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utility of setting up FBI liaison with Ukraine on criminal activity was right on the mark. It
was a perfect use of an FBI attaché, because it gave them real work that affected our
interests and Ukrainian interests in positive ways.
Q: Was there cooperation – in other words, were the resources of the FBI also made
available, in certain cases, for the Ukrainians?
MILLER: Yes. It was an aspect of our aid program. It was a sensible legal assistance
program. It took the form of document exchange, computer integration, joint
communications, integration into Interpol, the international tracking of criminals, and
relations with other national police forces, particularly in Western Europe. It was a very
busy program and Louis Freeh himself took a great personal interest in it, because he had
been both a prosecutor and a judge, and so he knew all the sides of the law enforcement.
Of course, he had dealt with “On the Waterfront” types and mafia, in New York and, of
course, Ukraine had its mafia, waterfront, and gangs.
Some of the criminals in New York and other cities in the United States were of
Ukrainian and Russian origin. This ethnic legacy started from the end of the 19 th century -
family-ties, you might say.
Q: What about overall, while you were there, corruption? How did this play – did this
have any concern of ours?
MILLER: Certainly from the outset the word “corruption” was in our policy rhetoric. We
were against it, of course. However, the reality was we were very permissive in our
thinking and practice on corruption that seemed to be attendant to the so-called freemarket
processes. This is at the top, and these were the things that high officials, top level
bureaucrats, would not only see but possibly be able to do something about – that is, the
initial transactions of evolving state assets into private assets. We, in Russia, in Ukraine
and throughout the former Soviet Union, I think, did not pay enough close attention to the
fairness of the process of translating state assets into private assets. The phenomenon that
developed in these countries, Ukraine and Russia foremost, the rise of the oligarchs, was
the consequence. The process of auctions and vouchers, shares in a nonexistent market –
which were virtually worthless in the beginning but obviously had legal value as far as
title to ownership goes and great potential value – was badly handled. The ordinary
citizen had no benefit whatsoever from these processes of selling off state assets and
those few with fast footwork received all the benefit. Many of them, an astonishingly high
number, gained their wealth in criminal ways.
Q: Did we let it go or could we have …
MILLER: Could we have interfered? Yes, I think so, but privatization was also a legal
and philosophical struggle. Free market means for many that governments don’t interfere.
Q: But we’ve also got all sorts of things built in to our system of corrupt practices and…
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