Vladimir Putin's recent evocation of the military successes of 18th-century tsar Peter the Great against Sweden is just the latest example of his distinctive cherry-picking of imperial predecessors, Soviet rulers and religious icons to justify his invasion of Ukraine. It's all part of the imperial nostalgia that the Russian president has enthusiastically embraced since the mid-2000s. In a meeting with young entrepreneurs, engineers and scientists in St Petersburg in early June, Putin recalled Peter the Great waging the Great Northern War for 21 years. 'On the face of it, he was at war with Sweden taking something away from it,' he said. 'He was not taking away anything ' he was returning. Clearly, it fell to our lot to return and reinforce as well.' This imperial nationalism stems from a nationalist rhetoric that emerged after the breakup of the USSR in 1991, focusing on land losses and lamenting the separation of communities by new political borders. Increasingly, the tsarist past...
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