UKRAINE INDEPENDENCE OR COUNTRY 404?
Dr Petrus de Kock / Buiteboer
24 August, 2026
I – History, or, contested territory?
It had a dramatic beginning, and, going by the morbid economic, social, political and military phenomena unfolding in Ukraine today, its end might be just as dramatic.
Ilya Stukanov writes, “On August 24, 1991, two days after the collapse of the anti-Gorbachev coup plot by communist hardliners in Moscow, Ukraine’s Supreme Soviet declared independence from the USSR.”
After a short history as independent post-Soviet nation, the Ukraine has made a mark on its region, and world politics, for all the wrong reasons. This, especially following on the western backed, sponsored and instigated Maidan coup of 2014, after which the Ukrainian state turned its tanks, howitzers, and Nazi militias on the eastern regions of the country that refused to recognise the new regime in Kiev. Even more controversially, following on the Maidan coup, laws started emerging that banned the use of the Russian language, efforts continuing till this day with the most recent new such legal measures taken in 2025.
Upon rewinding time with more than a thousand years, a seminal moment came with the Baptism of the Rus, in 988, and conversion of the Slavic world to orthodoxy. The latter positioned Kiev as pivotal in the evolution of the Russian state, culture, and empire.
At the time of 988, the Kyivan Rus constituted the most powerful political force in the region, and Kiev, its capital, served as a crucial political and cultural hub. But, however deep the roots of Russian culture, history and tradition might run through the streets of Kiev, the post-2014 regimes in Ukraine have been trying to airbrush all traces of Russian language, culture, and religion from what had by then become the hotly contested territories of the country.
As the world clock moves to another 24 August, with to be expected outpourings of pro-Ukraine Russophobic propaganda to mark its independence, the question is, what is Ukraine’s history, but that of contested territory?
III – Enter the proxy war site beggar state
In 2007, at the Munich Security Conference, President Vladmir Putin delivered a famous speech, still recalled today by close observers of the evolution of Russian foreign policy, and its military-security posture in the region. At the time he indicated, regardless of western assurances at the time of the dissolution of the Soviet Union, that NATO powers should desist from expanding into former Soviet territories.
The historical encroachment of NATO and the EU continued apace, with Ukraine ultimately becoming the site of hot proxy war between Ukraine and, arguably, the collective west. None of this would of course be possible for the Ukraine on its own, lacking the industrial base, population, and economy to sustain war on Russia, it is totally reliant on continuous financial, materiel, and political support from what at Blindspot we call – Club Western World.
Sputnik International recently presented some sobering numbers in terms of Ukraine’s economic outlook and debt burden. Some key points include:
- Ukraine’s external state debt mushroomed 24-fold since Euromaidan in 2014
- Ukraine’s Ministry of Finance indicates that by the end of 2013 – before the coup that toppled then-President Viktor Yanukovych – the country’s external state debt was $6.71 billion.
- As of June 2026, this figure had grown 24 times, to $166.04 billion
- The country’s external debt continues to soar: in June of this year alone, it increased by $1.76 billion
- External debt stands at 78.5% of total state debt
- Over-all state debt (internal and external) in 2013 stood at about $13.08 billion. But by June 2026, debt had increased 16.2 times, exceeding $211.6 billion
Since the onset of the Russian SMO in Ukraine, the USA alone has allocated $182 billion in emergency aid to the country. Approximately 68% of these funds went to the US Department of Defence for, obviously, military aid and support. Not only is the Ukrainian economy shattered as a result of its territory being used as proxy war site (by Club Western World), but, its population decimated.
On the latter subject, upon gaining independence in 1991, the Ukraine inherited significant industrial, mining, and agricultural capabilities. The potential wealth of the country lies in its fertile soil, its resources, and industry. However, even before the Maidan coup, and especially since then, Ukraine has been recognised as one of the most corrupt countries on the planet, implying also, the the potential riches of the country has been squandered, partly through corruption, and partly through ongoing warmongering against Russia.
The ongoing financial, materiel, and political support Ukraine receives from the west underlines but one fact, which is that as the country ‘celebrates’ independence in 2026, there is not much to celebrate, seeing that its state, society, military forces, are all completely beholden to, dependent on, and sold out to western mega investment firms such as BlackRock.
IV – The population bomb
The State Statistics Service of Ukraine estimates that in 2022, before the Russian SMO, Ukraine had a population of +/- 41 million (including Russian speaking regions of east Ukraine). By 2026 the UN estimates the population to be 36.7 million, however, this number is disputed.
The fact remains that a state of active war with the Russian Federation, ongoing refugee flows out of the country, and significantly mounting losses on the battlefront, has plunged Ukraine into a population crises. In West European countries, moves are afoot to send Ukrainian males of military age back to the country to feed the meat grinder frontlines. The cynical joke that emerged at the onset of the SMO seems to hold true, being that Club Western World will fight Russia till the last Ukrainian.
The population bomb has exploded, and demographically the country is imploding. This evidently has severe consequences for any planner or politician in Kiev (or London, Paris, Brussels and Berlin) imagining that the country can withstand an ongoing, and indefinite war of attrition with the Russians!
V – Enter country 404
As the world gets entertained by the spectacle of another celebration of Ukrainian independence, the error code, 404 ‘Not Found’ should be considered.
With Ukraine stepping up terror strikes on targets in Russian territory, as it extends its terror into North and west Africa to support (with France) Islamist forces fighting against Malian government troops and Russian Africa Corp deployments, as it tries to insinuate itself into the confrontation with Iran by bombing Iranian vessels on the Caspian Sea, as Ukraine continues bluff, bluster, and bomb its way to an impossible victory, perhaps the controversial idea of Ukraine as Country 404, NOT FOUND on the world map, is not such a far fetched idea as espoused by former Russian President, Dmitry Medvedev.
The stated objectives of the Russian Federation’s SMO in Ukraine include, among others – the de-Nazification, de-militarisation and neutral status. With the latter meaning no NATO or EU ascension for the Kiev regime. As noted earlier, Vladmir Putin’s 2007 address to the Munich Security Conference laid out the framework according to which the Russian Federation engage with encroachment upon its borders.