In a reaction to my recent post, somebody posted this ignorant reply…

In reality, Ukraine is a part of Russia that was estranged by centuries of Western imperialism that took advantage of Russian weakness following the Mongol invasion. It was not a strange, distant land with an exotic culture, and unintelligible language like India was to Britain. It was a country with the same religion, where the people spoke a patois composed of Old Russian and Polish, the latter also being a language related to Russian. Finding differences between Greater Russia and Ukraine boils down to pointless and petty Borscht and Vodka wars.

As far as I am concerned, successive Russian rulers acknowledged this cultural difference of the Ukrainians and allowed them a share of autonomy. What however happens following such acts of kindness and understanding is the Ukrainians develop an enmity to the Greater Russians, and get consumed by betrayal and hatred for their kin to the East.

In fact, an opinion has it that if the Ukrainians ever abandoned their hatred for the Muscovites, they would seize to exist because Russophobia is their only raison d’être. Unfortunately, the Russians cannot tolerate a culture that acts like constant irritant to their state. According to many observers, Ukrainian nationalism would inevitably lead to a war with Russia. These observations have been made 100 years ago, and 30 years ago, and 15 years ago too. It is a perennial problem that stems out of the nature of the Ukrainian nationalism itself.

If Russia is waging a war to defend Russian speaking, pro-Russian Ukrainians from Ukrainian radical nationalists then how is this imperialism? Honestly, today’s Russia would much rather see Ukraine that accommodates all people and doesn’t engage in Russophobia but the fate ruled otherwise.