Nearly thirty years ago, then-President George H.W. Bush stood in Kyiv, in front of an auditorium of Soviet officials struggling to revive a flailing Soviet Union. Here was a golden opportunity for an American president to carry a torch for the independence movements bubbling up from Ukraine to Georgia to Kyrgyzstan. Bush, instead, backed the apparatchiks in the room. Tossing cold water on all those pushing to escape the USSR, Bush hinted that those demanding independence were doing little more than peddling “suicidal nationalism.” The Soviet Union—and Bush’s burgeoning partnership with then-Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev—must remain. Ukraine’s independence could wait. …read more
Source:: The New Republic
