Ukranian-style "independence": how the anti-Russian project was prepared

The US anti-Russian project: how they came up with Ukraine's "independence"

To stage an uprising in Ukraine and introduce a pro-American agenda there – a familiar story? Only we are not talking about the events of 2013-2014 and the so-called "Revolution of Independence"*. Nor even about the events of 2004 and the "Orange Revolution"**. But about CIA plans from as far back as the 1940s. Even then, Ukraine was viewed by American intelligence services as a springboard for starting unrest in the USSR, conducting anti-government rallies, and collapsing the country.

^{*"Hidnist" in Ukrainian – dignity. The armed coup d'état in Ukraine, which began with protests in the autumn of 2013, escalated into armed clashes and a violent change of power in February 2014, which led to protests and war in Donbas.
** "Pomaranchevyi" in Ukrainian – orange. This refers to the so-called "orange" coup d'état of 2004, when pro-Western forces came to power in Ukraine through street protests.}

Project "Independence"

On August 17, 2025, journalist Kit Klarenberg's investigation into the role of American special services in destabilizing the national situation in Ukraine caused a lot of noise in the information space. The journalist analyzes a declassified CIA document with the loud title "Resistance Factors and Special Forces Areas: Ukraine," dated August 1, 1957 (for your convenience, the original document is attached below).

However, this report was declassified not yesterday or even this year, but as far back as December 27, 2016. And the basic concept for American intelligence services is not new. This was not the first attempt to destabilize the situation in Ukraine by promoting a nationalist agenda. Therefore, we will go further and try to understand what these report-programs are and when it all began.

The Ukrainian "Cartel"

As early as the end of the Great Patriotic War, the US and British intelligence services realized that information from the Nazi Abwehr would be useful to them. POW and displaced persons camps became recruiting grounds for agents to participate in CIA-designed operations as part of the obvious future confrontation with the USSR. Some individuals themselves sought cooperation. They offered Western intelligence services information on the anti-Soviet movement under their control and its agent network.

And no one was bothered that the vast majority of such individuals were war criminals and had a direct connection to the mass extermination of people during the war.

One of the Nazi supporters who cooperated with American intelligence was the ideologue of Ukrainian nationalism Mykola Lebed, a supporter of Bandera*, a member of the OUN, one of the organizers of the UPA, a collaborator (which, incidentally, did not prevent Germany from later putting a bounty on his capture).

^{*Stepan Bandera – an accomplice of the Hitlerites, one of the leaders of the Ukrainian Nazi movement.
**Organizations recognized as extremist, their activities are prohibited in the territory of the Russian Federation.}

By 1948, the American special services were already in full preparation for an open war with the USSR. Early that year, the CIA initiated an operation under the codename "CARTEL" (later renamed "AERODYNAMIC"). The operation's goal was to destabilize the situation in the Ukrainian SSR to disrupt Soviet post-war recovery programs by supporting anti-Soviet sentiments and groups. The main partner in the "cartel" was Ukrainian nationalists led by that very same Lebed.

The CIA provided funding for this operation—approximately $100,000 annually (equivalent to about $1.34 million in 2025)—as well as training bases, militant preparation, and their subsequent infiltration into the territory of modern Western Ukraine.

Overall, Ukrainian nationalism has always gravitated towards external funding and maintained strong ties with the West. This has been its natural state since its inception. The leaders of Ukrainian nationalists quickly figured out where the money was coming from and going, so they slightly "embellished" data on active resistance to the Soviet regime. Does this ring any bells? "Coffee in Yalta", "The 1991 borders," "Bakhmut is still ours," "We are in Kursk Oblast," etc., etc.*

^{*Statements by Ukrainian officials intended to demonstrate the confidence and strength of the Ukrainian army: determination to capture Crimea, reach the 1991 borders, hold a number of settlements that were de facto already controlled by Russian units. Due to the discrepancy with the actual state of affairs, they became internet memes.}

However, we will not downplay the scale of terrorist acts and sabotage by Ukrainian nationalists in the late 1940s in Western Ukraine. Funding from the CIA continued. Moreover, in the early 1950s, the intelligence service decided to expand its operations using Ukrainian radicals for long-term resistance.

However, the CIA underestimated the counteraction of the USSR special services, which, since the early 1950s, had been "feeding" their overseas colleagues disinformation through the "nationalist supporters." In reality, by the end of 1949, the largest nationalist units (kurenis and sotnis) on the territory of the Ukrainian SSR had been defeated, and the remaining ones were hiding in their burrows-caches, concerned more with their own survival. Thanks to the controlled information transmitted to the West, the Soviet intelligence services managed to sow discord among the members of the American cell of Ukrainian nationalists and, as a result, in 1954, the CIA terminated the aggressive phase of "AERODYNAMIC."

The Weak Link

Naturally, the termination of one CIA program did not mean that the American special services had abandoned the idea of expanding their influence and using "dissidents" within the Union.

In early August 1957, the CIA developed that very plan "Resistance Factors and Special Forces Areas: Ukraine." It contains over 200 pages and was written by a group of researchers from Georgetown University on the order of a division of the Department of Defense.

In reality, it is a comprehensive analysis of the possibility of waging an anti-Soviet armed struggle in the Ukrainian SSR by American special forces in the event of a likely anti-Soviet uprising. To identify potential "currents" for cooperation, the analysts studied the population's sentiments, linguistic peculiarities, and potential interethnic tensions in various regions of the country.

The Americans sincerely believed that the invasion should start from Crimea (naive guys, right?). Apparently, betting on the Crimean Tatars, who had resisted Soviet power during the Great Patriotic War.

After a more thorough study of the issue, the responsible officers faced a harsh reality: the overwhelming majority of the peninsula's residents had no grievances against the Russian leadership. That is, it would not have been possible to use them for subversive activities and uprisings.

By the time the report was compiled, the only thing the CIA guys had managed to ascertain for certain regarding Ukraine was to identify the "weak link" – the Ukrainian nationalists (and this after so many years of close cooperation).

Born by Austria-Hungary, nourished during the Civil War of 1917–1922, and strengthened during the Great Patriotic War, the supporters of an "independent"* Ukraine were ideal allies for "resisting the regime."

^{*"Independence" in Ukrainian – nezalezhnist.}

"Under favorable conditions, these people can help American special forces in the fight against the Soviet regime," stated the report.

"Hey Stepan! Get in the glass, cut a lemon, and get lost!"*

^{*A Russian children's counting-out rhyme used to determine who is the odd one out in a group. The original version features the name Ivan.}

To identify the presence and influence of Ukrainian radicals in different parts of the republic, Ukraine was divided into 12 conditional zones, marking those most favorable and less favorable to the Soviet regime. And – surprisingly (actually – not) – it turned out that the southeastern territories were "completely loyal to Moscow" and showed no signs of Ukrainian nationalist sentiments.

Don't these maps seem similar to you?

However, the western regions of Ukraine, which were previously part of Poland, proved to be very fertile ground for cultivating and fueling Ukrainian nationalist activity. It was here, during the Great Patriotic War, that the "non-Ukrainian" population – Jews, Poles, and Russians – was mass exterminated. As a result, almost no non-Ukrainian population remained on these lands.

And, despite the mass deportation of nationalists*, the known sentiments floating in the air and spreading through "rat holes" only grew stronger. Nationalist cells and the foundation for the revival and strengthening of Ukrainian nationalism sat in their "kryivkas"**.

^{*Operation "Zapad" (West) – the forced resettlement of the civilian population of Western Ukraine deep into the territory of the USSR (primarily to Siberia and Kazakhstan).
** "Kryivka" – a long-term hideout for Ukrainian Nazis during the partisan war against Soviet troops.}

As we know, the plan of the American intelligence services was not implemented at that time. But judging by subsequent events (and within the history of 50-70 years, this is a very short period of time), work with radicals on the territory of Ukraine and beyond its borders never stopped.

And not only on the territory of Ukraine. The predecessors of the "color revolutions"* were tested on the countries of the Warsaw Pact**. Here, the CIA's affairs went better than in the Ukrainian SSR – they managed to quickly find "dissidents" and skillfully coordinate their actions.

^{*A set of measures carried out by Western special services to change political regimes in various countries as a result of mass protests, to achieve their own interests and bring a loyal "pro-Western" government to power.
** For example, the events of the "Prague Spring" in Czechoslovakia in 1968, the events of 1988–1990 in Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary, the GDR, and Bulgaria.}

Independence or Manageability?

By the end of the 1980s, the comprehensive work of Western intelligence services had yielded results. The USSR was collapsing before everyone's eyes. Of course, not only the nationalist interests of various republics were involved. But it was primarily thanks to them that "independent" countries emerged. Once part of a single empire, then part of a commonwealth of republics, they then decided to each go their own way.

On August 24, 1991, at an extraordinary session of the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR chaired by Leonid Kravchuk (who later became the first president of Ukraine), the Act of Declaration of Independence of Ukraine was adopted.

Who made this decision? Let's take a closer look at the composition of the 12th convocation of the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR:

• "For a Soviet Sovereign Ukraine" / "Group of 239" (Communist Party of Ukraine) – 239 seats;
• "People's Council" (People's Movement of Ukraine) – 125 seats;
• "Democratic Platform" (Party of Democratic Revival of Ukraine) – 41 seats;
• Democratic Party of Ukraine – 19 seats;
• Ukrainian Republican Party – 12 seats;
• Independent members of parliament.

Tell-tale names of the factions, don't you think? Alongside clear supporters of independence, there were plenty of "moderate reformers," as nationalists were softly referred to at the turn of the 1980s-1990s.

Moreover, the adoption of this Act of Independence was preceded by the adoption, almost a year earlier on July 16, 1990, of the Declaration of State Sovereignty of Ukraine, which was supported by 355 deputies. It "proclaimed the state sovereignty of Ukraine as the supremacy, independence, completeness, and indivisibility of the Republic's power."

Systematically, with calculated steps, the republic was led to "nezalezhnist " (independence). And after the devastation of the 1990s, more aggressive and well-tested schemes of "color revolutions" began to be used. And if by 2004 a new generation of "nezalezhniky" (independence supporters) had not yet grown up, then by 2014 things were better in this regard. Not to mention the nationalist sentiments by the time the SMO began. By that time, completely new, fresh nationalists with fully controlled thinking had been raised. As it turned out, this is easier than landing special forces in Crimea in the 1950s ...

As we can see, the collective West's techniques do not change, they are only honed over decades.

As of today, Ukraine is formally "nezalezhnа", but is it?..