'To the Highest Bidder' 

Editor:

It is revealing that ordinary western Ukrainians know as little about the history which led to Russia's invasion of Ukraine as we do ("Uniting for Ukraine," Sept. 8). There is no recognition of the Reagan and GHW Bush administrations' solemn promises not to move "one inch further east." The Clinton administration broke this promise and promptly began installing NATO bases bristling with missiles, around Russia. Over the next years the U.S. withdrew from the ABM, the INF, the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, the Open Skies Treaty and many more.

Ukrainians, as ourselves, are ignorant of the U.S.'s critical role in the 2014 coup, and the rapid arming and training of Ukraine in the ensuing years. We know nothing of Ukraine's years of shelling Donetz and Luhansk, taking 14,000 eastern Ukrainian lives, nor NATO's provocations, the Minsk accords or of Russia's repeated requests to join NATO.

The first duty of a country's leader is to protect their people. Zelensky threw Ukraine to the wolves. All Ukraine had to do to prevent war was to keep Reagan's promise.

The recent spectacle of Zelensky, wearing a T-shirt proclaiming, "The Power of Freedom," ringing a bell to open Wall Street's stock exchange, as he offers his country to the highest bidder, defines freedom in a way we know all too well.

Ellen Taylor, Petrolia