Leonid Bershidsky, Columnist

U.S. Profanity and Impotence in Ukraine

An audio recording with Russian subtitles, posted on YouTube and advertised by Russian officials on Twitter, revealed an embarrassing fact: U.S. diplomats involved in attempts to resolve the political crisis in Ukraine have zero influence on the volatile situation in Eastern Europe's biggest nation.

February 7, 2014 at 10:46 AM UTC

By Leonid Bershidsky

Leonid Bershidsky, formerly Bloomberg Opinion’s Europe columnist, is a member of the Bloomberg News Automation Team. He recently published Russian translations of George Orwell’s “1984” and Franz Kafka’s “The Trial.”

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Cold War spy craft appears to be repeating itself as farce in Ukraine.

An audio recording with Russian subtitles -- posted on YouTube and advertised by Russian officials on Twitter -- has severely embarrassed two U.S. diplomats, purportedly taped as they tried to resolve the political crisis in Ukraine. Russia seems to believe this proves dastardly American interference in the affairs of a sovereign country. Instead, it exposes the minimal influence that the U.S. has on events in Eastern Europe's biggest nation.