June 9 (Reuters) – Russian President Vladimir Putin paid tribute to Tsar Peter the Great on Thursday, the 350th anniversary of his birth, drawing a parallel between what he describes as their double historical aspirations to reclaim Russian lands.
“Peter the Great has been waging the Great Northern War for 21 years. He seems to be at war with Sweden, he took something from them. He didn’t take anything from them, he returned (as it was to Russia),” Putin said after visiting an exhibition dedicated to the king.
In television comments on the 106th day of his war in Ukraine, he compared Peter’s campaign to the task facing Russia today.
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“Obviously, it was up to us to give back (what belongs to Russia) and strengthen (the country). And if we start from the fact that these core values are at the core of our existence, we will certainly be able to solve the tasks we face. “
In response, a senior adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky rejected what he called any attempt to legalize land theft.
“The West needs to draw a clear red line so that the Kremlin understands the cost of each bloody step … we will brutally liberate our territories,” Mihailo Podoliak said in an online post.
Putin has repeatedly tried to justify Russia’s actions in Ukraine, where his forces have ravaged cities, killed thousands and evacuated millions by presenting a view of history that claims that Ukraine has no real national identity or tradition of statehood.
Peter the Great, an autocratic modernizer admired by both liberal and conservative Russians, gave his name to the new capital, St. Petersburg, Putin’s hometown, which he ordered to be built on land he conquered from Sweden.
Prior to Putin’s visit to the exhibition, state television aired a documentary praising Peter the Great as a staunch military leader, significantly expanding the territory at the expense of Sweden and the Ottoman Empire.
INTEREST IN HISTORY
In recent years, Putin’s interest in Russian history has become increasingly apparent in his public appearances.
In April 2020, when Russia entered its first coronavirus blockade, he likened the pandemic to 9th-century Turkic nomadic invasions of medieval Russia.
In July 2021, the Kremlin published a long essay by Putin claiming that Russia and Ukraine are a nation artificially divided. This laid the groundwork for sending troops to Ukraine.
Moscow says it has acted to disarm and “disinfect” its neighbor. Ukraine and its allies say Putin has launched an unprovoked aggressive war.
On the eve of what Russia calls its “special military operation,” Putin accused Vladimir Lenin, the founder of the Soviet Union, of creating Ukraine on what Putin said was historically Russian territory.
In contrast, he offered cautious praise to Joseph Stalin for creating a “firmly centralized and absolutely unitary state,” even when he acknowledged the Soviet dictator’s attempts at “totalitarian” repression.
Putin has a history of praising leaders who share his own conservative views.
Meanwhile, leaders seen as opposed to a strong, unitary Russian state, including Lenin and Nikita Khrushchev, have seen their contributions diminish.
“Putin likes leaders he sees as tough, strong managers,” said Andrei Kolesnikov, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
“He wants to be seen as Peter [the Great]a modernizer in style, although he will go down in history as a cruel ruler, more like Ivan the Terrible, ”he added.
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Reuters report; Edited by Alex Richardson and Alistair Bell
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