Survey Says . . .

Everybody's Screaming "misinformation"

This is a bit of a sidebar but I am shocked by how frequently writers will misquote or misinterpret the sources of their own opinions and arguments.  Big deal, right?  Everybody is screaming about misinformation these days.  Over the years, I've formed the impression that the people who are supposed to be the most reliable sources of information, the people most likely to scream "misinformation," often prove the worst purveyors of misinformation.

Baloney detector

If you have read Carl Sagan's rules for how to detect baloney, you are aware that what is quantifiable is more likely to be credible, factual and true.  In other words, if there is a number attached we can and probably should believe it--whatever "it" is.  The problem is that numbers always have to be interpreted.  With the interpretation, the baloney factor can immediately creep back in.  

The Telephone game

If you have ever been to summer camp, chances are you have played the "telephone game."  The point of the game is to discover how information gets distorted as it is passed (whispered) from one person to another.  Contrary to the argument that the internet would democratize the news, if you google any recent news story you will find all the major news agencies and most of the minor ones covering exactly the same story.  Each media outlet will provide a headline putting a slightly different spin on the news, and the headline that best plays to its target audience, and is most exaggerated, outrageous and enraging will get the most readers.  The old standard used to be that a news story needed at least two authentic sources, but these days you can read the same story in a dozen different places and conclude it must therefore be true, when the media may well be--a la telephone game--just repeating each other with increasingly colourful headlines based on a single questionable or misinterpreted source.  This brings us to the single most frequently misinterpreted and questionable source:  the poll.

The Template for a prelude to war

Following the model established when the US sent VP Joe Biden to Ukraine in 2014 to get the Ukrainians stoked for a war with Russia; recently, the Democrats sent their geriatric warrior princess, Nancy Pelosi, to see what could be done about encouraging a war between Taiwan and China.  (To be fair about the purpose of the visits, in both cases their children were involved.  Nancy's son accompanied her to do some business in the region, and Joe's son was in Ukraine in 2014 on the payroll of a Ukrainian energy company.)  VP Biden's promise, in 2014, of military support for Ukraine was ambiguous.  This time, President Biden has explicitly promised Taiwan the military backing of the USA, but the State Department has been vigorously walking back his statements.  And, of course, Canada, ever eager to imitate big brother USA, followed up by sending five MPs to Taiwan to further irritate China.  Needless to say, Taiwan is in the news because everyone in the West wants to know if, like the Ukrainians, the Taiwanese are ready to go to war with the tyrant next door.

According to the Globe and Mail

The headline in the Globe and Mail (1 October 2022) is radically moderate, outside the mainstream:  "Small minority in Taiwan say they support unification with China."  These days it's pretty radical for anyone in western media to report that even a "small minority" supports China. The article is a series of interviews with Taiwan citizens who are part of this fringe who claim "We are Chinese [ . . .] we should unite [. . .]."  However, just so we Globe readers don't get the wrong idea there is this:

An August poll by the Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation, an independent and non-partisan organization, found that only 11.8 per cent of respondents favoured "unification" with China.  Fifty per cent of those surveyed said they would opt for independence, and 25.7 backed the status quo.  

This paragraph serves as an inoculation against the content which follows, just in case you might be tempted to take the pro-unification opinions as a representation of reality.  This is the truth:  here are the numbers supplied by an "independent," "non-partisan," "Taiwanese" foundation.  What more could we possibly ask for?

Who Did the survey?  Who supplied the numbers?

Ever the skeptic, I googled "Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation."  Hmm, that's odd.  It's home office is in Washington, DC.  When I googled a bit deeper I discovered its parent organization, the Global Taiwan Institute.  Most of the heavy-weights on its Board of Directors and Staff have ties to the US Defense and/or State Department.  The Board of Directors describes itself online as Taiwanese-Americans and "board members all share a passion for closer ties between the United States and Taiwan." What does "independent" mean?  "Non-partisan"?  What does "Taiwanese" mean?

Numbers don't lie

Still, none of this proves that the survey wasn't carried out with scientific rigour and impartiality.  Numbers don't lie.  However, before there can be numbers there must be questions.  Of course, the poll doesn't ask the question we all want an answer to:  Are the people of Taiwan ready to go to war with China to claim independence?  If ever there is a war, we know this poll will be used as proof that the war is happening because it is the will of the Taiwanese people, who are ready to bravely fight and die for their sovereignty and independence from an evil Chinese empire. 

What Was the question?

Here is the question asked in the poll:

“There are debates regarding the future of Taiwan. Some people argue Taiwan should pursue unification with the other side of the [Taiwan] Strait, while others argue Taiwan should pursue its own independence. Do you support Taiwan independence, or unification with the other side?”

The wording of the question will always affect the outcome of a survey.  I would question the use of "the other side" as opposed to the official designation,  "Peoples Republic of China"  or even the vernacular "mainland China."  Nonetheless, here are the results of the survey of just over a thousand respondents, in July 2022, which are being repeated in the Globe and Mail.

The Results

The poll finds among Taiwanese adults aged 20 years and older, 50% said they support Taiwan independence, 11.8% for unification, 25.7% for maintaining status quo.

 The Interpretation of the numbers

These are the number which will eventually be used in western media to justify a war between Taiwan and China. However, before we send the people of Taiwan into battle for their independence, we should note that 50% of respondents did not express a desire for independence.  Moreover, based on a relatively small sample (1,035 people), the margin of error is 3.5%.  The survey, as a whole, danced around the question of a war with China--reactions to war games, Pelosi's visit, Biden's promises, confidence in Taiwan's military, etc--but never asked the obvious question: Are you ready to go to war with China over Taiwan's independence?

The only direct "war question" in the survey was "Do you think war with China is imminent?" and 39% of respondents thought war was likely, 53% thought it was not and the rest didn't answer. Obviously, many of the people who said they wanted independence weren't thinking about going to war for it. 

The same survey question about Taiwan independence has repeatedly been asked on surveys since 1994.  In many respects the 50% for independence number is an aberration, the highest that has ever been recorded.  One year earlier, the Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation results for the same question claimed 46.6% in favour of independence.  Nonetheless, according to the Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation report: 

This is yet another data point to support our long-established observation that the majority of the Taiwanese public, when offered the options, prefer Taiwan independence above all other options including “status quo”. The narrative that “a majority of Taiwanese want to maintain status quo” is simply a myth that is unfortunately embraced by the current leadership of both major political parties (DPP and KMT) which is not supported by polling data.

 This conclusion eerily echoes the "will of the people" argument which was used to justify the overthrow of the democratically-elected government of Ukraine in 2014.  While the report claims that the survey showed a preference for "Taiwan independence above all other options including "status quo'," we should note that the question asked was a binary--independence or unification--and did not offer "status quo" or any other possibility as an acceptable answer.  In other words, those who answered "status quo" had to ignore and go outside the question to answer.  Given that Taiwan is an island and has been politically dissociated from mainland China since 1949, it is surprising how few Taiwanese chose independence to answer a survey question phrased as it was. 

Diving deeper

What I have been quoting is an English excerpt based on the full survey. The excerpt  claims: "The full release in Chinese language is available on our official website."  Even with the help of Google translate, I was unable to track down the "full release." However, in the course of my attempts, I did discover that the address of the Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation was said to be "2F, No. 170, Fuxing North Road, Zhongshan District, Taipei City" (not Washington, DC).  All the information I read on the website destined for a Taiwanese audience was scrubbed of reference to the USA. 

Survey Says . . . 

Eventually I found another Taiwanese survey on the same question, and this time (as far as I could determine) the organization does seem to be Taiwanese, in Taiwan and under the umbrella of a Taiwanese university: Election Study Center, National Chengehi University.  Unfortunately, access to their data requires a special permission which I do not have.  But I was able to copy this chart (click on the link if you can't read what I copied):

As this graph shows, there are seven possible answers to the "Unification-Independence" question, and the Election Study Center has asked the question every year since 1994.  From 1994 to June of 2022, "Independence as soon as possible" has consistently scored second lowest of the seven possibilities.  Only "Unification as soon as possible" consistently scored lower.  For eighteen years, the Taiwanese have consistently demonstrated that they do not want to be pushed into independence or into unification with China, and they have elected governments which reflect those wishes.  Perhaps this is what should be reported in western media before we find ourselves with another proxy war.

Addendum

 From Reuters:

TAIPEI, Nov 26 (Reuters) - Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen resigned as head of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) on Saturday after her strategy to frame local elections as showing defiance to China's rising bellicosity failed to pay off and win public support.

 

 

 

 

On "Blaming America for Russian Aggression"

 "Eloquent rebuttals"

According to an article in Bulwark entitled "Blaming America for Russian Aggression, Then and Now":

The claim that American actions, especially pushing to enlarge NATO, precipitated Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has been asserted not only by Kremlin officials but also by foreign policy realists, anti-establishment pundits, and “anti-imperialists” in the West. It persists despite eloquent rebuttals by Cathy Young, Chris Miller, Peter Dickinson, former U.S. ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul, and many others.

As a novice, newly self-discovered foreign policy realist now being lumped together with "Kremlin officials," I guess it's time for me to face the truth about what caused the Russian invasion of Ukraine and how the USA was innocent of blame.  How do these articles rebut my recent hypotheses that the USA and western allies supported the overthrow of the democratically-elected President of Ukraine in a bloody coup in 2014 which was "a" provocation if not "the" provocation of the Russian invasion days later?

Niranjan Shankar's "Blaming America" article makes no mention of the Maidan Uprising.  Shankar glosses the time period saying: "Putin forced the country to renege on a proposal to join the EU in 2013 and subsequently invaded in 2014." Obviously, Ukraine is still not a member of the EU.  The suggestion that the 2013 trade agreement (which was signed in 2014, after Maidan) was "a proposal to join the EU" is an exaggeration.  "Putin forced the country" is Shankar's interpretation of the fact that Putin invited Ukraine to join a Eurasian Customs Union and offered a bailout of $15 billion. "Reneged" is a questionable choice of word to describe Yanucovych's decision to end the negotiations and accept the Russian offer when the EU showed little interest in providing a bailout.  

"Putin's Bogus Blame-NATO Excuse"

 Cathy Young's "Putin's Bogus Blame-NATO Excuse" at least mentions the Maidan Uprising.  She writes:

Indeed, the 2013-14 “Euromaidan” protests that led to a new revolution in Ukraine—and to the beginning of Russia’s protracted war against its neighbor—were sparked when Putin strong-armed and cajoled Yanukovych, who succeeded Yushchenko in 2010, into abruptly abandoning an about-to-be signed EU trade agreement and ditching several bills meant to fulfill the EU’s conditions for the pact. 

Young seems to acknowledge a cause-and-effect relationship between Maidan and the Russian invasion but she says nothing more about the uprising.  Her claim that "Putin strong-armed and cajoled Yanukovych" suggests that she was in the room when the strong-arming and cajoling were happening--which seems unlikely.  Yes, Yanukovych "succeeded Yushchenko in 2010" in what she fails to mention was a democratic election, supervised and accredited by the OSCE (Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe).  Consequently, if the great majority of Ukrainians (West and East) objected to Yanukovych and his trade deals, rather than a a bloody coup in 2014, they could have voted him out of office in 2015.

"Vladimir Putin Fears Ukrainian Democracy not NATO"

If Cathy Young sounds like she was in the room, in "Vladimir Putin Fears Ukrainian Democracy not NATO," Peter Dickinson sounds like he was at Putin's bedside recording his every murmur, dream and nightmare.  Like Young, Dickinson suggests cause and effect between Maidan and the Russian invasion.  He argues that Putin responded to the "Ukrainian pro-democracy uprising by ordering the invasion of Crimea and eastern Ukraine." Like Young, Dickinson has nothing more to say about the subject of Maidan.  It is striking that in an article on "Ukrainian Democracy," Dickinson seems undisturbed that the democratically-elected President was overthrown in a bloody coup, and blithely describes the coup as a "pro-democracy uprising." 

"What Putin Really Wants"

 In "What Putin Really Wants"  Christopher Miller has nothing to say about and makes no allusion to the Maidan Uprising that I can detect.  However, Miller makes the kind of claim that always catches my attention:  "The vast majority of Ukrainians reject them [the Minsk Accords]."  The Minsk Protocol was an agreement between Russia and the Ukraine in 2014 overseen by the OSCE and mediated by France and Germany to end the fighting between East and West Ukraine by granting increased autonomy to the eastern regions.  Miller's source for the claim that the vast majority of Ukrainians reject the agreements is an article in Euromaidan Press:  "Three-fourths of Ukrainians oppose Minsk accords in current form, poll shows."

Contrary to MIller's claim that "the vast majority of Ukrainians reject them," the article states, right off the top, that the poll "showed that the majority of Ukrainians (54%) believe that the Minsk accords should be revised." [Bold highlighting is in the original article.]  The debate outlined in the source article concerns variations in the format and which countries should be involved.  Western analysts may be eager to conclude that Ukrainians reject the Minsk Accords, but that is not what the poll shows.

I dove into the poll which is the source for both articles (thank God for Google Translate and BTW, am I the only person in the world who checks the polls quoted in the press?  Help me out here, people!)   The poll being cited is a general survey of the "Socio-political attitudes of the [Ukrainian] population" based on telephone interviews with 2500 respondents in December 2021, excluding residents of the Donbas and Crimea.  Although Miller sounds categorical that the vast majority reject the accords, according to the poll, only 11% of respondents (275 people) said they were very familiar with the content of the Minsk Agreements.  If anything, the poll reflects general support for the idea of the Minsk Accords, ending the east-west conflict, despite differences of opinion on and knowledge of the details.

The mistake is to believe that any thought or feeling is shared by the vast majority of Ukrainians.   According to the poll, if an election were to be held the next day, 23.5% of decided voters would vote for Volodymyr Zelensky--well ahead of his rivals but far from the 100% support we in the West are encouraged to imagine he enjoys.  In the poll, 33% of respondents identified Zelensky as the candidate they would "not vote for under any circumstances."

"What Putin Fears Most" 

Of the four "eloquent rebuttals" Shankar lists, only Michael McFaul's "What Putin Fears Most" has much to say about the Maidan Uprising.  After the predictable list of what Putin thinks, feels, dreams, wants and fears, McFaul and his co-author Robert Person write:

Putin believes that Russian national interests have been threatened by what he portrays as U.S.-supported coups. After each of them—Serbia in 2000, Georgia in 2003, Ukraine in 2004, the Arab Spring in 2011, Russia in 2011–12, and Ukraine in 2013–14—Putin has pivoted to more hostile policies toward the United States, and then invoked the NATO threat as justification for doing so.

Are the authors telling us that these are all Putin-imagined coups and have no connection with reality?  The only example I have researched, "Ukraine in 2013-14," appears to be an overt US-supported coup. If the USA supported the overthrow of the pro-Russian President of Ukraine twice, wouldn't that be a justification for Putin to view NATO as a threat?

The authors describe the Maidan Uprising and its context as follows:

The next democratic mobilization to threaten Putin happened a second time in Ukraine in 2013–14. After the Orange Revolution in 2004, Putin did not invade Ukraine, but wielded other instruments of influence to help his protégé, Viktor Yanukovych, narrowly win the Ukrainian presidency six years later. Yanukovych, however, turned out not to be a loyal Kremlin servant, but tried to cultivate ties with both Russia and the West. Putin finally compelled Yanukovych to make a choice, and the Ukrainian president chose Russia in the fall of 2013 when he reneged on signing an EU association agreement in favor of membership in Russia’s Eurasian Economic Union.

Sometimes, the choice of words is everything.  A bloody coup is a "democratic mobilization";  the billionaire president is a "protégé" and "servant"; "wielded other instruments of influence" like campaign financing (?); to be elected with a margin of the popular vote which would put most US presidential elections to shame is to "narrowly win."  Yes, Yanucovych backed out of the negotiations and was pushed by Russia to do so; but, as reported by Reuters at the time (19 December 2013),  "the unwillingness of the EU and International Monetary Fund to be flexible in their demands of Ukraine also had an effect, making them less attractive partners."

When Person and McFaul come to describe the Maidan, they claim:

To the surprise of everyone in Moscow, Kyiv, Brussels, and Washington, Yanukovych’s decision to scuttle this agreement with the EU triggered mass demonstrations in Ukraine again, bringing hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians into the streets in what would become known as the Euromaidan or “Revolution of Dignity” to protest Yanukovych’s turn away from the democratic West. The street protests lasted several weeks, punctuated by the killing of dozens of peaceful protestors by Yanukovych’s government, the eventual collapse of that government and Yanukovych’s flight to Russia in February 2014, and a new pro-Western government taking power in Kyiv. Putin had “lost” Ukraine for the second time in a decade.

"To the surprise of everyone":  this phrasing stretches credulity.  The size and rapidity of the demonstrations prove advanced planning and, as we have seen, sources inside Ukraine pointed to TechCamps in the US embassy as the training ground if not the hub. "The killing of dozens of peaceful protestors by Yanukovych's government":  as we have confirmed from multiple sources  the protesters were armed, fired on and killed police officers. Most shockingly, if the detailed report based on video, interviews with Maidan protesters, and bullet impact studies, by political scientist, Ivan Katchanovski of the University of Ottawa, is to be believed, the uprising was orchestrated by an alliance of right-wing ultra nationalists who fired upon their fellow protestors.  

Who's Afraid of Democracy? 

It is a truism in literary studies that when writers want to avoid politics they focus on individual psychology.  As I read these detailed comments on Vladimir Putin's psyche, I wonder if these political analysts are trying to avoid politics.  Putin may very well be afraid of democracy, but so are those who preferred a bloody coup in 2014 to a Presidential election in Ukraine in 2015.

"Unlikely Canada": First Quebec and Now Alberta

Does Canada make sense?

Peter Zeihan's 2015 anatomy of world geopolitics, The Accidental Super Power, is fascinating reading largely because of his bold and confident predictions about the near future (2015 to 2030).  I felt both taken aback and vindicated to read his chapter entitled "Unlikely Canada."  I was taken aback to read that my country is unlikely to exist for much longer but vindicated that his rationale echoed an observation I made in a presentation entitled "The Concept Formerly Known as Nationalism" in 2002 at the University of Toronto. I pointed out:

At first glance, Canada doesn’t make sense as a country.  Everything about the country’s social and physical geography suggests that it should not exist.  We live in a country that is three thousand miles long, in which 90% of the population lives within a hundred miles of the American border; the vast territories to the north remain largely unknown to the majority of the population.   We are divided by language, race, ethnicity, gender, by sexual and political orientation, province, region and class.  The urban centres are growing, largely in isolation from one another, while every place else stagnates and shrinks.

My point, unlike Zeihan's predictions of disintegration, was that "Such a place can only be held together through conscious and considerable human effort."  If geography, demographics, economics, provincialism and short-term self interest are allowed to play out uncontested, then Canada's future, as Zeihan claims, is "unlikely."

First Quebec

As a citizen of Quebec, I witnessed the independence movement grow from a fringe terrorist group, the FLQ (Front de libération du Québec), in 1970 to the ruling Parti Québécois in 1976. Through two referendums on independence--1980 (40.44% for; 59.56% against) and 1995 (49.42% for; 50.58% against)--I came to realize how messy, unpredictable and even mercurial democracy and the future of nations can be.

Zeihan's take sounds a lot like the Quebec bashing I'm used to hearing from Anglo Canadians, especially when he describes the federal system of equalization payments as "bribing Quebec" to the tune of $16 billion a year using tax money from Alberta. 

Indirectly, Zeihan makes a point I have unsuccessfully tried to present to my Québécois friends: Canada wouldn't necessarily survive provincial independence. As a Québécois comedian quipped during an early referendum campaign, "According to advocates of independence, Quebec will still have Canadian passports, Canadian money, and the Canadian military. Gee, maybe we're already independent and don't know it!"  

The underlying motivation for Quebec's independence tends to be maintenance of the language, culture and identity; in other words, all the features of ethnic homogeneity while at the same time adamantly denying ethnic nationalism.  The rational justification for independence is that a sovereign Quebec would be a better country than Canada.  I have argued that you can't have a sovereign Quebec and a strong, thriving  Canada; you can't have your Canadian cake and eat it too.  Most Quebec independentists refuse to acknowledge this claim, perhaps because there isn't an exact translation of this expression (French equivalent is, roughly,  "you can't have the money and the butter"), but more likely because French language and culture would arguably fare less well without a Canada, in an expanded USA or as one of a number of Balkanized countries on the US northern border. 

Having outlined in detail how Quebec secession would be the end of Canada, Zeihan then concludes categorically that "the Quebec question is answered. Quebec will not secede and so the question won’t kill Canada." While Zeihan's certainty might reassure some Canadians, we should not lose track of the fact that three of the four parties in Quebec's National Assembly are officially in favour of independence.  In the most recent Quebec election (3 October 2022) the CAQ (Coalition Avenir Québec), led by Bernard Legault, a former PQ (Parti Québécois)  minister, won a commanding majority.  Legault is rightly described as an étapist, adhering to a step-by-step strategy to Quebec sovereignty. His current dominance might well prove a step in that direction.

Party		Elected		Total	Votes	Share
Coalition Avenir Québec		90		90	1,682,952	41.0%
Quebec Liberal Party		21		21	590,171	14.4%
Québec Solidaire		11		11	633,414	15.4%
Parti Québécois		3		3	599,678	14.6%
Conservative Party of Quebec		0		0	530,804	12.9%

The Liberal Party of Quebec, the only federalist party to hold seats, barely managed to form the official opposition by winning seats in and around Montreal and western Quebec.  But the Liberals won less of the popular vote than the independence-minded parties which placed third and fourth on October 3rd.

Now Alberta

I have, in moments of gallows humour, predicted that if Quebec were to leave Canada, it would not be the first province to do so.  It would be third behind Alberta and British Columbia.  Zeihan is humourlessly adamant that Alberta's future is neither to remain part of Canada nor to become sovereign.  Alberta's manifest destiny is to join the USA.

With an unencumbered market for its oil and grain, and an influx of young, highly-skilled American labour, Alberta, according to Zeihan, "as a U.S. state would not simply be rich—the richest in the Union, in fact—but would have a vibrantly well-financed and diverse economy that would put its former (and a lot of its newfound) countrymen to shame."  Zeihan's evidence for Albert's immanent secession was the election of the Wildrose Party as the official opposition in 2012.  The Wildrose Party has since disintegrated but, in recent days, the former leader of the party, Danielle Smith, was elected to lead the United Conservative Party and became de facto Premier of Alberta.  Smith has promised a  sovereign Alberta inside a strong and thriving Canada.  We now have étapist Premiers in both Quebec and Alberta.

 

What Keeps a country together?

Both Zeihan and Tim Marshall display how countries are arbitrary--accidents of history, lines on a map.  Sometimes countries hold together because of geography (mountains, deserts, rivers and coastlines) or economics or religion or ethnicity or military might or a common enemy.  None of these hold Canada together; in fact, they tend to divide us.  I often think of Canada as a poker player who picks up his hand and sees four aces but is reluctant to bet because the guy across the table is smiling like he might have a royal flush.  Canada has everything, now and for the future.  Canada is a really good idea but I am frequently amazed at how difficult it is to sell this idea to Canadians.

The Concept formerly known as nationalism

In my presentation to the Association for Canadian Theatre Research, somewhat tongue-in-cheek for an academic plenary, I said:

I grew up being told that this country was held together by a railway.  The railway was sold because the truth was that in an age of communications the country was really tied together through its public broadcasting system.  As soon as this notion had installed itself, the budgets of the CBC were massively slashed.  Most recently the truism has become that Canada is held together by its distinctive network of social programmes: no sooner said than those programmes are under attack at every level of government in the country.  On the basis of recent history, I am not about to propose that the theatre is or should be a means of holding the country together. 

We need to take a chance and build a unified and independent Canada. And if we are not willing to do that then, at least, let's have an open discussion about why not.

 

Who Do You Believe?

Who Do you believe? 

Recently, a friend gave me a copy of Tim Marshall's fascinating book, Prisoners of Geography:  Ten Maps that Explain Everything about the World. (Thanks Tom!)  In Prisoners of Geography, Marshall claims that "The Germans were involved in the machinations that overthrew Ukraine's President Yanukovych in 2014 [. . .] (102).  Out of curiosity, I googled "Germany involvement Ukraine overthrow."  Two websites came up as most relevant--World Socialist Web Site and Vox Ukraine--neither of which answered my question but they gave rise to another question:  Who do you believe?

What We say is information; what they say is disinformation

The article entitled "The 2014 coup in Ukraine" on the World Socialist Web Site begins:

The background and implications of the 2014 far-right coup in Kiev, which overthrew the pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych, is critical for understanding the current Ukraine-Russia war. This coup was openly supported by US and European imperialism and implemented primarily by far-right shock troops such as the Right Sector and the neo-Nazi Svoboda Party.

It represented the temporary culmination of long-standing efforts by US imperialism to install a puppet regime on the borders of Russia and brought the world a major step closer to a war between the largest nuclear powers, the US and Russia. Ukraine has since been systematically built up as a launching pad for a NATO war against Russia.

The second most relevant URL was a Vox Ukraine article entitled "The Maidan in 2014 is a coup d’etat: a review of Italian and German pro-Russian media."  The article is presented as "fact checking" and offers examples of "fake news" and "the truth" which contradicts this "fake news."

Fake: The Maidan in 2014 is a coup d’etat

Since 2014, the German publication RT.DE has mentioned Maidan in numerous publications as a place where a coup d’etat took place in Ukraine. A number of Italian media outlets, including Viva.it and Glindifferenti, share this view.  [. . . .]

What is the truth?

Allegations of an alleged coup d’etat in the downtown of Kyiv are typical rhetoric of the Kremlin, which thus justifies its own aggression. Putin himself mentions it again and again [. . . .]

The Revolution of dignity [aka Maidan Uprising] has absolutely no signs of a coup d’etat .

 So, Who do you believe?

I have reviewed a number of articles, essays and polls in my modest search for my own modest version of the truth--what is coherent, based on the known and/or agreed-upon facts, and follows logically.  The challenge is to separate fact from opinion and, more importantly, fact from spin.

The Agreed-upon facts

Despite the semantic debate, hyperbole, the divergent characterization of the various agents, the word choices and loaded vocabulary, and the inclusion or exclusion of particular details, a number of agreed-upon facts do emerge:

1. The President of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych, was overthrown in 2014. 
2. Over one hundred people were killed in the process of overthrowing Yanukovych.   
3. The USA supported the overthrow of Yanukovych. 
4. The demonstrations, protests and eventual overthrow occurred when Yanukovych withdrew from a trade agreement with the EU. 
5. What happened in 2014 and how it is interpreted matter:  they affect how we understand the war in Ukraine today.

Interpretations and Spin of the agreed-upon facts 

I can immediately imagine individuals disputing these "facts," suggesting alternative "facts," or dismissing these five facts as irrelevant.  However, based on my reading, these five facts are agreed-upon, self-evident, and unchallenged by both sides of the debate.  I highlight both sides to immediately point out that I am not talking about a Russian side or a Ukrainian side or a US side or a NATO or European or Communist or Democratic side.  There is a divergence of opinion in each of these cohorts and I immediately dismiss claims that "this is what all Ukrainians think" or "this is what all Russians think" or "this is what all Americans think."  The "sides" in this case are those that claim a coup in 2014 and those that deny a coup in 2014.  I have written on this blog that the evidence of a coup seems strong, even obvious and overt.  The fact that I now see significant effort to deny that the Maidan Uprising was "a coup" tells me that the question of a coup is an important one.   

1. The President of Ukraine was overthrown. Deniers of a coup will add that Yanukovych was a powerful oligarch, corrupt, a Russian puppet and showing signs of becoming a dictator.  What deniers leave unsaid is that Yanukovych was democratically elected.  Yanukovych's election was overseen by "Observers from the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) [who] said there were no indications of serious fraud and described the vote as an 'impressive display' of democracy."

2. People died in the overthrow.  According to the National Memorial to the Heavenly Hundred Heroes' description of the "Revolution of Dignity," the Maidan began with 1500 protestors, mostly students, but grew to hundreds of thousands in response to Ukrainian security forces' beating some of the students. The National Memorial reports that 

On the 61st day of Maidan, at the place of protests, the first two activists were shot. As at that moment, there were already two dead outside the places of confrontation. It was around a month when the power structure tried to clean up the city centre from protesters.

Only in the night of 22 February 2014, President Yanukovich escaped to Russia by using a charter jet. The amount of 108 victims of the Revolution of Dignity was officially determined. Most of the Heroes of the Heavenly Hundred died from fire wounds on 20 February 2014.

According to Wikipedia's "List of people killed during the Revolution of Dignity," there were 130 victims.  The Wikipedia list includes 18 police officers.  BBC news video reports show protestors being fired upon and police being fired upon by protestors.

3. USA supported the overthrow.  Over the last eight years, the USA's support for post-2014 Ukraine has been displayed in increasingly bold and frequent headlines.  We know that under both presidents Biden and Trump the USA has sent tens of billions of dollars in military aid to Ukraine. We know that within weeks of the February 2014 overthrow, the Director of the CIA, John Brennan, was in Ukraine.  Two months after the overthrow, Vice-President Joe Biden was in Ukraine to give a press conference with the American choice to lead the government, Arseniy Yatsenyuk, and to promise Ukrainians on behalf of the USA, "we’re in the struggle for your very future." We know that individuals from both the US government and the CIA have praised CIA collaboration in Ukraine.  But what about in February 2014 and earlier?  We know about the infamous Nuland/Pyatt telephone conversation planning the post-overthrow government and power structure before the overthrow happened.  And, of course, we know that Nuland and Pyatt made themselves available for various photo-ops with the Maidan demonstrators and the eventual over-throwers.  We also know of complaints in the Ukrainian parliament in 2013 about TechCamps being run in the US embassy in Kyiv to promote civil unrest.  In this context, what truly surprises me is that in the various denials of a coup I have read there is no mention of the USA or American involvement.

4. Uprising began when the President withdrew from a trade agreement with the EU. Withdrawal from a trade agreement seems an insufficient cause for the chaos and bloodshed which followed.  Clearly the failed negotiations of the trade agreement provided a context for the uprising but what were the underlying reasons?  One side argues that in addition to being friendly with Moscow, Yanukovych was making moves toward dictatorship enforced by his security apparatus.  The other claims that the uprising was a power grab spearheaded by ultra-nationalist Neo-Nazis.  Neither of these claims is a sufficient explanation for the sudden large-scale uprising. Both sides blame the other for the escalation in violence and bloodshed.  Both sides were prepared to use deadly force and eventually did.  

As a Canadian, I try to imagine a similar situation here, and there are some parallels between Canada and Ukraine.  Like Ukraine, Canada is often geopolitically divided between east and west.  More specifically the independence movements in the Donbas and Crimea are at least superficially similar to Quebec's aspirations for greater autonomy and even sovereignty.  In Canada, we have come to accept that in order for a Prime Minister and his party to be elected, they must have support in French-speaking Quebec.  As reported in the New York Times, President Yanukovych and his Regions Party depended on strong support from Ukraine's eastern provinces in order to be elected.  As in Canada, language tensions are a constant feature of Ukrainian politics.  28% of Ukrainians speak Russian, most living in the eastern regions; 22% of Canadians speak French, most living in Quebec.  The difference I see is there has, historically, been a strong movement to make Ukrainian the national language to the detriment of Russian and other minority languages.  Western Canadians may not always like it but, for the most part, have come to accept the French language and asymmetrical power-sharing with Quebec as facts of life in Canada.

Am I suggesting that the Maidan Uprising can be understood as a language issue?  Absolutely not.  I am suggesting a myriad of causes--no single one being sufficient-- which coalesced around the EU trade negotiations with the catalyst of US support and encouragement.

5. What Happened in 2014 matters

Denials that the events of 2014 constituted a coup are frequently based on a semantic argument.  For example, the National Memorial article entitled "Why the Revolution of Dignity is not a coup d'état" offers this list of conditions for a coup:

– unconstitutionality;
- violent character;
– a small number of organizers and participants;
- seizure of power as the main goal.

5.1 Unconstitutionality. At face value, the events of the Maidan Uprising satisfy each of these criteria.  However, the article argues that the overthrow of the democratically elected President was constitutional on the grounds that "the only source of power in Ukraine is the people."  The argument echoes Vice President Joe Biden's speech of 22 April 2014, "that all Ukrainians can agree on the core idea that government exists to serve the people.  The people do not exist to serve the government." It is, of course, a slippery claim that "the people" have the constitutional right to overthrow the elected government, especially for President Joe Biden, as he now presents the counter argument in the context of the January 6 attempts to overthrow the election results in the US.

5.2 Violent character. In denying the violent character of events, the National Memorial claims that 

The violent actions of the authorities forced the protesters to use means of self-defense, mostly homemade shields, helmets, batons, and "Molotov cocktails." Therefore, the use of self-defense by protesters was forced, provoked by the criminal actions of those in power [ . . .].

However in a paper entitled "The 'Snipers' Massacre' on the Maidan in Ukraine" presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association in 2015,  Ivan Katchanovski of the University of Ottawa concludes

[ . . .] that the massacre was a false flag operation, which was rationally planned and carried out with a goal of the overthrow of the government and seizure of power. [The study] found various evidence of the involvement of an alliance of the far right organizations, specifically the Right Sector and Svoboda, and oligarchic parties, such as Fatherland. Concealed shooters and spotters were located in at least 20 Maidan-controlled buildings or areas. The various evidence that the protesters were killed from these locations include some 70 testimonies, primarily by Maidan protesters, several videos of “snipers” targeting protesters from these buildings, comparisons of positions of the specific protesters at the time of their killing and their entry wounds, and bullet impact signs.

In the detailed evidence and analysis of his 80-page report, Katchanovski makes a brief reference to the fact Globe and Mail reporter Paul Waldie was in the Hotel Ukraine, a stronghold of the Maidan protestors, during the massacre, and witnessed protestors carrying guns which were used to kill police and, according to Katchanovski, their fellow protestors in order to discredit the government.  In his report for the Globe and Mail, "Globe in Kiev: Yanukovych regime’s hold is shaken after a deadly day," Waldie recounts that

Some protesters had guns as well and at least one could be seen taking aim at officers. A group of protesters, some carrying guns, also rushed into the hotel in the morning to get a better vantage point to attack police across the street. At least 37 people died, with some reports putting the figure as high as 70. Several hundred were also wounded.

In the body of his study, Katchanovski claims that Maidan protestors were the first to use deadly force, i.e. "live ammunition": "analyses of various sources of evidence indicate that the cease-fire agreement was broken by the Maidan side in the early morning, when small groups of armed protesters started to shoot from the Music Conservatory building with live ammunition [. . . ]." 

5.3 A small number of organizers and participants. For deniers of a coup, the "Revolution of Dignity" (aka Maidan Uprising) was the will of the great majority of the Ukrainian people.  For example, both Vox Ukraine and the National Memorial claim that over 8.5 million Ukrainians, 20% of the population, took part in protests against the government during the Revolution of Dignity.  The evidence for these numbers is a poll carried out in Ukraine in October 2014.

According to a sociological poll conducted in October 2014 by the Ilko Kucheriv Foundation for Democratic Initiatives, about 20% of Ukraine’s population, more than 8.5 million people, took part in peaceful rallies. The poll showed that most citizens perceived participating in the protests as a conscious struggle for their rights.

However, the poll being referred to  did not claim "8.5 million people took part in peaceful rallies" nor did it show "that most citizens perceived participating in the protests as a conscious struggle for their rights." According to the poll data,11% of the 2,025 respondents (i.e., 223 people) claimed to have "participated in Euromaidan events" and 9% "helped the protestors" in some way. Given the context of the survey within celebrations of the Revolution of Dignity, it is perhaps more striking that 81.6% of interviewees responded "I did not participate."

Contrary to the claim that "The poll showed that most citizens perceived participating in the protests as a conscious struggle for their rights," the poll actually showed that 37.9% shared this perception and the great majority of them were from Western Ukraine; i.e., 70.5%.  According to the poll (being cited by coup deniers), 31.2% of respondents perceived the Euromaidan/Revolution of Dignity/Maidan Uprising to be a "coup d'état."

What, in your opinion, was Euromaidan? Regional differences

	West	Center	South	East	Donbas	Ukraine in general
A coup d'état carried out with the support of the West	2.4	5.3	14.2	15.4	50.7	15.5
A coup d'état to be prepared by the political opposition	5.5	12.8	19.4	24.4	21.4	15.7
Spontaneous protest of the population	17.3	17.9	21.8	21.6	7,8	17.2
Conscious struggle of citizens united to protect their rights	70.5	47.9	20.1	22.3	3.2	37.9
HARD TO TELL	4.3	15.8	16.6	16.2	16.6	13.8

 

5.4 Seizure of power as main goal.  In denying a coup, the National Memorial claims that the goal of the Maidan Uprising was not "seizure of power" but "the signing of the Association Agreement with the EU."  The claim is followed by a list of idealistic ambitions almost none of which were achieved following Maidan.  The "seizure of power" may not have been the intended goal in everyone's mind, but we know with certainty that the major figures behind the Maidan did come to power in the aftermath:  most notably, Petro Poroshenko became President, Arseniy Yatsenyu became Prime Minister, and Vitali Klitschko became Mayor of Kyiv.

And, of course, what is left out of denials of a coup is the role of western governments.  As outlined in the Globe and Mail, 20 February 2014--"Canada imposes new sanctions on senior Ukrainian officials"--Canada, the USA and the EU had shown their strong support for the Maidan Uprising in advance of the overthrow of the Viktor Yanukovych government.  Whatever your opinion of Maidan as a coup or not, we can agree that understanding the war means understanding Maidan.