Political Infighting Could Complicate War with Russia by David Ignatius

Political Crossfire In Ukraine, Political Infighting Could Complicate War with Russia

By David Ignatius

On the eve of what could be a Russian invasion, Ukrainians appear united against the threat from Moscow – but also battling among themselves for political advantage in Kyiv. The political infighting is one more liability for a disorganized democracy up against a ruthless authoritarian state.

Concern about Ukraine’s fractious internal politics prompted a delegation of American diplomats to visit Kyiv late last month to show support for Ukraine – and appeal to President Volodymyr Zelensky to meet with opposition politicians and form a unity front. He refused, at least for the time being, apparently worried that his rivals might exploit his concessions.

William B. Taylor, a former U.S. ambassador to Kyiv, represented the group of former U.S. envoys who visited Zelensky on January 31 on a trip organized by the Atlantic Council. Despite the current impasse, Taylor told me last week that “if the Russians come across the border, I am confident that they [opposition politicians] will rally around Zelensky.”

Ukraine’s struggle for political unity is a reminder of its fragility in what’s likely to be a continuing confrontation with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Ukraine is long on patriotic fervor but short on internal organization – at once a vibrant democracy and a country manipulated by wealthy oligarchs. It’s “Western democracy” in its most disheveled form.

Ukraine’s array of feuding politicians, backed by rival oligarchs, marks the biggest political difference with Putin’s one-man show in Moscow. “In Russia, by 2004, Putin and his former KGB co-workers had effectively neutralized the [Russian] oligarchs, ensuring that Russia’s economy and politics were completely under their purview. In Ukraine, in contrast, this did not happen,” writes former ambassador Marie Yovanovitch in a revelatory new memoir, “Lessons From the Edge,” which will be published next month.

The internal drama in Ukraine is worth examining now, before there’s an outright Russian invasion, because it shows the fault lines and cleavages that Putin might seek to exploit. While Ukraine’s political fabric is frayed, its recent history shows that its people are surprisingly tough and resilient in countering Russian attempts to manipulate their country, which have been almost constant since 2004.

If Zelensky and other Ukrainians appear less agitated about the Russian invasion threat than U.S. officials, it’s partly because Kremlin pressure has been a chronic condition – something people have learned to live with. Ukraine defied Russia in the “Orange Revolution” that brought a pro-Western president to power in 2004; in the Maidan Square “Revolution of Dignity” that drove a pro-Russian president from office in 2014; and in the past eight years of armed resistance to Russia-backed rebels in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine.

Putin’s attempt to suppress this pro-Western drift in Ukraine has only deepened his unpopularity there. Ukrainians disagree about many things these days, but they appear united in their dislike of Putin.

Zelensky might be the world’s most unlikely president. He’s a television comedian who came to power in 2019 after his show, “Servant of the People,” captured the nation’s imagination. He played an idealistic schoolteacher who is elected president after a student posts a viral video of him denouncing corrupt oligarchs. Ukrainians adored the show, with Zelensky’s wisecracks about local pols and even a swipe at Putin that got the show banned from Russian TV.

It’s a measure of Ukrainian idealism that a whopping 73 percent of the country voted to make him a real-life president. Inevitably, he had an oligarch backer of his own, billionaire Ihor Kolomoisky, who owned the 1+1 TV station that broadcast “Servant of the People.” (The genially manipulative Kolomoisky was known as “Special K” within the U.S. Embassy, according to Yovanovitch.)

Zelensky’s biggest rival now is probably his predecessor, former president Petro Poroshenko, a billionaire candy-maker who also has a media empire. Another player is Rinat Akhmetov, a controversial billionaire who owns Ukraina, perhaps the country’s most influential TV station.

Russia is unpopular, even among Ukrainian oligarchs. When I met Poroshenko this past month in Kyiv, he alternated between blasting Zelensky for mismanaging the confrontation with Putin and pledging that he would join a unity coalition to save the nation. But rather than drawing his rivals into a unity alliance, Zelensky has attacked them – accusing Akhmetov of plotting a coup in November and placing Poroshenko under investigation in December. That might have made good TV, but it’s unwise now.

It falls to Zelensky, the former comedian, to confront the stone-cold menace of Putin. But Zelensky isn’t strong enough to do this alone. He needs help, and he can get it at home and abroad if he’s willing to put national unity first. In the real-life version, as in the TV show, people want the good guy to win.