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He also repeated his claims that Kyiv is reviving Nazi ideology.
Rhetoric during long wartime conflicts often shifts from daily battlefield reports to grand historical claims.
When political leaders address military personnel, their messaging frequently aims to reshape the past while setting expectations for an uncertain future.
And if anyone knows how to rewrite history in order to make it fit his own narrative, it’s Vladimir Putin.
Responding to hostilites
The Russian President recently delivered a series of wide-ranging claims during a meeting with navy sailors, and according to the Russian state news agency TASS, one of the claims coming from the Russian leader was that the war in Ukraine, now in its fifth year, is not Russia’s fault.
“Russia did not start the war, but is responding to hostilities unleashed by Kyiv with Western support,” he said, according to the agency.
He also presented a sweeping reinterpretation of European geography and Soviet history.
As reported by Ukrainska Pravda, Putin predicted that Ukraine will eventually lose its western lands. Those territories, he argued, will historically return to neighboring nations like Poland, Hungary, and Romania because Soviet-era land decisions were only meant within a unified state.
While it is true that parts of Ukraine have historically belonged to various other countries, including Poland, Hungary and Romania, Ukraine’s borders were internationally recognized when the country gained independence in 1991.
Part of Russia
The Russian leader further claimed that left-bank Ukraine was historically part of Russia rather than an independent entity.
He argued that Moscow was once the sole guarantor of Ukrainian territorial integrity. In his view, leaders in Kyiv destroyed that protection by deciding to turn Russia into an official enemy.
He assured the assembled troops that the military campaign would end with an inevitable Russian victory. According to him, soldiers serving on the front lines are actively writing the country’s history and setting its future course.
Harsh political attacks
Beyond historical arguments, the address featured sharp personal attacks against officials in Kyiv.
According to TASS, Putin claimed Ukrainian politicians have turned on each other like “spiders in a jar” while fighting over stolen funds and Western financial assistance.
He insisted corruption and internal feuds have completely destroyed national unity across Ukraine. By contrast, he praised his own armed forces for displaying deep brotherhood on the front lines, calling that sense of unity essential for their mission.
“There was only one guarantor of Ukraine’s territorial integrity, and that was Russia,” Putin stated during the address.
He dismissed Ukraine’s current political path as complete rubbish. Throughout the meeting, he maintained that Russian forces are simply placing regional history back on its normal track, claiming the nation will emerge victorious.
