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Ukraine in the eyes of Putin; it doesn't exist and it is united with Russia
The We For News reported Russian President Vladimir Putin is obsessed with Ukraine – or, rather, with pretending that Ukraine doesn’t exist. In his annual call-in show on June 30, he claimed that “Ukrainians and Russians are a single people.”
Putin then published an article aimed at justifying that “conviction,” by tracing the two countries’ shared history. It is a masterclass in disinformation – and one step short of a declaration of war.
According to the We For News, Putin said Russians, Ukrainians, and Belarusians were united by one language and – after the “baptism of Russia” into the Orthodox religion – one faith until the fifteenth century. Even amid fragmentation, Putin writes, the people perceived Russia as their shared motherland.
According to this narrative, the Polish-Russian War of 1605-18 was, for the people, “liberating.” Ukrainians were “reunited” with the rest of the Russian Orthodox people, forming “little Russia,” and the word “Ukraine” was used to mean something like “on the frontier.”
In Putin’s story, the creation of Novorossiya in 1764 and the expansion of the Russian Empire also reflected the will of the people. “The integration of the western Russian lands into the common state was not only the result of political and diplomatic decisions; it took place on the basis of common faith and cultural traditions” and “linguistic affinity.”
In terms of language, Putin suggests that the shared language – separated only by “regional linguistic features and dialects” – all but nullifies the possibility that Ukraine could have developed its own culture. For example, while Taras Shevchenko, Ukraine’s national poet, wrote poems in Ukrainian, he wrote prose mainly in Russian.
Later, Putin condemns the “harsh Polonization” that was carried out during the interwar period, when the Poles suppressed “local culture and traditions.” He then credits the Bolsheviks for “developing and strengthening” Ukrainian “culture, language, and identity” through their policy of Ukrainization.
Putin also presents the Soviet Union as the savior of Ukrainian reunification. “In 1939, lands that had previously been seized by Poland were returned to the USSR. Their main part was given to Soviet Ukraine.”
According to Putin narrative, Russia always treated Ukraine “with great love.”
Nonetheless, Putin says in his article, “Russia is open for dialogue with Ukraine.” But, for such a dialogue to work, Ukraine must be representing its “own national interest,” rather than attempting to “serve foreign interests.” Of course, in Putin’s view, Ukraine’s only national interest must be to unite with Russia.
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