In his speech to the Russian nation on Monday (21), President Vladimir Putin reinforced his arguments for consolidating the separation of Ukraine’s two rebel territories, declaring that the very notion of Ukraine as an independent state is a myth.
With the conviction of an authoritarian leader who is not limited by historical nuances, Putin declared Ukraine an invention of the Bolshevik revolutionary leader Vladimir Lenin, who, according to him, mistakenly endowed Ukraine with statehood by allowing it autonomy within the newly created state. created soviet state.
“This process began immediately after the Revolution of 1917, and, moreover, Lenin and his associates did it in the most disorderly way in relation to Russia: dividing, ripping from Russia pieces of its own historical territory,” he said.
As a misreading of history, it was extreme even by the standards of Putin, a former KGB officer who once described the collapse of the Soviet Union as the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century.
Ukraine and Russia share roots that come from the first Slavic state, the so-called Kievan Rus, a medieval empire founded by the Vikings in the 9th century.
But the historical reality of Ukraine is a complex, millenary history, made up of different religions, borders and peoples. The capital, Kiev, was founded hundreds of years before Moscow, but both Russians and Ukrainians consider it the birthplace of their respective cultures, religions and modern languages.
Situated in the midst of trade routes that developed in the 9th and 10th centuries, Kiev prospered but saw its influence wane as trade shifted. The many conquests by warring factions, combined with the diverse geography — with farmland, forests and a maritime environment on the shores of the Black Sea — have created a complex set of multi-ethnic states.
The history and culture of Russia and Ukraine are indeed intertwined. The two countries share the same Christian Orthodox religion, and their national languages, customs and cuisines are related.
Despite this, Ukrainian nationalism and identity politics are factors that have irritated Moscow since feudal tsarist times. Many Russians see Ukraine as their “little brother”—and think it should behave as such.
Eastern Ukraine, which entered the sphere of influence long before the west, still has many Russian-speaking people loyal to Moscow. But the happy brotherhood of nations that Putin often describes is dubious.
Parts of modern Ukraine actually spent centuries within the Russian empire. But others in the west fell under the jurisdiction of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Poland or Lithuania.
Cliff Kupchan, chairman of political risk consultancy Eurasia Group, says that while the themes of Putin’s speech were nothing new for him, “the vehemence and magnitude with which he attacked everything Ukrainian was surprising.”
The Soviet regime under Lenin would eventually crush the nascent independent Ukrainian state. The language was banned in schools, and the culture was only allowed to persist in the form of a caricatured image of Cossacks dancing in puffy pants.
In the throes of the Soviet Union, it was not Moscow that granted Ukraine its independence in 1991, but the Ukrainian people — who, in a democratic referendum, voted by a large majority to leave the USSR.
Now, with an estimated 190,000 Russian troops encircling the country, Putin’s declaration that Ukraine’s very existence as a state was the fruit of a historic mistake threatens to send shivers across all lands that were once under Moscow’s rule. And it was met with disdain.
“For the past two decades the West has been looking for fascism anywhere but where it was most present,” says Maria Tomak, an activist involved in supporting people in Crimea, territory annexed by Putin in 2014. “Now it’s so evident it burns our eyes. Perhaps now the West will finally face the seriousness of what Russia is doing.”
It is unclear whether Putin believes his version of Ukrainian history or whether he simply invented a cynical mythology to justify any action. But his claim that Ukraine exists solely within the context of Russian history and culture is something he has been saying at least since 2008, when he tried to convince George W. Bush — who had expressed support for the idea of Ukraine joining NATO — not to country’s existence.
Last year Putin published a 5,300-word essay laying out many of the themes he highlighted in Monday’s speech, including the idea that nefarious Western nations had somehow corrupted Ukraine through what he described as “a forced change of identity.” “.
“It’s clear that Putin didn’t want to launch a historic debate,” says Russian political scientist Joshua A. Tucker of New York University. “He laid the groundwork for the argument that Ukraine does not have the kinds of rights we associate with sovereign nations, a sign that he intends to argue that military intervention would not constitute a violation of another country’s sovereignty.”
As a condition for Ukraine giving up its nuclear weapons after the Soviet collapse, Moscow swore to respect its neighbor’s sovereignty. But Putin, analysts say, has already made it clear that he cares little for that promise, taking Crimea and instigating the separatist war in eastern Ukraine in 2014 and now recognizing the two territories’ independence.
But his efforts to drag Ukraine back into Russian orbit have had the opposite effect in many ways. In a country that in the past was at best ambivalent towards NATO and at worst hostile, opinion polls reveal that today a solid majority of the population is in favor of joining the country in the US-led military alliance.
In Kiev, the reaction to Putin’s speech was one of repudiation and fear of what lies ahead. Gathered with colleagues in a bar, political journalist Kristina Berdinskikh watched the conversation on her cell phone, alternating between tears and swearing.
“This is hatred for all of Ukraine and revenge for the country’s move towards the European Union, NATO and democracy – a democracy that can be chaotic, with huge problems, slow reforms and corruption, but in which people elect and alternating power with elections or revolutions”, he says. “An old lunatic’s worst nightmare is these two scenarios.”
