is a very special kind of happy place in the United States, very famous for tourism. And literally on every second house you could see Ukrainian flag on the first month of invasion. So clearly it was kind of amazing actually. And usually people here do not worry about foreign policy just by the very nature of this land. And so people had an ordinary working, people had absolutely knee-jerk reaction that one has to help thanks all over the border or innocent people. That’s not good. So I have far more questions to so-called experts, and I think one of the main misconception is it actually was articulated by Timothy Snyder, a famous historian from Yale University, that the way the education works, so all ex-Soviet space, former Soviet space is basically dominated by Russian studies and all the spaces being in general, east Europe, caucuses, et cetera, it’s all studied through the lens of Russian imperial point of view, whether it’s Soviet studies or Russian studies, it doesn’t matter.

And this has cultivated generations of experts and diplomats with this point of view. And of course it revealed itself immediately in the first days of war. And second is that of course cold war thinking is not gone in expert circles, it’s also extremely moderate the situation for the assessment of what’s happening with the level of the threat and the nature of dynamics. By looking at this through this point of view, of course all the eastern Europe in particularly Ukraine, is sort of this borderlands which are supposed to be buffer zone between two geopolitical blocks and totally denying agency to actually people of Ukraine and totally denying their historical and present experience.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you very much. Can we then now go into what are the reasons that led putting to invade Ukraine? I don’t know, Hanna, do you have any thoughts on that? How do you explain this invasion?

Hanna Perekhoda:

This is a question that needs the whole discussion in itself. And as you said, there are multiple reasons and in such limited amount of time we cannot really touch all these reasons, but the least we can say maybe is that to understand the immediate motivations, we must understand the power dynamics inside Russia, between the state economic actors, the society for the past 25 years that Putin is in power. But what we can say at least is that Putin, when he came to power, had a strategy of restoring the previous Soviet imperial zone of influence through a deal with Western political elites. So he expected the west to let him establish an exclusive control over post Soviet space in exchange for he will give them cheap fossil fuels and some individual preferences of various kind. And European leaders at that time were very happy with this deal.

But there was a factor that Putin did not took into account. It is the agency, precisely the agency that Denise was mentioning of the population of this so-called zone of influence. Of course, Russia could easily corrupt the post-Soviet president of Ukraine and other countries, but the citizens of these countries like Ukraine voiced their dissatisfaction, radical dissatisfaction with autocratic ineffective leaders that were supported by Russia. And when the control of Putin and his friends over Russia itself were threatened, even inside Russia, he just went nuts. And for him, every possible means was now justified in order to stop the erosion of his power and the spreading of popular unrests including so he used repressions, annexations, wars, et cetera. So I think this is something that we need to understand. The principle roots of this war are inside the internal dynamics of the Russian state and the power relations.

But another dimension that is crucial but mostly overlooked, I will try to really synthesize it quickly, is that to concur, Ukraine is explicitly presented by Putin as motivated by the necessity to restore the unity of a Russian nation national body that is being supposedly torn apart by the enemies. So Ukraine is imagined as a part of a Russian national body, and this kind of ideology is very charged with strong emotions. And as a consequence, it is clearly leaving a very small space, less space for compromise, for diplomacy, et cetera, because Putin is motivated by ideology and he invest his ideology of nationalism with a sense of self, very strong one I think. And this is something that western reading is struggling really to grasp. And the last important point is this national denta, the assimilation, the conquest in assimilation of Ukraine is not presented as a purpose in itself. It is presented explicitly as a means to achieve something else, something bigger. The ultimate purpose, and he make it clear, is that once we assimilate Ukraine, we can have a future imperial expansion because he’s convinced that the only reason why Russia is still not the greatest power on earth is mainly because Ukraine is not part of it. This is silly, has nothing to do with reality, but narratives, they have their own logic and their own power.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you, Hannah, because I hear you saying that most of the western media explanations that have to do with NATO are missing all of these factors that have to do with the internal loss of legitimacy or opposition that putting was facing. And of course, as you’re reminding us this desire for putting to a reestablish an imperial state by going back to this great Russia imperial imagination, I wonder if Denis has something to add on the multiple causes of the war and how he’s been explaining to working people in the US what is behind this invasion?

Denys Bondar:

So I just further would like to evidence what Hannah said, in particular the internal Russian reason for the war. Putinism as a system has been in deep crisis since 2018. If you track the Putin’s approval ratings, absolute numbers don’t actually tell you much, but the dynamics of these approval ratings actually tell you a lot about the legitimacy. And you can see 2018, these approval ratings jumped up because of the pension protest took place and there was pension reform 2018. Then immediately next year 2019, there were protests in Moscow 2020 protests in be Russia for fair election. Then there was a series of regional protests followed in Cabarrus cry. There were 2021 next year Navalny protests. You can see every year there’s a major, major protests are happening in Russia and plus Belarus of course, that you can see that the Putin’s regime is in very deep crisis legitimacy crisis.

And this kind of frequency of the protests that have not been mainly mostly covered in the west, smaller protests, regional protests show you that the regime needed to boost up its approval rating. And only in post February, 2022 after the full scale invasion of Ukraine, you can see his disapproval rating finally collapsing back to nearly zero. So the internal dynamics was absolutely essential to restored the legitimacy of Putin regime because we can, again, if you look back to the entire history of Putinism starting from two thousands, from 1999 when he was appointed in that his disapproval when he had a crisis of legitimacy, which should reflect itself as a increase of disapproval rating, it was fixed by actually some imperialistic adventure, whether it was in Shia or in Georgia or in Ukraine by next Crimea interfering in Donbass before that. And one important reason I would like to emphasize is that basically Putin clearly counted on the European elites, in particular the EM embedment of the Putin oligarchy and the Putin regime with the European elites, especially with a conservative and far right ban, I think is hard to underestimate. And we know also some of the far right parties have been actually taking loans from Russian banks. So clearly the Putin regime expecting complicity of European, of European elites kind of basically he expected that they would behave the same way as they did during the first war, which was the annexation of Crimea in 2014.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you, Dan. So something both of you have said that I think it’s quite important to emphasize is like reading this war through just a competition between two blocks, the NATO block and Russia block tends to erase the agency of the Ukrainian people themselves and also unfortunately buy into the narrative that the Ukrainian nation does not exist and these assimilationist pressures that Russia has on Ukraine. And my question to you now is what does it mean for working people in the West and in particular in the US to stand in solidarity with Ukrainian people? What kinds of support are needed to ensure the right of self-determination of Ukrainians and the support of their agencies so they are not erased in this sometimes reductionist geopolitical narratives of the war? Can you tell us a little bit about that

Denys Bondar:

First? So you’re asking very touchy question in this difficult times as we know that the both military and humanitarian aid from the United States is suspended currently to Ukraine, and these are the most two important things. So Ukraine first and foremost needs the military aid and also humanitarian aid to fulfill basic social needs of its citizen. And I would like to sort of remind listeners that in nineties when Ukraine became independent, it undergone massive disarmament program which included both disarmament of unconventional weapons, which led to actually partially destruction destruction of military equipment as well as transferred back to Russia as well as disarmament nuclear disarmament. So at that time, Ukraine had a third largest nuclear arsenal in the world and it was surrender under the, it was actually transferred again back to Russia under the promise of security, security assurances and territorial in respect of territorial integrity from both United States, Russia, as well as the United Kingdom. And so in a way, all the eight is not only morally justified but also legally should be in these terms. And in order for Ukraines to realize the right of self-determination is of course they have to be able to protect their homes, right? Their land, their homes from the invaders, Russian invaders. So this is why first and foremost, military assistance, military aid is absolutely essential.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you so much Dennis. Hannah, do you have anything to add? I know you are based in Switzerland, I know you’re also being very actively engaged in solidarity with the Ukrainian people during the war, and I imagine you also been having this kind of conversations of organizing support for the right of self determination of Ukrainian. So what would you say or what have you been proposing and organizing in Switzerland and in Europe?

Hanna Perekhoda:

Well, from the practical point of view, you can for example build links with the forces of social transformation in Ukraine, actually Ukrainian civic society, civic organizations, trade unions, but also feminists also with be Russian and Russian progressive anti-war organizations. You can raise money for their initiatives. You can participate in some international campaigns that exist, for example, for the conation of Ukraine’s foreign depth for increasing help confiscating the assets of Putin’s oligos and using them for the reconstruction of Ukraine. But let’s be honest, for the overwhelming majority of Ukrainians, the help that matters is the military help. And this is the condition number one for the Ukraine survival as a society and the survival of its individual members. But from my perspective, I would like to make it a little bit another take on this question, that the help that American in general western societies can offer to Ukraine’s not just in the military or economic sphere.

It is the primary help that you can do for Ukrainians is by resolving your own crisis of internal legitimacy. Because what is clear in the United States is that worsening inequalities participates in rising sense of injustice and the perception also among the ordinary people that elites are completely out of touch with day-to-day realities, it undermines the illegitimacy. And you saw the results that a society that feels abandoned or ignored is very unlikely to support international commitments even if they respond to some principles such as defense of rights or sovereignty, et cetera. And this feeling of being abandoned and the frustration is used by irresponsible politicians to instrumentalize discontent to feed the idea that the governments, the previous governments were actually sacrificing national interests for some distant causes and such as support of Ukraine. And now the isolationist politics will solve the problem. Now it’s America first. A society that could respond to the struggles of other societies against injustice, against aggression is a society based on solidarity. So the action for social equality is not just an internal priority for the United States Society, but also it is essential a condition number one for the Ukrainian survival, at least in my opinion.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you, Hannah. I really like your point, this idea of not competition, but of who deserves more at home or abroad, but an expansive understanding of solidarity, solidarity without exception, solidarity without borders, like fighting for the rights and the needs of working people here in the US as something that connects directly with fighting for the needs of working people in Ukraine or in Palestine or in Syria or in anywhere else in the world where there is oppression and war and genocide. And I know you’ve been very active in New Orleans in providing material aid, and if you can tell us a little bit about the value of having this worker to worker solidarity campaigns working with the unions, I think that would be really useful to explain how we can connect with Ukrainian working people today.

Denys Bondar:

Yes, our network, Ukrainian Solidarity Network US is currently running campaign on fundraising for generators for the trade union members of miners, workers union, as well as the railway workers union. And these generators go to the members of the trade union that have three or more children or actually or have disabled family members. So they really cannot afford to buy ones. And it’s a truly working class solidarity because these are members of the independent union they have which have been active in fighting neoliberal reforms and resisting neoliberal agenda and fighting for the rights of working people all across industries and such a solidarity is actually absolutely fundamental because they feel that we on the west as a working class, people absolutely understand their needs, not just these generic geopolitical things like, oh, military aid is important, but to understand that individual members of societies matter and individual member of societies who are willing to fight to fight for the more just future are even more matter even more.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you. And this makes me think that what I hear you both saying is that part of the work we have to do here in United States, but also in Europe, Western Europe, to support the struggle for liberation of Ukrainians aside of the questions of material aid, military aid is to amplify the voices of Ukrainians who are fighting for social justice, fighting for union rights, fighting for the progressive causes in Ukraine, and show that there are forces there that are fighting for an independent Ukraine that are not necessary tied to their government. Now, I would like to go to one of the tricky questions that emerges every time we are organizing solidarity campaigns for Ukrainian particular for the left in Western imperialist countries that has rightly so, a very clear concern and position of opposition to western imperialism, to the military actions and expansions of their government starting with the us, which is this question of weapons. Because once and once again, we have run into many social justice activists, folks who really want to support Ukraine and they want to support Ukraine diplomatically, they want to send food, they want to send medicine, but they become really hesitant about giving critical support or not obstructing military aid because they see that military aid is necessarily going to strengthen NATO and the US war machine. And I would like you to tell me how do you resolve this contradiction?

Hanna Perekhoda:

Well, many things to say of course, and I would not pretend that the question is easy or something. So yes, of course the US is pursuing its own interest and this interest, you can see that they could align sometimes with progressive struggles in some parts of the world, like in Eastern Europe, while in the other parts of the world, like in Middle East, it’s the extreme opposite. But the question is why should an ordinary person follow or mirror the logic of the state’s interests? Because in different parts of the world, ordinary people are struggling against the external invasion, against the internal oppression. And of course, because they are facing different and partly competing enemies, they would need to use the tools of self-defense that are produced by these competing imperialist forces. It’s obvious, it’s not like they have a lot of choice. And when you face a fascist state that denies you right to exist, Ukrainians are facing, your priority is freedom and survival.

And for that you need weapons wherever they come from. And this is of course the perspective of Ukrainians, but I also, I understand what it means when you focus also on your own perspective. But what is crucial to understand is to look beyond and to have a little bit a long-term vision because a lack of substantial support of the victims only encourages aggressors, and not just one aggressor in particular, but all the aggressors and if you abandon the victims of the aggression in the family. But if you abandon the victim of a military aggression, also you give a green light to those in the position of power that now they’re free to do whatever they want. They’re free to solve their problems of legitimacy through wars, genocides, and the impunity given to those who advocate this law the strongest on the international stage, inevitably fuels the rise of the same ideas, the same forces that defend the same principles at home and also vice versa. So of course I understand all the reticence when it comes to the US imperialism, et cetera, but I think we need to see what not defending the victims of aggression means for all of us in the long-term perspective.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you, Hannah. Dennis, what are your thoughts on these? Very tricky question. How do you address this in the multiple conversations you have about raising support for Ukraine, specifically being here in the us?

Denys Bondar:

So in fact, this question is very straightforward. No military aid, no Ukraine, so there is no debate. This is absolutely essential component of defending Ukraine. No amount of pillows would have saved mariupol, right? Air defense system would’ve saved mariupol, better artillery would’ve saved mariupol. Again, no amount of pillows or blankets would have saved several hundreds victims in the massacre of bucha, right? Only Ukrainian army could have saved them and so on. And so the list goes on with all the cities that are wiped out in the east of Ukraine. Only military aid can save that, and it still is still important. And just to emphasize this point, that anate about general, I’m sorry to say geopolitical context, but it never that it’s very important. So Ukraine has a railway connection to Europe. So in principle, an infinite amount of weapon can be delivered to Ukraine, right?

Because it’s very logistics, it’s very simple, very straightforward. And for example, compared to Taiwan where it’s of course it’s an island and should anything horrible happen by horrible I mean potential invasion from mainland China, then of course the supplies have to be done over the maritime domain, which is much more difficult logistically, and by showing, so in the case of Ukraine, in a way it’s a cannery in the mine. If collectively speaking, the western societies are not, Western elites are not able to provide sufficient military aid to country which is willing to fight for its freedom, independence, and logistically easy to deliver at this point also, the military is trained to use this equipment.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you, Dennis. I was reflecting also on what Hannah was saying, that it has been in history something very common that those fighting for liberation use the weapons of the competitors of the powers that oppressed them. And I was thinking even the way the United States won its independence from Britain, it got military aid from France, and Haiti was using military aid and making alliances with the Spanish imperial powers to fight the French and so on and so forth. And even entire Latin America relied on financing and weapons from Britain to fight the Spanish empire. So that has been one of the ways, I mean, maybe the way the oppressed have been able to fight for the liberation is trying to get the weapons from where they can get them from and then use them in a smart way for their own liberation. This discussion reminds me also of a very important statement.

They came out last summer that is called the people’s piece, not an imperial piece that I think was endorsed by many networks of solidarity with Ukraine by social niru, and in particular by the Ukraine solidarity network in the US where we were making very clear that an effective support of Ukraine does not require necessarily a new wave of armaments. We can just send the existing arsenals and huge arsenals that exist in the US to Ukraine, and we can have a social reappropriation of the arms industry or working people could decide who produced weapons and for whom. And I think this question of just thinking aiding Ukraine with food and medicine, but not thinking of the military component is a little bit like Dennis has said, pie in the sky, right? It’s not realist politics. Without military aid, there is no struggle for self-determination. Now, do you see some potential dangers of only relying on western aid or some strings that would come attached with these aid? Do you think the Ukrainian people need to have some kind of alerts of the way these military aid is being sent?

Denys Bondar:

We can see the strings attached, like clearly limitations on the usage of weapons that is supplied and the scheduling of the deliveries of the weapons, how different systems were delivered. Actually pretty much always too late and then too little quantities.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you, Dennis and Hannah, do you have any thoughts about that?

Hanna Perekhoda:

Yeah, I dunno much about the military aid, but when it comes to the other kind of help, well, Western countries tie aid firstly to political reforms. The European Union is linking it to the political reforms like anti-corruption efforts, judicial institutional reforms, and I had say rather useful string attached, it’s not necessarily bad in the Ukrainian context, but the financial aid loans, reconstruction funds often come with economic conditions tied to neoliberal policies. So privatization of state assets to supposedly attract foreign investment, which inevitably also leads to the loss of control over the strategic sectors. It must be said that it is, the war has proven that, for example, such spheres like transport cannot be privatized. If it is privatized, it is dysfunctional in the conditions of war and of self-defense. This is if the Ukrainian railways were in a private ship, they would not be able to evacuate millions and millions of people.

So in this sense, I think it must be clear that the strategic sectors must not be subject to privatization, but it is clear for us, not clear for the Ukrainian government. Also UK Ukraine is in the same manner asked to cut public spending or to limit some subsidies and economic policies in general kind of prioritize investor interests over public interests. So this is the first point. Also, of course, the dependence on this kind of loans create a cycle of debt. Ukraine is hugely indebted in the sense, and maybe the last point that the Western aid, of course the huge risk, it could be used as a tool in negotiations for leveraging negotiations and potentially it could restrain Ukraine’s freedom to make decisions about its own policies, domestic and foreign one.

Blanca Missé:

Yeah, Hannah, I mean you were going into the next question I wanted to ask you because I think you touched on the key thing here that because of the war, of course, the debt internal and external debt of Ukraine has a boom. I was reading this morning an article by Eric Tusan who has been working very much on the question of abolition of external debt and following very closely the situation of Ukraine that since the beginning of the war, the debt has increased by 60%, that today Ukraine has won hundred 60 billion of debt. And many of these grants and loans come with different conditionalities as they’re called. We’re very familiar with them. Now, as you mentioned, privatization of state companies cuts to social programs, deregulation of the liberal law. So it seems that Ukraine is kind of trapped on the one hand, the Russian invasion, which is trying to oppress and also exploit further exploit Ukraine and its resources. And on the other hand, this western imperialist powers that are also trying to take advantage of Ukraine by signing these loans and these agreements for reconstruction and financing that, as you said, could put in danger or are putting in danger, is possibility of being fully independent in the future. So one question I have is, do you see any struggles already happening or position is already happening in Ukraine against these neoliberal plans, and what has been the role of the landscape administration in all of that? I don’t know. Dennis, if you want to start.

Denys Bondar:

So Blanca, I would like to step a little bit back and revisit the premises of the question by asking question. You sort of imply intentionality of the western elites and also Ukrainian elites of this about commitment to neoliberal form. But I think situation is much more worse. I think we are all new liberals. There is nothing but neoliberal agenda. There’s no alternative in the world. And this is where every society here in the United States, in Europe, in Ukraine, this working people suffer from the same problems from this total GMO of neoliberal ideology. And this the summation of social safety nets is a problem everywhere. So that’s where absolute solidarity can be built, right? This is the same problem that you listed. You could have put any name of any country in the west and it’ll still be the case. So the first and foremost, to get rid of ourself from this kind of spiraling down motion, we need to start thinking collectively thinking about alternatives as far as I’m aware specifically talking about Ukraine again, which is similar to the US unions are at the forefront of the fight for just society. Even though right now Ukraine is a martial law and all the politics is basically kind of suspended and protests are not allowed. They still do happen, actually they still do happen about reforms, labor reforms about mobilization, the way mobilization is done, and again, these are specific cases to Ukraine, but most of the problems that you mentioned are actually unique, absolutely universal to all the countries.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you, Dennis. Hannah, what is your take on the opposition of new liberal reforms in Ukraine and also this connection that DE is making?

Hanna Perekhoda:

I mean it’s this question really deserves better experts than us. I think it is the central one. Also, I need to ize, I mean, I agree with what you said Blanca with your analyst, but I also want to say that we must not enter into a little bit simplistic analysis to interpret what happens through the prism. There is an almighty west imposed in neoliberal conditions on poor Ukrainians. As said in this, it is worse than that because the most radical and crazy funds of neoliberalism are the Ukrainians Ukrainian political and economical elites themselves. I think they are on the top of this pyramid in terms of neoliberal, imaginary and fanaticism. And in comparison with them the requirements, for example of the European unions in regard to Ukraine that for example, Eric to he says that yes, these are neoliberal requirements, but they seem rather humanistic in comparison of what the Ukrainian government does itself.

In fact, the European commission pressures the Ukrainian government to threaten the social dialogue and to not to crush the unions and this kind of thing. But I think, well, the Ukrainian government, it is not very smart to say in the least because it is trying. What is actually doing is trying to win a war of such a magnitude while sustaining the fantasy of a neoliberal economy and the neoliberal economy. It is based on deeply individualist, social imaginary on deregulated economic system. And it is evident that is simply not suited to the demands of defense because the defense requires solidarity at all levels of society and they promote reforms like the regulation of labor law, et cetera. And these reforms, of course, they weaken the workers and obviously destroys the very little trust that the workers still had in the state because there is a trust, the state is kind of fulfilling, tries to fulfill its duty of the defense of the society, but it is eroding very quickly. It’s legitimacy. And Ukraine’s existence depends on the collective effort, on the resilience of its citizens, a collectively resilience. But the government itself is weakening actively the very foundation of this society and it’s a horrible situation.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you, Hannah, because I really also want to thank you both for reframing my question because what I hear you say, one is we’re all under neoliberal assault for the past 40 years. So this is kind of the common basis for international solidarity regardless that you live in the US in Ukraine and Palestine, in France, in Syria and Sudan is the same policies that attack workers’ rights, social rights, democratic rights. So there’s nothing exceptional. But I also heard you say that in particular in Ukraine, the economic elites have a very high capitalist predation and have been attacking social rights even more or more eager to do so that to pay on privatizations and accumulation of money more than the European Union would like them to do. So that’s also something very important that there is an internal class struggle that I’m assuming began before the war and is exacerbated by the war.

But I think what you said, Hannah, and I would like to know if you could develop a little bit more, I think you kind of getting to one of the crux problems here is that these policies, these neoliberal policies are today an obstacle to win the war in Ukraine because they weakened national economic independence, they weakened the production of goods, they weakened the working people who are the ones who are fighting in the forefront and making sure the economy can resist the Russian imperialist aggression. So what would be alternative social and economic policies that would help the Ukrainians win the war? I understand you’re very critical of the Zel landscape administration.

Hanna Perekhoda:

Yes. So I think the very crucial thing now is the redistribution, the fair redistribution of resources inside of Ukraine, the revision of taxation. Also, the take on the reform is complex and it implies a lot of things. Also, the fight of corruption is a very important point in order to dismantle this oligarchic predatory system. But the investment needs to be made a huge investment in a public sector and also in defense. And to restore the legitimacy of the government and the trust of the working people, the people who are now in the trenches, they want to be sure that their families don’t starve and their families get what they deserve from the state. And they are respected, their work and their families are respected. And it’s not the case now because as I said, they try to pretend that neoliberal state could function during the times of war, and it is clearly not the case.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you, Hannah. Dennis, do you have any thoughts about this question?

Denys Bondar:

As far as alternative goes? Actually everything depends what’s going to happen in the battlefield. All sectors of societies are represented in the battlefield. Future political leaders are obviously there will be former soldiers or commanders, and now we have progressive members of progressive forces there. And there are different groups. L-G-B-T-Q groups are also represented in the armed forces. And all these groups will have their say once the political process is open, if there’s a ceasefire and there is a martial law is canceled so that elections can begin, can restart only then we will see. Honestly, that’s the only way to see, in my opinion, some change. Because at the moment, people of Ukraine have many problems with the zelensky government, yet they’re not willing to challenge it openly through protests because they understand that the country needs to become not internally paralyzed internal politics because that’s the only thing that basically Russian occupier want to see. Right? Internal destabilization to the point where the state is not able to provide the basic defense needs. So is I would like to again reiterate that we, everything is right now decided on the battlefield, including the future.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you, Deni. So I have a more broad or abstract question to you that has to do with what does it mean today for you to be an anti-imperialist and to stand for international solidarity? What are the principles you think we should be upholding?

Hanna Perekhoda:

Yes, I just wanted to say a few words to complete, maybe to react to what Denise was saying before answering. I think I also would like to repeat that there is an idea that circulates in the western media and among some people about the reelections of zelensky, blah, blah, blah. I think Ukrainians are very clear, most of them on the fact that objectively it is unrealistic to hold democratic elections in times where the cities are bombed. Dial one sort of the country is under occupation, 10 million of people are displaced. Million is I think around a million is of people is in the trenches. But of course we need the return of politics and the conditions where the political economic struggles are possible when the elections could take place, but not just elections, of course, all kinds of struggles. And for this, we need the end of the war, but we need functioning democratic institutions.

And for this, the condition number one is just peace. Just peace that could be accepted by the majority of the Ukrainian society because nothing will strengthen the populists, the extreme rights more than the military occupation and all the systematic injustice oppression that accompanies it. And I think if Ukraine is forced to make peace under the Russian conditions, it is more likely that we will not have the opportunity to actually make politics, us and our organizations. It is more likely than in this circumstances, radical groups which capitalize on frustration on the feelings of injustice will gain thread. And you have multiple examples in the world of such dynamics, very sad examples. And Ukraine, I think it must not become one of them and we must not repeat the same mistakes. And as for the more broad question, also a lot of things to say, but if we consider the current context, which is very, for me personally, very difficult, discouraging, and kind of emotionally, I’m really feeling bad for what is happening in the world and particularly in the United States. And with the return of Donald Trump, I think it should be clear now that the rising of reactionary militaristic states like Russia, like Israel directly fuels the rise of fascist forces in the United States and other countries and vice versa. These are the communicating vessels. And these forces are actually working very actively in order to dismantle all possible international structures that limit their ambitions, their ambitions of wars, of pollution, of exploitation. And I think the fight in Ukraine is in this sense, linked directly with the global struggles against this destructive trends.

Blanca Missé:

Thank you, Hanna, Denys. What it means to you to be an anti-imperialist today, and which connections do you see between the struggle of the Ukrainian people and other struggles abroad?

Denys Bondar:

So it’s very simple. It’s basically trusting people, right? Trusting ordinary people, working people everywhere, respecting their voices, respecting their opinions, and trying to sympathize with them on their own terms, trying to put yourself in other shoes. And I think these principles have been foundational principles since 19th century emergence of the progressive thoughts, and they remain activists today. And unfortunately, it’s painful to see many people whom I would call comrades on other issues, not basically remembering these basic fundamental tenants.

Blanca Missé:

Can you give examples of comrades who have not been remembering the tenants and some of the struggles about supporting this liberation movement or not this movement? Can you tell us a little bit more about that?

Denys Bondar:

Yeah, so it’s very particular in the western left, especially in the US and actually some of the European left, which are mainly from major countries like uk, Germany. You can clearly see how the starting point of discussion is always this geopolitical and cold war thinking that we have started our conversation with, even though these people should know better, right? They’re activists, they’re engaged with Palestinians, with the Georgians, et cetera, et cetera. They know other people, they know how it is to be oppressed and not able to apply the same principles to Ukrainians. Sorry to Georgians. I wanted to say also just I cannot fathom how they can live with this self-evident contradictions, how they can reconcile two different worldviews as applied to Ukraine and East Europe and Ukraine and Coco regions and everybody else.

Blanca Missé:

Yeah, I’m glad that you mentioned Georgia because of course there is also an analogy between the aggressions Russian aggressions to Georgia and interference in Georgia, national affairs from Russia and the situation of Ukraine. But you also mentioned Palestine, and I do remember that in the Ukraine social solidarity network in the us, and we had a point of taking a position of solidarity with Palestine, that was our first episode of solidarity, without exception whether to Ukrainian guests. It is clear that for the Ukrainian people to achieve a durable peace, it is them who have to be at the table of negotiations as they have been the ones fighting on the front, and it is their own country and livelihood that is at stake. Stay tuned for our next episode hosted by Ashley Smith, where we’ll turn into the recent events in Syria with a fall of Bashar Assad, and the challenges posed today to the Syrian people to lead a truly democratic transition free from any foreign interference.

This content originally appeared on The Real News Network and was authored by Blanca Missé.