Home Alone in Ukraine in the age of Trump

KIEV — Channel-surf through Ukrainian television during the holiday season and you’re bound to come across a rerun of the classic Christmas film “Home Alone.”

The slapstick comedy — whose soundtrack, coincidentally, includes a song, “Carol of the Bells,” by a Ukrainian composer — ranks among the 10 most watched films in Ukraine, and local friends consistently rate it as their “favorite” holiday flick.

It may seem an odd choice. But Ukrainians empathize with Macaulay Culkin’s character Kevin, who’s left alone to protect his home against ruthless criminals and forced to improvise clever gags to keep them at bay. For centuries, Ukrainians have had to defend themselves against rapacious outsiders, and channel their ingenuity to secure their borders.

In the ongoing war with Russia in eastern Ukraine, the country’s cash-strapped Air Force decided to breathe life into an ancient Soviet An-26 cargo plane lying idle in an aviation museum for military transportation in the war zone. There were even stories about tanks from World War II being refurbished for use on the front lines.

It’s this resourcefulness and determination against all odds that aligns the underdog Ukrainians with the “Home Alone” film series.

But this winter the films also have a darker subtext: Donald Trump’s election has jeopardized the country’s strategic friendship with the United States, and Ukraine now finds itself, quite literally, home alone for the first time since its 2014 “Euro” revolution.

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Given Trump’s call for mutual cooperation with Putin’s Russia, many Ukrainians now fear that they will be pushed under the bus and left to fend for themselves against Russia.

“Trump’s arrival means no one will keep giving money to Ukraine for beautiful promises and kleptocrats’ tears over the ‘Maidan ideals,'” Serhiy Leshchenko, a prominent lawmaker, wrote on Facebook recently.

A selection of front pages of the biggest Ukrainian national newspapers, following Donald Trump’s shock US presidential victory | Sergei Supinsky/AFP via Getty Images)

Even Europe, which encouraged Ukraine’s pro-European revolution, has grown wary of supporting a country that hasn’t moved fast enough to implement reforms and weed out corruption.

Earlier this month, the EU extended sanctions against Russia until July 2017, despite growing opposition from many European nations, including Italy and Hungary. But it is unclear whether they will be extended again next summer, and though Europeans have agreed to grant Ukrainians visa-free access to the border-free Schengen zone, the deal is far from finalized.

An EU agreement that would establish closer ties between Europe and Ukraine, meanwhile, was kiboshed by Dutch voters in a referendum in April. The Dutch parliament may now be able to override voters and ratify the deal after the EU released a statement specifying the agreement “does not confer on Ukraine the status of a candidate country for accession to the Union, nor does it constitute a commitment to confer such status to Ukraine in the future.”

The EU’s blunt words have thrown cold water on Ukraine’s hard-fought dream for eventual membership of the European community.

“There’s now great anxiety and concern among the general population about Ukraine’s future,” says Mykola Dieleskov, an analyst at the Kiev-based Institute of World Policy.

Even Poland, formerly Ukraine’s strongest ally within Europe, has turned inward under its new right-wing government, and has little inclination for helping Ukraine. Instead, Polish nationalists have chosen to focus on the massacre of more than 100,000 Poles by Ukrainian nationalists during World War II, thus rupturing relations between the two “friendly” nations.

And although the Baltics have remained steadfast in their support for Ukraine, they have little clout in Brussels.

“Ukraine is going down the tubes,” says an American friend, who has moved to Moscow. “They should have stuck with Russia instead of dreaming about Europe.”

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Still, being home alone does have its advantages. Just look at Kevin, with his booby traps and childish ingenuity. For Ukraine, the silver lining is that the loss of external support may force the government to push through painful reforms and finally clean up its house on its own.

“The election of Donald Trump might be a good thing for Ukraine,” says Dieleskov. “There will be more pressure to reign in the oligarchs and fight corruption now.”

Other business friends in Kiev echo the sentiment: Without Uncle Sam holding its hand and the promise of easy money, Ukraine will have to learn to take care of itself. That might be a good thing for a government that has been reluctant to stick its neck out to implement difficult reforms.

In the era of Trump, Ukraine will have to prove that it’s worthy of support from the West, instead of taking its goodwill for granted.

The recent nationalization of the country’s largest bank, Privatbank, is a sign that the government is taking the initiative. By moving quickly, the government prevented the collapse of the massive lender — riddled with bad debts — and also clipped the wings of Igor Kolomoisky, the bank’s former oligarch owner, who has been a constant thorn in the government’s side and has now reportedly emigrated to the U.S.

People take part in a rally in Dnipropetrovsk organised by oligarch and former regional governour Igor Kolomoisky | Genya Savilov/AFP via Getty Images

The recent law on e-declarations, which forces lawmakers to declare their assets, also shows that Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko is taking the fight against corruption more seriously.

Still, there’s no denying it is scary to be home alone. The Ukrainian Army says it lost five troops late December in an aggressive rebel attack near the strategic town of Debaltseve in eastern Ukraine, the most serious flare-up in fighting in the past several months.

The upsurge in hostilities in the country’s war-torn East indicates rebels and their Kremlin backers feel emboldened by Trump’s victory. And it’s quite possible that a slackening in American support for Ukraine will encourage Vladimir Putin to grab more territory in the country’s East, especially the port city of Mariupol.

Even in the best-case scenario, Ukraine would be forced to legitimize Russia’s presence in the country by approving the controversial law on a “special status” for the breakaway republics in the East.

With reports in the media that some schools in Ukraine will be closed in early 2017 because of a shortage of natural gas for heating, the country faces a long, hard winter ahead.

The reruns of “Home Alone” on Ukrainian television will, if nothing else, add some much-needed cheer during the holiday season.

The second film in the classic trilogy, “Lost in New York,” does include a nasty segment, however: A cameo by the president-elect in his landmark Plaza Hotel. “It’s down to the hall and to the left,” a younger Trump says, directing a lost Kevin to the bathroom.

Will President Trump be as accommodating to Kiev, if it loses its way?

Vijai Maheshwari is an American journalist and entrepreneur based in Kiev.