Russia distributed images of its tank in operation in Ukraine with a flag of the Soviet Union, in a political provocation to the government of the country that invaded on February 24.
The scene was filmed somewhere in Ukraine, according to the Defense Ministry in Moscow. The portfolio-run TV channel TV Zvezda (Star) and its web pages showed a column of tanks and other vehicles, featuring a BMP-2 armored personnel carrier with the prop.
The image aims to reinforce the echoes sought by Vladimir Putin in the conflict, seeking to refer to the Second World War. In justifying the invasion, the Russian president said that one of his goals was to denazify his neighbor.
He exaggerated the presence of neo-Nazi elements in the Ukrainian military and political circles, which was a fact, suggesting that the government of Volodymyr Zelensky, a Russian-speaking Jew, would adhere to the ideology of Adolf Hitler (1889-1945).
Nazi forces took Ukraine, then part of the communist empire dissolved in 1991, in 1941. Three years later, the Soviets regained ground and marched on Berlin. For many Ukrainians, the decades under Moscow’s control were grounds for resentment.
On the other hand, the quote can be quite offensive to locals. After all, Ukraine was one of the countries most affected by the war on the eastern front. An estimated 6 million Ukrainians died in the conflict, out of 27 million Soviets — or 40% of the war’s total casualties.
Putin has for years worked the memory of the Soviet victory in 1945 as part of his own political discourse. He seeks to draw a line between the romanticized heroism of that era and the resurrection of Russia’s self-image as a great power in its more than 22 years of power.
To this end, he chose military dates as important calendar holidays and always maintained a warmongering rhetoric — now, as in Georgia in 2008, taken to the paroxysm of action. Putin brought back the Soviet anthem by changing the lyrics. Critic of communism, he says the Soviet dismantling has left millions of Russians far from their homeland, in what would be the “greatest geopolitical disaster of the 20th century”.
Back in the world communication war, Putin has increased pressure on Russian public opinion, escalating war propaganda, such as encouraging the use of painted Z on invading vehicles. He also instituted censorship, which could lead to 15 years in jail for anyone who spreads what the government considers fake news about the conflict.
