On August 1, 1991, a little more than three weeks before Ukraine declared independence from the Soviet Union, US president George H.W. Bush arrived in Kyiv to discourage Ukrainians from doing it. In his notorious “Chicken Kiev” speech in the Ukrainian parliament, Bush lectured the stunned MPs that independence was a recipe for “suicidal nationalism”, “ethnic hatred” and “local despotism”. The speech was a colossal blunder. Ukraine’s people were being ...