Maidan

Here's a clue: Millennium Challenge Account, or MCA.

There has in fact been a lot of up and down on the US side regarding line-item foreign aid budget to Ukraine -- despite compelling and overwhelming imperatives following the Orange Revolution that demand by all moral precepts that Ukraine is the most deserving country on Earth for first, primary focus of US foreign aid budget.

But there is a little secret but not-so-secret in the background.  US House of Representatives were first to bring to public light that Ukraine deserves this money, and Yushchenko followed on in a very, very rare address to joint session of US House and US Senate during the first week of April 2005.  Here is the secret/not secret: the US has a reserve account of FIVE BILLION DOLLARS PER YEAR set aside as a line-item budget to support emerging democratic/market reforms.  

Two weeks ago, for the first time in history, some of this money was finally approved for -- Macedonia.  While Macedonia may be deserving of a slice of this money, there is no more deserving country in the world for this particular US aid than Ukraine.

US House of Representatives have already said so, US Senate agrees.  US President Bush can only follow and agree with US House and Senate that Ukraine deserves special consideration for this aid budget.  This money is entirely, completely separate from the paltry USAID budget being argued for Ukraine, which is fluctuating between about US$30 million and US$115 million for this year.  MCA is the budget account that I've had in mind all along, and have discussed with business colleagues from Kyiv and Warsaw,  as the go-to funding on the US side to underpin democracy and market development in Ukraine.  I�ve said in this forum that half a billion dollars over four years should be appropriate and sufficient � a small fraction of MCA funding.  Moreover, I and others have already developed a game/business plan that will guarantee two things, already agreed by US Embassy-Kyiv as of two years ago as being a viable plan:

1-Poverty reduction throughout Ukraine, which according to Kyiv Post�s May 5 print edition, page 5, is President Yushchenko�s top priority




2-Economic stimulus in Ukraine that has only one possible outcome, to boost Ukraine�s economy and move Ukraine closer to her potential as an economic powerhouse

US$125 million a year for four years will get the job done, for every oblast throughout Ukraine.  This is a microscopic fraction of the MCA budget, and can be put to no better use than in Ukraine as has already been suggested by the US government and reminded to them by President Yushchenko.

Sometimes, we Americans get things very, very wrong.  I won�t mention any particulars here.  Sometimes, we are also capable of getting things right, and channeling a fraction of the MCA budget to Ukraine will prove to be one those occasions where we can actually get foreign policy right.

Only one addition and amendment, however, from my point of view: US$250 million a year for the next four years, instead of US$125 million per year, for a total US investment of one billion dollars over four years, and Ukraine will be transformed into THE leading example of emergent democracy in the world.  If freedom and democracy are what Bush is really seeking, as he is claiming lately, he needs only to agree with his US Republican-controlled Congress to prove it.

The basic plan has been in place, and already approved by the US side under the Bush administration, for two years now, pending elimination of corruption from the top down in Ukraine.  Elimination of corruption was my requirement � to which I had every right under US law, in that I wrote the plan � and I beg the forbearance of my US colleagues along the way of getting that done. To be absolutely clear on this particular point, it was Ukrainian citizens and their steadfast refusal of corruption in Ukraine that made ALL the difference. We Americans at best only encouraged, but the millions of peaceful protesters in November-December 2004 were Ukrainian citizens. So let's make no mistake as to how the Orange Revolution happened, and why: it was the heart and soul of Ukrainians, though perhaps encouraged by others in this world who value freedom and democracy -- which happens to include many of us born and raised in the US. In that sense, I humbly and respectfully suggest as an American citizen that it is now time for solidarity in principle of freedom and democracy with citizens of Ukraine, in more than words and congratulatory rhetoric.

Ukraine has now kept her part of the bargain.  Now it�s time for the US to step up and do our part.  One billion dollars over four years is one-twentieth of MCA total budget over four years, and cannot possibly be put to better use than in New Ukraine.  Further, a billion dollars is the same amount we�re now spending in, say, Iraq, each week.  I won�t go into the successes, or lack thereof, of those expenditures there.  But I will remind the US side that right is right, and there is no more righteous case to be made than investing in Ukraine�s new democracy, under terms and conditions which were agreed more than two years ago on condition that corruption not come into play. US Embassy-Kyiv, US Embassy's Economic Section, and US Ambassador to Ukraine know exactly what I'm talking about, as does the newly-cleaned government in Crimea -- as well as some recently discharged officials in Crimea's government who learned the hard way that corruption has no place in today's Ukraine.