烏克蘭革命亂成一團 仍值得支持

Most politicians try to say something uplifting when they take office. Arseniy Yatseniuk took a different approach. Accepting the post of interim prime minister of Ukraine in February, his opening words were: “Welcome to hell.”

大多數政客在就職時會試圖說一些鼓舞士氣的話。阿爾謝尼•亞採紐克(Arseniy Yatseniuk)則沒有這樣做。今年2月，他在接受烏克蘭臨時總理一職後的開場詞是：“歡迎來到地獄。”

Sitting in Mr Yatseniuk’s office in Kiev late last week, I asked him if the job had proved as hellish as anticipated? The prime minister, a gaunt 39-year-old, removed his glasses and rubbed his face wearily. “Worse,” he said. “We face the Russian military, Russian-backed terrorism, the economy is insolvent, our own military has been dismantled, the police are disorientated. The last government stole everything they could.”

上週末尾，在亞採紐克位於基輔的辦公室裏，我問他，這份工作是否如預想的那般恐怖？這位39歲、一臉憔悴的總理取下眼鏡，疲憊地揉揉臉，說：“比預想的還可怕。我們面臨俄羅斯軍隊和俄羅斯支持的恐怖主義，經濟崩潰，我們自己的軍隊遭到解散，警察士氣渙散。上一屆政府把一切能偷走的都偷走了。”

The day after our conversation, the Ukrainian government responded to this desperate situation by launching an offensive to retake buildings and territory in the east of the country that had fallen under the control of pro-Russian separatists. The authorities in Kiev felt that if they did not fight back, they risked losing the eastern half of their country by default.

談話次日，針對這種令人絕望的境況，烏克蘭政府發起了攻勢，開始收復烏克蘭東部被親俄分裂主義者攻佔的大樓和領土。烏克蘭當局覺得，如果不回擊，他們可能會眼睜睜失去東部那半邊國家。

But the fighting in towns such as Slavyansk and Donetsk carries its own risks. The large number of civilian casualties, particularly in Odessa, further west, opens the government in Kiev to charges of brutality. The fact that much of the fighting is between Ukrainians feeds into the Russian narrative – that Ukraine is a deeply divided country, many of whose citizens look to Russia for protection. Above all, the fighting risks giving Russia an excuse to send troops into Ukraine, under the guise of a “peacekeeping mission”.

但在斯拉維揚斯克(Slavyansk)和頓涅茨克(Donetsk)這樣的城市作戰，本身也有風險。大量平民傷亡，特別是在更靠西的敖德薩(Odessa)，讓烏克蘭政府面臨被控實施暴行的風險。戰鬥雙方多爲烏克蘭人，這給了俄羅斯口實；俄方聲稱烏克蘭內部嚴重分裂，許多烏克蘭公民指望俄羅斯提供保護。最重要的是，開戰可能爲俄羅斯提供藉口，讓其能夠打着“維和行動”的旗號向烏克蘭出兵。

The Ukrainian government knows that it would lose a conventional war with Russia, whose military is larger and better-equipped. Russia also has an air superiority of more than 80:1. The Ukrainians would like Nato to declare a “no-fly zone” over their country, in the event of a Russian invasion. But that is a daydream. The Americans are not going to shoot down Russian jets.

烏克蘭政府知道，與俄羅斯打常規戰，自己肯定會輸；俄軍的規模更大、裝備也更精良。俄羅斯的空軍實力也爲烏方的80倍以上。烏克蘭希望，如果俄羅斯入侵，北約(Nato)能宣佈烏克蘭上空爲“禁飛區”。但那是白日做夢。美國人是不會動手打俄羅斯飛機的。

The Russian parliament has already pre-authorised an invasion of Ukraine and a large Russian army is hovering on the Ukrainian border. But what does President Vladimir Putin want? Mr Yatseniuk argues that “Putin has no limits . . .  He wants to become the emperor of a new type of Soviet empire.”

俄羅斯議會已經預先批准入侵烏克蘭，大量俄軍正在烏克蘭邊境集結。但俄羅斯總統弗拉基米爾•普京(Vladimir Putin)到底想要什麼？亞採紐克稱，“普京沒有底線……他想成爲一種新型蘇維埃帝國的皇帝。”

But many in Kiev still find the thought of a full-scale Russian invasion hard to credit. When I asked Victor Pinchuk, one of Ukraine’s richest and most internationally connected businessmen, if Russia might seek to go all the way to Kiev, he rolled his eyes and said “science-fiction”. An alternative theory is that Mr Putin simply wants to create enough chaos in Ukraine to prevent a presidential election, planned for May 25 – as well as thwarting any thought of Ukraine moving closer to the EU.

但基輔的很多人仍然不相信俄羅斯會全面入侵。維克托•平丘克(Victor Pinchuk)是烏克蘭最富有、與國際聯繫最爲緊密的商人之一。當我問他，俄軍是否會一路攻入基輔時，他轉了轉眼睛，說，“天方夜譚”。另外一種說法是，普京只不過想在烏克蘭製造足夠的混亂，以攪黃計劃於5月25日舉行的總統選舉，並挫敗烏克蘭進一步向歐盟(EU)靠攏的任何企圖。

But the military aspect is just the most high-profile part of the struggle for Ukraine. The government in Kiev also needs to win a propaganda battle and a war on corruption.

但軍事問題只不過是烏克蘭面臨的困難中最顯眼的部分。烏克蘭政府還需要打贏一場輿論戰和一場反腐戰。

The Russian media is pumping out the message that the government in Kiev is run by “fascists” and anti-Semites, who are said to be the direct descendants of those Ukrainian partisans who fought with the Nazis against Josef Stalin’s Soviet Union. That message has been widely transmitted in eastern Ukraine and has also found an audience in parts of the EU. But Ukrainian Jews, some of whom are serving in the Kiev government, are unconvinced. When I put the allegations of fascism and anti-Semitism to Mr Pinchuk, Ukraine’s most prominent Jewish businessman, he replied, succinctly: “It’s bullshit.”

俄羅斯媒體大肆宣稱，烏克蘭政府掌握在一羣“法西斯主義者”和“反猶分子”手中，這些人據說是當年與納粹一道、跟約瑟夫•斯大林(Josef Stalin)領導的蘇聯打仗的那部分烏克蘭人的後代。這種說法在烏克蘭東部廣爲流傳，在歐盟一些地方也不乏聽衆。但烏克蘭籍猶太人並不相信這種說法，他們中的一些也在烏克蘭政府中任職。平丘克是烏克蘭最知名的猶太商人。當我向他轉述有關烏克蘭政府法西斯主義和反猶的說法時，他簡潔地答道：“胡說八道。”

What is true is that the red-and-black flag of wartime Ukrainian nationalism is very visible on the barricades that still remain on Kiev’s Independence Square. When I asked some of the demonstrators, clad in military fatigues and camped under the flag, why they were still on the streets, one replied: “To make sure that the new government does not steal the money that is coming from the IMF.”

千真萬確的則是，基輔獨立廣場(Independence Square)的路障還在，上面仍有非常顯眼的黑紅相間的旗幟，那是二戰期間的烏克蘭民族主義象徵。我問一些穿着軍服、在旗幟下紮營的抗議者，爲什麼還在這裏抗議，其中一人的回答是：“爲了確保新政府不會偷走國際貨幣基金組織(IMF)給的錢。”

That concern seems reasonable enough. A point that the governments in Moscow and Kiev actually seem to agree on is that Ukraine has been miserably misgoverned by a succession of corrupt and kleptocratic governments. Mr Yatseniuk is generally regarded as straight. But, even as the country faces the prospect of civil war or invasion, there are still interim ministers who, with remarkable single-mindedness, are said to be intent primarily on stealing.

這種擔憂看上去合情合理。俄羅斯和烏克蘭政府事實上似乎都同意的一點是，烏克蘭不幸地受到一屆又一屆腐敗盜賊政府的糟糕統治。人們普遍認爲亞採紐克還比較正直。但即便在國家面臨內戰或入侵的情況下，有一些臨時官員據說仍然一門心思打算撈一筆，這種冥頑不靈簡直令人難以置信。

The image of a corrupt, chaotic and divided Ukraine – killing and robbing its own citizens – suits the Russian government very well. If Russia can convince the outside world that Ukraine, which only gained independence in 1991, is not really a “proper” country, it will be much easier to dismember.

烏克蘭給外界的腐敗、混亂和分裂印象，包括殺害和搶劫它自己的國民，正中俄羅斯政府下懷。如果俄羅斯能說服外界相信，1991年才獨立的烏克蘭，其實不是一個“合格”的國家，那麼分裂烏克蘭將變得容易得多。

So it is important to remember some basic facts. While there clearly is a cultural divide between eastern and western Ukraine, 91 per cent of the country’s citizens voted to be an independent nation in 1991, with a majority in all regions. Millions of Ukrainians died in the Stalin-imposed famines of the 1930s, which gives modern Ukrainians good grounds to be suspicious of Russian offers of “protection”.

因此，記住一些基本事實很重要。儘管烏克蘭東部和西部存在明顯的文化差異，但在1991年，該國有91%的公民投票支持烏克蘭成爲獨立國家，並且獨立在烏克蘭的所有地區都取得了多數人的支持。上世紀30年代，數百萬烏克蘭人在那場斯大林造成的饑荒中死亡，這讓現代烏克蘭人有充分理由對俄羅斯提出的“保護”打個問號。

When thousands of Ukrainians demonstrated in Kiev earlier this year – and more than a hundred died – they were not demanding a “fascist” government. Instead they were calling for an end to corruption and for eventual membership of the EU. Those goals are both worthy and attainable. Amid all the current chaos and violence, they still deserve support.

今年早些時候，數千名烏克蘭人在基輔抗議，一百多人在抗議引發的衝突中喪生。那時他們要求的並不是一個“法西斯”式政府。相反，他們要求的是終結腐敗、並最終加入歐盟。這兩個目標是值得實現的，並且可以實現。儘管目前局面混亂不堪、充斥着暴力，他們仍值得支持。