Yeah, and he also gave many speeches and writings about how he is fighting Nazism in Ukraine. Are we seriously going to discuss Putin's speeches? This Putin's rhetoric did not exist before the 2014 revolution in Ukraine.
I support Ukraine and oppose Putin - but Putin isn’t a Nazi. His ideology, in its details, is quite different from that of Nazism.
Russian propaganda that “Ukraine is a Nazi state” is stupid, but you have to understand that “Nazism” means something quite different to Russians than to most Westerners. Most Westerners focus on the Nazis’ genocidal Antisemitism; in Russia, the focus is more on the Nazis’ genocidal Russophobia. That different focus makes the propaganda seem not quite as ludicrous as it does in the West, especially when one considers the language policy issue (encouraging the use of Ukrainian language over Russian), which the Russian government paints as Russophobic discrimination.
The interesting thing is to notice how Putin calls the Ukrainians Nazis. It's like he's thinking that it's an easy word to throw around because our society is so prevalent with people throwing that word around. It's like the subversion tactics were to make it easy to call someone a nazi and make it so commonplace to cancel people that he's literally using that term himself.
What you said is all true, but the Nazi thing is almost certainly propaganda. Putin wants to restore the USSR and his justification for annexing Ukraine has been to question the existence of a separate Ukrainian Culture and State. You only have to go over the stuff he’s talked about since the last invasion; most of it is the reunification nostalgia, very little about defeating “Nazis”.
No, this is not about Nazis. Putin simply always considered Ukraine to be part of Russia's legitimate "sphere of influence" and tried to steer it into becoming a pro-Russian vassal state. It's part of his incorrect views as a hobby historian. As a psychopath, or at least sociopath, he calculated that the 2014 invasion would not meet any strong resistance and was right. So he calculated in 2022 that grabbing more territory would work, too, and was wrong.
The problem with dictators like Putin is that they always overestimate their own judgments and nobody tells them when they're wrong. You could be the smartest guy of the world, if you run a whole country, are insanely rich, and constantly surround yourself with Yes-men, then your perception of reality will fail at some point. It's inevitable.
It this a competition of who is the real neo-Nazi? So even the mainstream media are a bunch of white supremacists without realising it?
Why are they giving a reason for Putin to carry on his so-called 'de-nazification' of Ukraine when the mainstream media are caught on air behaving like Nazis before and during the war? I can see why non-Ukrainians were barred from escaping and why the Azov Battalion would support that, whilst being cheered on by tech companies like Meta. Oh dear.
I'm disappointed, but not surprised. Can't wait for them to deny it and slap, 'manipulated media' on their own video interviews and then figure out a new way to suggest it is 'misleading' or it the whole tweet is a 'disinformation campaign'
My question is, why are we even seriously discussing Putin's claim that Ukraine is ruled by Nazis? If there ever was clear propaganda BS, there it is. I get it so why he's using it. But why on Earth is anyone buying into it?
>Putin isn’t a Nazi. His ideology, in its details, is quite different from that of Nazism.
no. Just read his war declaration speech. Classic Nazism. They had "master race" and inferior "races" of Jews and Slavics. Putin has master nation of Russians and inferior Ukrainians. And he is using that the same was as Hitler as a reason to claim the master race's/nation's right to the territory and to conduct ethnical cleansing and genocide there.
>especially when one considers the language policy issue (encouraging the use of Ukrainian language over Russian)
The "War and Peace" opens with the scene of an aristocratic party in St.Peterburg where French language - de-facto language of Russian nobility in the years before - is totally banned because of Napoleon invasion.
Earlier this year, Putin gave a speech about why Russia was invading Ukraine that went on and on about history, but conspicuously, even flagrantly, omitted any mention of the Nazi-Soviet pact.
It's clear this is a very sore point for many Russians, and a lot of anti-US propaganda I'm beginning to think is overcompensation for feelings about this history, rather than a calculated, rational strategy of psychological manipulation.
We heard Putin's nonsense concerns - he accused Ukraine leadership of being literal Nazis. The President of Ukraine is Jewish and his family survived the holocaust. Putin has lied every step of the way. And you want us to sit down so he can tell more lies?
I'm confused about what your argument is here. It sounds to me that your position is that this article is proof that Ukraine's government are Nazis (it's not), therefore Putin is justified both in invading Ukraine and the war crimes he's most likely responsible for during said invasion.
um... there's a huge subtext going on here that you are glossing over. Putin has said that the greatest tragedy of the 20th century was the fall of the Soviet union. He has intoned that he wishes to restore the former glory of the Soviet Union in Russia. He is now currently displaying on state run media, images of tanks flying the soviet flag as they invade Ukraine. He has called into question the very nature of the Ukrainian state as a legitimate entity. He has called into question the very nature the Ukrainian people as a legitimate ethnic group, claiming they are in fact Russians. He is now conducting a war which encroaches on their national identity by invading its borders, and he is engaged in specifically targeting civilians, including hospitals and fleeing refugees. He is also engaged in a vast information war against Ukrainians, and if he's successful in taking over Ukraine that information war will come to them as well. This isn't merely about gaining access to a port, this is about erasing a people, its history, and its identity.
I've gotta say, if this is not recognizable as genocidal war to you, can you please lay down a firm line that needs to be crossed before you apply that term? Because the way things are going if Putin doesn't cross it today, he will soon enough.
Because what do you think happens if Putin takes over Ukraine? When you look at the images of the bombed hospitals, what do you think happens next, after the brutal dictator takes over the country filled with people whom he claims are Nazis?
No, you have it exactly backwards. Claiming Ukraine is run by neo-Nazis and that NATO is an existential threat to Russia is Putin's propaganda to justify his dream of the restoration of the Russian Empire.
No, your first sentence presumes that the Kremlin propaganda is truthful. Putin's ambitions have nothing to do with neo-Nazis in Ukraine, as his own writings over many years reveal. It's imperial ambition.
Ukraine was smart not to get rid of Azov. Putin invaded once for made up reasons, no reason to think he won't do it again. Ukraine's understanding of fascist Russia's true self was correct.
I believe that to Putin “Nazi” ins interchangeable with “evil invaders”. And he sees that western leaning elements of Ukraine as Sauron like figures tempting Ukrainians from their rightful place as part of the Russian empire.
Not saying I agree, but that is the only coherent worldview I can from his speeches.
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