Today is Ukraine’s Independence Day, and here’s why you should celebrate, too: Letter from editor-in-chief Olga Rudenko (Patreon)

This is Olga Rudenko, editor-in-chief of the Kyiv Independent. 

I’m coming to you from our newsroom in Kyiv, where we are preparing to celebrate Ukraine’s Independence Day. 

And actually, you have a good reason to celebrate it, too. Let me explain.

At 35, I’m almost the same age as independent Ukraine – to be precise, I’m two years older. I remember nothing except living in a free Ukraine, and I know from personal experience that it’s easy to take your country’s independence for granted. I imagine that’s what it must be like for most of you. If you come from a place that has had its independence for centuries, it’s only natural that you aren’t anxious to lose it – and therefore, naturally, don’t really appreciate it.

I remember feeling like that. Growing up in a post-Soviet Ukraine, I felt like independence came to us as a natural event, and the return to the past is impossible. Why even give it a second thought if it felt so permanent? We grew up knowing that the Soviet past was a dark page in Ukraine’s history. Surely, there is no return to that? 

Russia strongly disagrees. When it started its aggression against Ukraine in 2014, and when it escalated it to a full-scale war in 2022, it pursued the goal of ending independent Ukraine and making it once again a satellite, or a part of Russia. 

My nation’s dream of independence didn’t sit well with one pathetic dictator in the Kremlin. Vladimir Putin has his own dream, one that he shares with many Russians: restoring Russia as an empire. Call it the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union, or Great Russia – the meaning is the same. Russia as the titular nation that oppresses its neighbors, sucks in their resources, and deprives them of all imaginable freedoms.

Unfortunately for the Kremlin’s wannabe tzar, Ukrainians weren’t up for it. The ambitious plan of restoring the obsolete empire stumbled when thousands of Ukrainians stood up and took up arms – and told Russia to get lost.

One of the things that the Russian invasion changed irreversibly is the meaning of Ukraine’s Independence Day, celebrated every year on Aug. 24. What used to be just a symbolic official holiday, became the day that carries so much in itself: the mourning of those who sacrificed their lives to win another year of freedom, the gratefulness for those who defend it today, and the defiance of a nation that stays free against the odds.

Today, we will put on our vyshyvanka shirts, raise the blue-and-yellow flags, and celebrate our freedom – another year of freedom that we wrested from fate. 

If you’re anything like this – if you value your freedom and the freedom of your community, if you support Ukraine in its fight against the oppressor, if you are free like us – then you should know that it’s your day, too. 

Today, join our celebration. You’ve been standing with us – now celebrate with us. Raise a glass to Ukraine’s Independence Day – and to our common freedom. 

 Thank you for your continued support and for choosing to stand with us in this fight.