At first glance, the entire Trump impeachment probe looks like terrible news for Ukraine. With Russian forces still firmly entrenched in the Donbas and Russian President Vladimir Putin eager to exploit the inexperience of the country’s new president, the last thing Ukraine needs now is a crisis in relations with its most important ally.
While the potential security implications of impeachment are ominous enough in their own right, the optics of the scandal are arguably even worse. As U.S. coverage has intensified, Ukraine has become a byword for graft and political sleaze, with Donald Trump’s defenders frequently dismissing the nation as “one of the most corrupt countries in the world.” This is not a winning message, by any stretch of the imagination. Nevertheless, the fact remains that in the space of a few short months, the impeachment story has garnered Ukraine far more international attention than the country has enjoyed in the previous 28 years of its independent existence. The question Ukrainians should now be asking themselves is whether there really is no such thing as bad publicity.