Putin’s accusation of Nazi rule in Kyiv is more than just an absurd lie, it’s something that tells us more about Russia than about Ukraine.
While the spectacular demise of Wagner Group founder Yevgeny Prigozhin made headlines around the world, less noticed was the fact that accompanying him on the ill-fated plane was Dmitry Utkin, the mercenary company’s co-founder and military commander. Unlike Prigozhin, Utkin had generally avoided the spotlight, but the few public photos of him revealed a neck tattoo of the Nazi SS insignia, and he was believed to have named the group in honor of Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer. The fact that Russia’s most prominent military force in the invasion of Ukraine was led by a Nazi sympathizer is especially ironic considering that President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly stated that the goal of his so-called ‘special military operation’ was to ‘denazify’ its neighbor.
Of course, it was already easy to dismiss the characterization of Ukraine being controlled by Nazis as absurd. While the country does have some far-right nationalists serving in its armed forces, far-right parties hold less than 3% of seats in its parliament – far less than in many Western European democracies. Ukraine is also home to as many as 400,000 Jews, including President Volodymyr Zelensky, whose great-grandparents were killed in the Holocaust. The city of Uman serves as an important Jewish spiritual center where thousands of Hasidic Jews from all over the world make pilgrimage every year. Moreover, Ukrainian Jewish communities and organizations have unanimously rejected Putin’s claims and condemned Russia’s invasion, while Jewish citizens fight in Ukraine’s armed forces. Meanwhile, Russia’s artillery and missile strikes have damaged or destroyed multiple Jewish cultural sites, including the historic cemetery at Hlukhiv, the Holocaust memorial at Drobytsky Yar, and even the famous memorial to the massacre at Babyn Yar.
But Putin’s accusation of Nazi rule in Kyiv is more than just an absurd lie – it’s something that tells us more about Russia than about Ukraine.
The Allied victory in World War II came at a great cost to the USSR, whose civilian and military casualties exceeded 20 million. In the ensuing decades, this collective trauma would be used to forge a new patriotic narrative, with the conflict coming to be known as the ‘Great Fatherland War’. At the same time, inconvenient details such as Stalin’s prior cooperation with Hitler under the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact were suppressed. Notably, Soviet history erased the particular nature of the Holocaust as a genocide targeting Jews, its memorials referring only to the murder of ‘Soviet citizens’. And with the fall of communism in 1991, the victory over Nazism became an even more crucial part of Russia’s national ideology.
In this way, the words ‘Nazi’ and ‘fascist’ have acquired a different meaning within Russia. While in the West they have been primarily associated with authoritarianism and persecution of minorities, for many Russians they simply designate a national enemy. And as the Russian government has turned increasingly illiberal, these labels have been applied to anything viewed as a threat to so-called ‘Russian values’ – whether it be LGBT rights, or a Jewish-Ukrainian president. This kind of redefinition is what allows Russia to claim to be fighting Nazism in Ukraine while itself employing fascist paramilitaries such as the Wagner Group and the Sparta Battalion, and funding far-right parties all over Europe.
Putin’s claims that Ukraine is controlled by Nazis are not meant to be convincing to Western audiences. Instead, these lies are directed at Russia’s domestic sphere, where virtually all media has been brought under state control, and even referring to the conflict as a war is a criminal offense. Polls show that a majority of the Russian public supports Putin’s narrative, with many even refusing to believe the accounts of their own relatives in Ukraine who are suffering under Russian bombardment.
While Moscow’s justification for the war may be baseless, far-right extremism does remain a serious threat, both in the region and beyond. Russia’s ongoing war against Ukraine since 2014 has boosted Putin’s standing amongst far-right nationalists around the world, particularly in the United States, while the Kremlin has sought to empower far-right and Eurosceptic parties across Europe. The war itself has also attracted extremist militants from all over the world, volunteering on both sides of the conflict in hopes of gaining arms training and battle experience. And because defending against a foreign invasion undoubtedly contributes to rising nationalism, the longer the war goes on the more Putin’s lie risks becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy.
William Faulkner once wrote, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” The way in which Vladimir Putin has harnessed the USSR’s heroic World War II victory for his own political ends underscores how much the past century’s historical narratives continue to shape our reality today.
ALEX GENDLER is a Ukrainian-born, Brooklyn-based writer, editor, and translator who has published articles in American Affairs, The Battleground, and Australia's Metro Magazine, produced video explainers for TED-Ed and Voice of America, and presented at the International Society for Metal Music Studies. You can find more of his work at https://alexgendler.com.
Home » Why Does Putin Say Ukraine Is Nazi?
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Why Does Putin Say Ukraine Is Nazi?
Putin’s accusation of Nazi rule in Kyiv is more than just an absurd lie, it’s something that tells us more about Russia than about Ukraine.
While the spectacular demise of Wagner Group founder Yevgeny Prigozhin made headlines around the world, less noticed was the fact that accompanying him on the ill-fated plane was Dmitry Utkin, the mercenary company’s co-founder and military commander. Unlike Prigozhin, Utkin had generally avoided the spotlight, but the few public photos of him revealed a neck tattoo of the Nazi SS insignia, and he was believed to have named the group in honor of Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer. The fact that Russia’s most prominent military force in the invasion of Ukraine was led by a Nazi sympathizer is especially ironic considering that President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly stated that the goal of his so-called ‘special military operation’ was to ‘denazify’ its neighbor.
Of course, it was already easy to dismiss the characterization of Ukraine being controlled by Nazis as absurd. While the country does have some far-right nationalists serving in its armed forces, far-right parties hold less than 3% of seats in its parliament – far less than in many Western European democracies. Ukraine is also home to as many as 400,000 Jews, including President Volodymyr Zelensky, whose great-grandparents were killed in the Holocaust. The city of Uman serves as an important Jewish spiritual center where thousands of Hasidic Jews from all over the world make pilgrimage every year. Moreover, Ukrainian Jewish communities and organizations have unanimously rejected Putin’s claims and condemned Russia’s invasion, while Jewish citizens fight in Ukraine’s armed forces. Meanwhile, Russia’s artillery and missile strikes have damaged or destroyed multiple Jewish cultural sites, including the historic cemetery at Hlukhiv, the Holocaust memorial at Drobytsky Yar, and even the famous memorial to the massacre at Babyn Yar.
But Putin’s accusation of Nazi rule in Kyiv is more than just an absurd lie – it’s something that tells us more about Russia than about Ukraine.
The Allied victory in World War II came at a great cost to the USSR, whose civilian and military casualties exceeded 20 million. In the ensuing decades, this collective trauma would be used to forge a new patriotic narrative, with the conflict coming to be known as the ‘Great Fatherland War’. At the same time, inconvenient details such as Stalin’s prior cooperation with Hitler under the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact were suppressed. Notably, Soviet history erased the particular nature of the Holocaust as a genocide targeting Jews, its memorials referring only to the murder of ‘Soviet citizens’. And with the fall of communism in 1991, the victory over Nazism became an even more crucial part of Russia’s national ideology.
In this way, the words ‘Nazi’ and ‘fascist’ have acquired a different meaning within Russia. While in the West they have been primarily associated with authoritarianism and persecution of minorities, for many Russians they simply designate a national enemy. And as the Russian government has turned increasingly illiberal, these labels have been applied to anything viewed as a threat to so-called ‘Russian values’ – whether it be LGBT rights, or a Jewish-Ukrainian president. This kind of redefinition is what allows Russia to claim to be fighting Nazism in Ukraine while itself employing fascist paramilitaries such as the Wagner Group and the Sparta Battalion, and funding far-right parties all over Europe.
Putin’s claims that Ukraine is controlled by Nazis are not meant to be convincing to Western audiences. Instead, these lies are directed at Russia’s domestic sphere, where virtually all media has been brought under state control, and even referring to the conflict as a war is a criminal offense. Polls show that a majority of the Russian public supports Putin’s narrative, with many even refusing to believe the accounts of their own relatives in Ukraine who are suffering under Russian bombardment.
While Moscow’s justification for the war may be baseless, far-right extremism does remain a serious threat, both in the region and beyond. Russia’s ongoing war against Ukraine since 2014 has boosted Putin’s standing amongst far-right nationalists around the world, particularly in the United States, while the Kremlin has sought to empower far-right and Eurosceptic parties across Europe. The war itself has also attracted extremist militants from all over the world, volunteering on both sides of the conflict in hopes of gaining arms training and battle experience. And because defending against a foreign invasion undoubtedly contributes to rising nationalism, the longer the war goes on the more Putin’s lie risks becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy.
William Faulkner once wrote, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” The way in which Vladimir Putin has harnessed the USSR’s heroic World War II victory for his own political ends underscores how much the past century’s historical narratives continue to shape our reality today.
ALEX GENDLER
ALEX GENDLER is a Ukrainian-born, Brooklyn-based writer, editor, and translator who has published articles in American Affairs, The Battleground, and Australia's Metro Magazine, produced video explainers for TED-Ed and Voice of America, and presented at the International Society for Metal Music Studies. You can find more of his work at https://alexgendler.com.
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ALEX GENDLER is a Ukrainian-born, Brooklyn-based writer, editor, and translator who has published articles in American Affairs, The Battleground, and Australia's Metro Magazine, produced video explainers for TED-Ed and Voice of America, and presented at the International Society for Metal Music Studies. You can find more of his work at https://alexgendler.com.