- Putin said on Thursday that the invasion of Ukraine was to expand into Russian territory.
- Until now, Putin has insisted that Russia liberate Ukraine from the so-called Nazis and prevent genocide.
- Putin said his destiny was to “bring back and strengthen” Russia, as 17th-century ruler Peter the Great did.
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Russian President Vladimir Putin said publicly for the first time on Thursday that his invasion of Ukraine was to expand into Russian territory, as Western leaders have long argued.
To date, Putin has justified the invasion, arguing unreasonably that he is preventing Ukraine and what he described as a neo-Nazi government from committing genocide against ethnic Russians. He also said NATO’s eastward expansion threatened Russia’s national security.
Speaking to students Thursday after attending an exhibition on Peter the Great, Russia’s first emperor, credited with making the country a great power in the early 18th century, Putin compared himself to the ruler and said they were both meant to expand Russia.
“It is clear that we had to go back and strengthen [Russia] also. And if we act on the premise that these core values are the basis of our existence, we will certainly be able to achieve our goals, “he said.
In addition to occupying territory in the 21-year war with Sweden in the late 17th century, Peter also conquered the territory of Azov from the Crimean Tatars who joined Turkey in 1696, and conquered territory in the Caspian Sea from Persia in 1723
“At first glance, he was at war with Sweden, which was taking away something from her,” Putin told Peter. “He was coming back and getting stronger, that’s what he was doing.”
In a tweet on Friday, Mikhail Podoliak, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, said Putin’s comments proved his “fabricated pretexts for genocide” in Ukraine were false and called for “immediate de-imperialization” of Russia.
Putin’s attempts to expand Russian territory began long before his invasion of Ukraine on February 24.
Putin invaded Georgia in 2008 and is currently supporting pro-Kremlin factions there. In 2014, it annexed the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine and invaded the Donbass region of eastern Ukraine through proxies the same year.
Just two days before invading Ukraine, Putin said allegations that he wanted to restore the Russian Empire were untrue.
However, Western leaders have long argued that this is not the case.
“He has much bigger ambitions than Ukraine. He really wants to rebuild the former Soviet Union. That’s what this is about,” President Joe Biden said on February 24, the first day of the invasion.
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