Putin’s claim that Russians and Ukrainians were one and the same people and his branding of those who believed otherwise as nationalists ran counter to a long Soviet and post-Soviet tradition of treating Russians and Ukrainians as historically and culturally close, but still separate peoples. Putin’s statement challenged the foundations not only of Ukrainian national identity but also of modern Russian identity. The affirmation that Russians constituted a distinct people had been the legitimizing foundation of Russia’s revolt against the dying Soviet Union in 1991 and of the existence of the
...more
