Reportedly, the current phase of what some describe as an American “imperial presidency” has irreversibly upended the post World War II global order – strategically, politically, economically, and militarily, affecting international alliances and partnerships.
International power structures have shifted from a largely “unipolar” system under the aegis of the United States of America toward an emerging “multipolar” configuration. This reflects an age-old dictum that “nations have no friends, only interests.” A complementary observation holds that “leaders do not make a nation; rather, a nation makes its leaders.” Both ideas apply broadly across states, including Russia and the United States.
In this context:
- Russia’s apologists and fellow travellers argue that the Russian people as a whole should not be held responsible for the war of aggression against Ukraine, attributing responsibility instead to Vladimir Putin’s regime.
- Similarly, America’s apologists claim that the current internal “deconstruction” of the country, political strain and foreign policy setbacks should not be attributed to the American people, but to the administration of Donald Trump.
- Nevertheless, the reality is that to varying degrees, societies “produce” their leaders, just as the Russian electorate enabled Putin’s rise, and portions of the American electorate supported Trump. Russians “made” Putin, just as the American voters “made” Trump.
Shifting perceptions of U.S. reliability
The current situation also reveals the fickleness of the USA and a long-standing question about the reliability of the United States as a global partner. Throughout the 20th century and into the first quarter of the 21st, U.S. foreign policy has at times been perceived as inconsistent, leaving affected nations to manage the consequences of abrupt strategic shifts. Critics attribute this to a limited sensitivity to different civilizational, cultural, political, and security contexts – perhaps shaped in part by the country’s geographic security and its sense of “exceptionalism.”
Key historical reference points cited in this argument include:
- The post-World War I settlement, the first partitioning of Europe, and the marginalisation of Ukrainian aspirations in the Versailles-era order (1919)
- U.S. diplomatic recognition of the Soviet Union in 1933 during the Holodomor (genocide by famine) period in Ukraine
- Post-World War II arrangements made at Yalta (1945), which consolidated Soviet Russian dominance over Central and Eastern Europe
- Later Cold War crises, including the betrayal of Hungary’s national uprising (1956) and Czechoslovakia’s Prague Spring (1968)
- The strategic and tactical failures in Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Georgia (Caucasus), and now the Iran (the Middle East) quagmire ensnaring the Middle East
- The musings to “annex” Canada and Greenland, and to “take over” Venezuela, Cuba, Panama and the Strait of Hormuz.
All of the above points to a string of costly interventions, regardless of the political party in power at a given time in the USA.
Reportedly, Winston Churchill once complained that “Americans can always be trusted to do the right thing, once all other possibilities have been exhausted.”
Ukraine and Western support
With respect to Ukraine, U.S. assistance in resisting Russian aggression has been significant but, at various stages, hesitant, delayed or incremental, which affected battlefield dynamics and overall strategic effectiveness.
These concerns are further complicated by the current U.S. political environment and President Trump being clearly beholden to Russia and its leadership controlled by Vladimir Putin – a war criminal, but who, according to current American peacemakers is a “humanitarian”. This has prompted concerns about the direction of U.S. foreign policy and its implications for NATO cohesion and transatlantic relations.
The New York Times (May 15, August 23, 2026) published an update on the “Autocracy Index” outlining markers of democratic erosion in the USA, including bypassing the legislature, stifling speech and dissent, persecuting political opponents, defying courts, declaring false emergencies, using the military domestically, vilifying marginalized groups, controlling information, pressuring universities, cultivating personality cults, using public office for private gain, and manipulating legal frameworks to remain in power. These indicators have contributed to wider discussions about institutional resilience in established democracies. And to all of this we may add political, military and economic blackmail bordering on extortion, as a medium for achieving foreign policy objectives. Reportedly, among these objectives, attempts are underway at partitioning the world into three “spheres of influence” under the aegis of the “humanitarian” trio, namely America’s Trump, Russia’s Putin and communist China’s Xi.
As for Mr. Trump and his minions, who, acting like a Kremlin asset by openly embracing Putin along with his narrative about Moscow’s war on Ukraine, have recently declared that “Russia, frankly, has been fine on Ukraine” (NYT, 25 October 2026). What an ignominious moral and political depravity laced with arrogance and vulgarity!
Such an unhinged domestic political environment in the U.SA. intersects with the influence of hostile foreign actors, including long-standing assertions of Russian “active measures” against the West. In the EU and NATO countries hybrid tactics – including cyber operations, disinformation, targeted sabotage and assassinations – have been documented as part of broader attempts to disrupt military and political support for Ukraine.
Europe’s evolving security architecture and Ukraine’s role
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, building on the earlier phase of the war beginning in 2014, has exposed structural weaknesses in European security and Western political cohesion. In response, European states have increasingly reassessed their defence posture and strategic autonomy.
Analysts argue that Europe may require a more adaptive collective security framework, whether through a reformed NATO or a complementary structure, potentially involving additional frontline partners such as Ukraine, Georgia, and Armenia. The European Political Community, including meetings such as the one held in Yerevan with participation from Ukraine and Canada, is cited as a possible foundation for such an evolving architecture. Moreover, the EU leadership has recently proposed establishing a new leadership body – the European Security Council – that would include non-EU partners in Europe like Great Britain, Norway, Ukraine and Canada.
Measures are being implemented for:
- strengthening European defence capabilities;
- expanding deterrence frameworks, including the role of France and the United Kingdom’s nuclear capability;
- providing long-term security for Ukraine.
Other proposals that are gaining traction refer to Ukraine’s pre-1994 nuclear status. While Ukraine was pressed to relinquish its inherited nuclear arsenal under the Budapest Memorandum framework, the renewal of its tactical nuclear capability would go along way in terms of security. Nowadays common wisdom has it that a nuclear-armed Ukraine would have prevented the current Moscow hybrid onslaught against Ukraine and the Western world.
Ukraine’s armed forces, shaped by years of high-intensity warfare, along with its rapidly developing defence technologies and societal resilience, have positioned the country as a significant actor in European security. Its experience is increasingly viewed by partners as strategically relevant to the future defence architecture of the continent.
Concluding perspective
As columnist David French wrote in The New York Times (28 April 2026):
“While America is still the world’s most powerful nation and it remains (for now) in NATO, it is rapidly forfeiting its role as the leader of the free world… But you cannot threaten the free world and lead it at the same time… For the first time in my adult life, the moral and strategic heart of the defence of liberal democracy doesn’t beat in Washington. It doesn’t beat in London or Paris or Berlin or Ottawa, either. It’s in Kyiv, where a courageous leader and a courageous people have picked up the torch America has dropped.”
From this perspective, Ukraine is increasingly seen not only as a frontline state in a military conflict, but also as a central actor in the evolving political and security identity of Europe and the broader democratic world.
Russia is a criminal imperial state led by criminal elites. Lasting security for Ukraine, Europe, and the wider international system will ultimately depend on the establishment of a stable post-imperial balance in which Russian aggressive revisionism is no longer tolerated in international relations. And this will come to pass only when the Kremlin – as the seat and symbol of Moscow’s imperial brutality – is no more.
Oleh Romanyschyn, PhD
League of Ukrainian Canadians
National Executive
P.S.
On 14–15 June 2026, Moscow struck the historic Ukrainian religious and cultural landmark in Kyiv, the 11th-century Kyievo-Pecherska Lavra (Kyivan Cave Monastery) Historical and Cultural Preserve, a UNESCO World Heritage Site spanning approximately 22 hectares. The complex includes, among other sacred structures, the 11th-century Dormition Cathedral of the Kyivan Cave Monastery. Over its long history, the site has suffered repeated destruction and loss, including extensive looting of its antiquities and relics during the Soviet period in Ukraine, as well as the mining and destruction of the Dormition Cathedral in 1941, followed by its later reconstruction. According to reports, the renewed attack brought fresh damage to a site of profound spiritual and cultural significance. President Volodymyr Zelensky described the strike as “one of the largest Russian crimes against Christian culture.” On July 19, 2026, a Russian ballistic missile struck the premises of “Konvi”, one of Ukraine’s largest printing companies, destroying over 600,000 books and textbooks belonging to different Ukrainian publishers. In recent months, Russian bombardments targeting Ukraine have destroyed approximately 15 million newly published books, nearly half of the country’s annual book production, according to The New York Times (September 26, 2026). Such incidents have further intensified international concern over the protection of heritage sites during armed conflicts and has reinforced calls for accountability under international humanitarian law.
Indeed, what Moscow has not looted from Ukraine over the centuries, it endeavoured to destroy in its persistent, yet ultimately futile, attempts to erase Ukrainian identity: religious temples, museums, archives, architectural and cultural landmarks, ancient archaeological sites, monuments, libraries, bookstores, publishing houses and printing facilities, the venerable National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine – all integral to Ukraine’s civilizational landscape, heritage and national memory.
