I don’t know what the country will be like in ten years. The last 35 have shown that predictions in our country do not come true.
Every time we look back, we are tempted to describe the path taken as the only possible one. History seems like a logical line connecting our yesterday with our today. But if a time machine allowed us to return to the past, no one would believe our description of the future.
Imagine you return to the summer of 2013. You say that in a few months the country will be engulfed in protests. That security forces will kill more than a hundred people. That Maidan will win, Yanukovych will flee, and Russia will seize the chaos to annex Crimea.
You will talk about the start of the ATO in the country. That Russians will shoot down a passenger ‘Boeing.’ But at the phrase “and the former president of Georgia will head the Odessa region,” your friends will call an ambulance. The only thing you will be able to do in the summer of 2013 is buy dollars at eight.
You might argue that the Russian invasion separates current us from pre-war us. That it reshaped our perception of what is permissible. That the annexation of Crimea and the invasion of Donbas changed Ukraine and Ukrainians. And that after February 2014, it became much easier for us to face reality.
Then imagine the time machine takes you to the summer of 2016. And you start telling friends that Nadiya Savchenko, who has just been released from a Russian prison, is not who they think she is. Then you can tell acquaintances who will become the next president of the country. You can even turn on the TV and show them the future head of state. After that, your friends will call an ambulance again.
You can go further and imagine fate takes you to the summer of 2021. And you suggest to your loved ones to guess who the West will declare as the face of freedom and symbol of democracies’ struggle against dictatorships next year. Hint one — it’s a president. Hint two — it’s not the President of the USA. And once again, they will suggest calling an ambulance because only those who read European headlines in 2022 could believe the image transformations of the Ukrainian president.
We often search in our past for the crossroads that separate recent us from current us. The watershed after which the future stopped surprising us. The point of phase transition after which events began to seem logical and natural. But the thing is, such a point does not exist. Our heroes and antiheroes switch places. Our reality refutes our past predictions. There is no sense in us traveling to the past, because no one there will believe us.
In 1991, those who aspired for freedom and democracy voted for Chornovil, while those who wanted a revamped USSR voted for Kravchuk. In 1994, supporters of freedom voted for Kravchuk, and proponents of the USSR voted for Kuchma. In the second round of 1999, Ukraine’s supporters voted for Kuchma, and their opponents voted for Symonenko. Our country is one of tricksters. Every hero is on the border, and you never know whose side they will take at a critical moment in history. Perhaps yours.
Predicting ahead is a privilege of countries on a set course, whose trajectory is clearly visible. But Ukraine is a ship in a storm. Our future depends on how well we do our homework, and also on hundreds of thousands of factors beyond our control.
We do not know who will win the next elections. Not only because they are possible only after the war, and we don’t know when it will end. The point is also that war acts as an anesthetic for society — it brings us the unity we see in the polls. The end of the war will plunge us back into our usual disputes and divisions. Post-war, we will be as different from our current selves as we are now from our pre-war selves.
Our post-war reality will depend on how we view the scenario of ending the war — as a victory or a defeat. Victory is inclusive — it can have many parents, and under its umbrella, there is a place for everyone. Those who fought and those who paid taxes. Those who stayed and those who left. With defeat, everything is precisely the opposite — it immerses the country in frustration, makes us look for culprits, and leads to “Orbanization.” That is why, if Russia cannot defeat us on the battlefield, it will do everything to convince us it has won.
We do not know what our streets will look like after the war. How many new accents and skin tones will be on them. Our depopulation will require us to make difficult decisions, and we will have to choose between migration and a half-empty country. Our future challenges will generate discussions that we do not even think about now because we are too preoccupied with survival.
We do not know what the future holds for NATO. Once, we dreamed of membership in this organization. And over the past four years, our country has managed to destroy the Soviet tank force created for a dash to the English Channel. In a situation where the strongest army on the planet seems ready to turn away from Europe, the only hope for it remains the strongest army on the continent — ours.
We do not know what the future holds for the USA. For decades, we were accustomed to seeing them as a beacon of democracy and a role model. Yet, over the last two years, we’re getting used to the idea that there are no adults in the room anymore. The only adults are us.
The only thing the last 35 years can teach us is that we can surprise ourselves. Circumstances are not static, people change, coincidences disrupt plans. Sometimes I even envy the conspiracy theorists because in their worldview everything is predetermined. But in reality, our world is governed by black swans.
It’s just that in our country, the black swans are us.
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