Foreign Affairs. January-February 2020

The Shoals of Ukraine

January/February 2020 83

In the face of this effort, U.S. President George H. W. Bush fell

prey to magical thinking. Although he was the leader of a country

born out of revolt against empire, Bush also hoped to persuade Ukraine

to remain part of the Soviet Union. He feared that if it collapsed, the

Soviet Union could become a nightmare version of Yugoslavia: disin-

tegrating into ethnic violence, with nuclear weapons in the mix. In

August 1991, on his last trip to the dying Soviet Union, Bush delivered

his infamous “Chicken Kiev” speech as a result, hoping to prevent

Ukraine from pulling out. “Freedom is not the same as independence,”

Bush lectured the Ukrainian parliament. “Americans will not support

those who seek independence in order to replace a far-off tyranny with

a local despotism.” The irony of the speech was sharp: a U.S. president

was actively trying to prolong the existence of the country that had

been, until recently, the United States’ greatest foe.

Bush failed to convince the Ukrainian parliament, which seized on

weakness in Moscow in the wake of a failed coup to declare its intent

to become fully independent. Kyiv called for a dual election in De-

MARCY

NIGHSWANDER

/ AP

IMAGES

Terms and conditions: signing the Budapest Memorandum, December 1994