Opportunity knocks – it makes no sense to rebuild these grim soviet-style apartment blocks

Like Bulgaria since the end of the Eastern Bloc in 1989, except even more so, Ukraine has been losing population at a rapid rate due to emigration and low birth rates.     The 2022 Russian invasion has accelerated the de-population with perhaps 15%-20 of the (already much reduced) population having left.  Since Ukraine is the poorest country in Europe – and the refugees are flocking into much wealthier countries further west, it is more than likely that many, if not most, of these emigrees will never return.

So, once the war is over, what can be done to attract back some of these people AND new blood from the over-populated but much wealthier West..?

The obvious answer – BUILD OASIS-CITIES..!

Entire cities and towns have been reduced to rubble, so will they be re-built much as they were before, or will this UKRAINIAN BLANK SLATE be the GREATEST RE-BUILDING OPPORTUNITY in history..?

Ukraine would seem to be an ideal location for Oasis-Cities – cheap land, low wages, highly-educated people, harsh winters, to name just a few.

The usual curmudgeonist nay-sayers will opine that OA-cities would make perfect targets for Russian artillery, which may be true, but the same could be said for any new cities.   So what would such critics suggest?  Low-rise sprawl?  Besides, any serious re-building cannot take place until the war is over and a peace treaty signed – at which point it is probable that Ukraine will be admitted into NATO, if not the EU.

Ukraine is not just fighting for itself – it is the front-line against tyranny for all the free countries of Western Europe.  Having seen the courage and fortitude of the Ukrainian people, Western Europe will want to re-pay Ukraine by re-building it as a shining beacon of freedom – and a bulwark against the evil Russian gangster-state.   In the long run this will help Russians themselves to rise up and finally break free from its long and sordid history of tyrannical totalitarian rule.