Russia and Ukraine: How Russia’s “humiliation” over the breakup of the Soviet Union helps explain Putin’s expansionist ambitions
- Drafting
- BBC News World
Image Source, Agence France-Presse
The BBC’s Stephen Rosenberg has been in Moscow for almost three decades and for a years He saw how Putin’s Russia lived in longing for its Soviet past. In 2020 He made a documentary for television About it Which, because of its validity during the current invasion of Ukraine, we are now adapting.
It stretched from the Pacific Ocean to Western Europe: the Soviet empire seemed invincible.
But in 1989 the Iron Curtain collapsed. And the enormous power of Moscow began to collapse.
“Russia Today wants to forget that year,”says Lilia shitsova, an expert at the Chatham House Study Center.
But after more than 30 years, Russia is reasserting itself and showing military power beyond its borders.
What Moscow teaches
To understand the historical aspirations of Russia, it is enough to look at Moscow.
Image Source, Agence France-Presse
This immense city, with its skyscrapers of Joseph Stalin and the splendor of the Kremlin, sends an unambiguous message: This is an ambitious country.
Eagles, golden arches and enormous constructions show that it is a nation that for centuries believed in its greatness.
By the nineteenth century, the Russian Empire covered one sixth of the world’s surface.
It was controlled by the Tsar, a word derived from” Caesar ” and to this day there are many Russians who still believe that the Moscow government is the natural successor…
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