Opinion: Arms would aid Ukraine democracy

When Ukraine President Petro Poroshenko addressed a joint session of Congress last week, he called on members to support Ukrainian freedom and democracy. They stood and cheered.

Ukrainians must “live free or die,” the president said, using a slogan from the American Revolution to describe his struggle with “rebels” who have taken over the eastern regions of his country. In reality, these separatists are Russian proxies, whom the Kremlin armed and organized in an effort to drag Kiev back into Moscow’s orbit.

So it will take far more than cheers (or economic sanctions) to persuade Russian President Vladimir Putin to resolve this conflict by negotiations. Indeed, Poroshenko urged President Obama and Congress to provide the outmatched Ukrainian army with defensive military equipment. Obama has refused so far, although legislators on both sides of the aisle seem willing (more on this later).

To understand why providing such aid to Ukraine would serve the cause of Western democracy, one need only compare the violence in Ukraine with the referendum on Scottish independence last week.

In Scotland, we saw an example of European democracy at its finest. A Scottish separatist movement fed up with rule from London organized a grassroots movement that galvanized almost 90 percent of voters to cast ballots on whether to separate from England. Faced with Scottish discontent, British politicians rushed to address Scottish grievances, promising to devolve more powers. The voters elected to stay unified with England, but the nationalists haven’t given up.

Contrast that peaceful expression of people power with the actions of Russian-backed separatists in Crimea and the eastern Donbass region who sought to split Ukraine by violence. As Poroshenko told Congress, “The world has been thrown back in time” to a pre-World War II era, when countries changed borders by invading. “The postwar system of checks and balances has been effectively ruined (by Putin’s actions),” Poroshenko warned. Too true.

Unhappy with Ukraine’s turn toward the European Union, Putin decided to dismember the country in order to make it dependent on Moscow. He invaded Ukraine’s Crimean region by stealth, and annexed it to Russia. He then revved up a fake, well-armed separatist movement in the Donbass, terrifying local Russian speakers with ferocious propaganda claiming Kiev fascists would kill them.

When the newly elected Poroshenko rallied poorly trained and armed Ukrainian forces to repel the Kremlin proxies, Putin sent in Russian troops and tanks (and a Russian-supplied missile apparently downed Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17).

Despite all that, the pragmatic Poroshenko is trying to compromise with Moscow. He has pushed legislation through the Ukrainian parliament that grants three years of self-governance to areas of the Donbass, guaranteeing the right to use the Russian language as well as local control over economic development.

Most important, those areas would hold elections for local officials on Dec. 7. Poroshenko told an audience at the Atlantic Council that the elections are the key part of the new law — because they would give locals a chance to decide who should represent them in future negotiations with Kiev. The separatists fear elections, Poroshenko said, “because people can demonstrate to whom they will give their votes.”

However, in ongoing talks with separatist leaders and Russians, the separatists are spurning Poroshenko’s offer.

“If this was about rights and not about geopolitical ambitions, a solution (would) be found,” Poroshenko told Congress. In other words, if Putin were open to a negotiated solution, the Kiev government would be ready to devolve serious powers to the Donbass.

But so far, Putin isn’t interested in a democratic solution — the kind that was worked out with Scotland and that could be in Ukraine. Rather, he seeks to forcefully revive a Russian empire — upending the rules that kept post-World War II Europe safe and peaceful. That is a challenge NATO nations cannot ignore.

Which brings us back to what those cheering men and women of Congress should do to help Poroshenko. So far, the White House has pledged $70 million in nonlethal military assistance to Ukraine, including meal rations, blankets, and night-vision goggles — much of which hasn’t yet arrived.

Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., has introduced a bill that calls for providing such lethal weapons, along with economic assistance, and a strategy to strengthen Ukrainian civil society and reduce corruption. The bill also calls for new sanctions on Russia’s defense, energy, and financial sectors if Putin continues to promote violence; it unanimously passed the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Friday.

“I urge you not to leave us alone,” Poroshenko told Congress. If those cheers meant anything, the Menendez bill should be considered soon.