'Putin’s war of aggression in Ukraine is a sign of the imperial expansionism that has defined the Russian state for so much of its history. But it is based as much on mythical ideas as on geo-politics in the conventional sense,' writes orlandofiges
to promote its spiritual inheritance from Kievan Rus, a link broken by the disintegration of the Soviet Union. It was seized on by Putin, who used it as an arm of his foreign policy to defend the Russian speakers left outside the territory of Russia after 1991. He justified his invasion of Ukraine on the bogus pretext of protecting them from the genocidal aims of what he called the Junta, the post-Maidan nationalist government in Kiev.
This is where the last tsar in our quartet of statues, Nicholas I, appears closest to Putin in his vision of the Russian World. Devoutly Christian, Nicholas believed that Russia was an empire of the Orthodox uniting Moscow with Constantinople and Jerusalem. On these grounds, in 1853, he went to war against the Turks to force the sultan to concede to his demands for a privileged position for the Orthodox in the Balkans and the Holy Lands .
Among Russia’s nationalists, including Putin, Nicholas I is a national hero because he stood up to the West for Russia’s spiritual interests, and because he made that stand alone, against the opposition of the western-looking liberal intelligentsia. Likewise, Putin cultivates the image of a man who stands alone for Russia, whoWhether he believes in the religious values which he places at the heart of his anti-Western nationalism is hard to say.
Putin’s war of aggression in Ukraine is a sign of the imperial expansionism that has defined the Russian state for so much of its history. But it is based as much on mythical ideas as on geo-politics in the conventional sense: ideas of a nationalist, socially conservative, anti-Western and religious character that underpin dictatorships in Russia, China, and Iran. Before us we can see a new type of empire arising in Eurasia, uniting countries with historic grievances against the West.
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