For Ukraine, Jan. 20 is a scarier date than perhaps for any other country: It may be about to lose the U.S. support that has allowed it to stay afloat in the face of Russian hostility and economic disaster.

The Ukrainian elite is divided between two competing strategies in response. One is all but unmentionable in public: concessions to Russia and a return to the previous policy of trying to build ties both with Russia and with the West. The other favors looking for ways to approach the new U.S. administration or at least keeping the support of traditional Republicans in the Congress and Senate. At the weekend, Joe Biden paid his last visit to Kyiv as U.S. vice president. Biden was the Obama administration’s point man on Ukraine and intensely sympathetic to the current Ukrainian government’s cause – breaking free from Russian influence and joining Europe. He was instrumental in securing U.S. economic aid.

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