The Eurasia Foundation, USAID, and US meddling in Ukraine

[starroute]

There was a thread posted here yesterday which quoted an article in the Guardian as denying that neo-fascists played any significant role in the protests that toppled the Ukrainian government. (http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/mar/13/russian-propaganda-ukraine-fascist-protesters-euromaidan?CMP=twt_gu)

The assertions in that article were so much at odds with what I've been reading about the protests for months that I decided to check out the credentials of the author, one Olexiy Haran. It turns out that he's a vice president of the Eurasia Foundation, so I responded on the thread with a quote from the Wikipedia article on that group, which describes it as a front for Western corporate interests. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurasia_Foundation )

Since then, I've been checking through my saved filed for mentions of the Eurasia Foundation and I've come up with some extremely interesting material that seems to demand a thread of its own. For example, here's a 2004 Washington Post article by a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution that denies assertions of US meddling in that year's Orange Revolution in language virtually identical to what is being said currently:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A15131-2004Dec20.html

December 21, 2004

Events in Ukraine have inspired most people living in the free world. Ukrainian democrats stood together in the freezing cold to demand from their government what we citizens of democracies take for granted: the right to elect their leaders in free and fair elections. But not all observers of Ukraine's "Orange Revolution" are so elated. Instead of democracy's advance, some see a U.S.-funded, White House-orchestrated conspiracy to undermine Ukrainian sovereignty, weaken Russia's sphere of influence and expand Washington's imperial reach. These skeptics range from presidents Vladimir Putin of Russia, Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus and Hugo Chavez of Venezuela to Republican Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, columnist Patrick Buchanan, and left-wingers in the Nation and the Guardian.

This odd collection of critics is a little bit right and a whole lot wrong.

Did Americans meddle in the internal affairs of Ukraine? Yes. The American agents of influence would prefer different language to describe their activities -- democratic assistance, democracy promotion, civil society support, etc. -- but their work, however labeled, seeks to influence political change in Ukraine. The U.S. Agency for International Development, the National Endowment for Democracy and a few other foundations sponsored certain U.S. organizations, including Freedom House, the International Republican Institute, the National Democratic Institute, the Solidarity Center, the Eurasia Foundation, Internews and several others to provide small grants and technical assistance to Ukrainian civil society. The European Union, individual European countries and the Soros-funded International Renaissance Foundation did the same.

However, the most interesting thing I came across was an item from 2007 at the Moon of Alabama blog that looked into the connections of the Foundation for the Future, where Paul Wolfowitz's girlfriend, Shaha Riza, was then employed.

http://www.moonofalabama.org/2007/04/wolfowitz_cia_l.html

Before she came to the World Bank in 1997 Shaha Riza worked at the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a Reagan legacy, which through intermediaries is funding democratic regime changes and US friendly foreign political parties. According to rightweb:

"NED’s chairman is Vin Weber, who along with current NED board member Francis Fukuyama and former board members Paula Dobriansky and Paul Wolfowitz (both of whom joined the Bush II administration in 2001), signed the founding statement of the Project for the New American Century." . . .

The Foundation for the Future was installed with some $35 million seed funds from the U.S. State Department, some $10 million from Bahrain and $11 million from various other state donors. . . . That address and suite is identical to the address of the Eurasia Foundation. . . .

The Eurasia Foundation's task is to support Democracy movements in former Soviet Union states. Its executive committee includes luminaries like Albright, Baker, Eagleburger and Frank C. Carlucci III of The Carlyle Group (Carlucci has been on the NED Board of Directors). It is financed by the United States Agency for International Development. USAID has been and probably is still used as a cover for CIA operations.

There are a couple of points of interest here. One is that the Eurasia Foundation is funded by NED, USAID, and the State Department. Another is that its job since at least 2004 has been to meddle in former Soviet republics while denying and obscuring the fact that it's doing so.

And a third is the mention of Paula Dobriansky -- former NED board member, PNAC signer, and Bush State Department official. Paula is the daughter of the late Lev Dobriansky, a Ukrainian-American who after World War II did more than anyone else to rehabilitate Ukrainian Nazi supporters. Here's a recent article by Max Blumenthal that highlights his connection to the pro-Nazi Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists:

http://www.salon.com/2014/02/25/is_the_us_backing_neo_nazis_in_ukraine_partner/

Many surviving OUN-B members fled to Western Europe and the United States – occasionally with CIA help – where they quietly forged political alliances with right-wing elements. “You have to understand, we are an underground organization. We have spent years quietly penetrating positions of influence,” one member told journalist Russ Bellant, who documented the group’s resurgence in the United States in his 1988 book, “Old Nazis, New Right, and the Republican Party.”

In Washington, the OUN-B reconstituted under the banner of the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America (UCCA), an umbrella organization comprised of “complete OUN-B fronts,” according to Bellant. By the mid-1980’s, the Reagan administration was honeycombed with UCCA members, with the group’s chairman Lev Dobriansky, serving as ambassador to the Bahamas, and his daughter, Paula, sitting on the National Security Council. Reagan personally welcomed Stetsko, the Banderist leader who oversaw the massacre of 7000 Jews in Lviv, into the White House in 1983.

“Your struggle is our struggle,” Reagan told the former Nazi collaborator. “Your dream is our dream.”

When the Justice Department launched a crusade to capture and prosecute Nazi war criminals in 1985, UCCA snapped into action, lobbying Congress to halt the initiative. “The UCCA has also played a leading role in opposing federal investigations of suspected Nazi war criminals since those queries got underway in the late 1970’s,” Bellant wrote. “Some UCCA members have many reasons to worry – reasons which began in the 1930’s.”

So there are a number of threads here, ranging from the relatively benign Neocon connections to something far deeper and more pernicious. There is also a consistent pattern of smoothly written propaganda that goes back over many years.

I think most of us are aware that anything coming out of Russia should be taken with a grain of salt, but we're far less discriminating when it comes to articles from people with apparently legitimate credentials that appear in Western media. That strikes me as a mistake -- particularly when it comes to smoothly written denials of the fascist element in Ukraine. This is one case where Putin's propagandists likely have more facts on their side than our own.

[2naSalit]

1. Huh

Why am I not surprised?

[joshcryer]

2. The Michael McFaul fellow reiterates what I've been saying:

Ex-ambassador McFaul says US has worst-case scenario plan for Ukraine

...

He also described President Putin's decision to protect the Russian-majority republic of Crimea as purely emotional, rather than rational.

McFaul suggested the move could damage Russia's plan to build a strong Eurasian Union because if this scenario plays out, "you have made sure that the rest of Ukraine will never have any interest in joining a Eurasian Union."

"It's important for people to remember that his most important foreign-policy objective is to create the Eurasian Economic Union as a counter to the European Union. Critical to the success of that object was to have Ukraine in the economic Union, not Crimea but all of Ukraine," he opined, adding that any Russian action in Crimea will dishearten Kiev and make any agreements between Ukraine and Russia highly unlikely.

...

McFaul also defended the Obama administration's "reset" policy, which he himself had put on track, saying that the intention was to "engage with Russia to seek agreement on common interests." He said the focus should be on actions, rather than words, and pointed out a number of breakthrough achievements, including a fresh batch of sanctions against Iran, the New START nuclear reduction treaty and the Northern Distribution Network to Afghanistan.

http://voiceofrussia.com/news/2014_03_11/Ex-ambassador-McFaul-says-US-has-worst-case-scenario-plan-for-Ukraine-7545/

[Catherina]

3. Great post Starroute. I hope it gets more attention n/t

[starroute]

4. Thanks

At this point, I don't expect it will -- but I'll keep trying to get these connections out there whenever the same line of neoliberal arguments pop up again.

[Catherina]

5. People are too busy ironing their curtains to pay attention

In a couple years, when it all goes south, everyone will pretend they weren't fooled by the neoliberals and fought them. Bullshit.

Thanks for trying.

[malaise]

6. Excellent post

Get thee to the greatest page.