Vladimir Putin, a master of the Kremlin nostalgic for greater Russia

As early as 2005, Vladimir Putin was already explaining that the dissolution of the former USSR was “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century”. The former USSR lost many territories in 1991, after the fall of the Berlin Wall (Germany) and the disintegration of the Soviet bloc. Then a young KGB officer and a pure product of the former USSR, Vladimir Putin did not accept NATO’s march towards the East.

He then forms a conviction. “There is a whole ideological component around the notion of the Russian world, and the idea that the various Slavic peoples who constitute the old Russian empire are in fact one and the same people, and should be united within same entity”analyzes Marie Dumoulin, a former diplomat.

This doctrine will push the master of the Kremlin to annex territories, and place others under his influence: Georgia, Crimea, the republics of Donetsk and Lugansk in the Donbass, as well as pro-Russian Transnistria in Moldova. The invasion of Ukraine is therefore the next step. Vladimir Putin wants to install a pro-Russian government there, in order to rebuild a wall between NATO and Russia.