From the figure of Catherine II to Satanism and trans identity, Vladimir Putin took a very wide berth during a speech to Moscow’s elite in the Kremlin at the planned ceremony to formally annex four Ukrainian territories. The announcement of the results of the “referendums” and the honoring of the “heroes” who fight “for the preservation of their faith, their language” will only have taken up a handful of minutes of the almost three quarters of an hour speech.
Just enough time to make a first projection on the fact that “the first article of the UN guarantees the right of peoples to self-determination”. The tone was set, very aggressively, with an attitude from the head of state that was more democratic than democratic. For the linguist Véronique Perry, a real snub from the international community. But also the first act of a permanent “reversal of good and evil”, decoded for 20 minutes by General Vincent Desportes, Professor of Strategy at Sciences Po and HEC. We invite you to analyze the three major rhetorical pirouettes of the Russian President.
To be Russian or not to be
In front of two huge flags, Vladimir Putin was quick to invoke “the thousand-year history” that connects part of Ukraine with Russia. “For people who identify as Russian, there is nothing more important than finding their true country,” he added, explaining that the separatists were fighting for “their language.” “His nationalism runs through the essentialization of the language, I’m Russian, so I speak Russian,” explains linguist Véronique Perry. But “everything is patois; Given the size of the country, unification of Russian is impossible,” defends the researcher from Toulouse.
However, the definition of the Russian people and Russian culture that he defends is very convenient for Vladimir Putin, who seems to open the door to other territories. In fact, he accuses the “Soviet representatives” of having “destroyed our great country and presented the people with a fait accompli” when the USSR was dissolved in 1991. “Putin is marked by the fall of the USSR. He wants to rebuild Russia and put it in its place,” says General Vincent Desportes. Even if, according to Véronique Perry, it means “denying any form of change”. But Vladimir Putin still denies it: he does not want to revive the USSR, “we cannot go back to the past, Russia does not need it”. Because the incorporation of the Ukrainian areas is the “choice” of the residents, and he does not want to appear as a colonizer.
The Toulouse researcher also points to the moment when Vladimir Putin “challenges the power of Kiev and its masters in the West” and points out that the residents of the four annexed regions “will become our citizens forever”. “He always speaks of superiority, but the dominant always imposes his culture, his language. He does, too,” she adds.
Satanism, Parent 1 and Neocolonialism
All pretexts are good for portraying “the West” as “barbaric” ogres. Confronted with the “neo-colonialism” of the United States, Vladimir Putin recalls that “the Soviet Union led the camp of anti-colonial struggle”. And even on the negotiated corridors for the transportation of grain from Ukraine “under the pretext of ensuring food security in the third world,” the Russian president claims that “only 5% of Ukrainian wheat goes to Africa.” “He is in a weak position internationally. Even his allies in India and China let him go,” recalls Vincent Desportes. “He seeks legitimacy on all levels: ideological, historical, emotional,” says Véronique Perry.
To the inattentive listener, Vladimir Putin may have floundered when he suddenly conjured incoherently “the extinction of family values,” the Western advocated freedom “taking the face of Satanism,” and “let’s have parent number one and parent number one.” 2 in Russia?” “. “He plays with the fear” of a “change in the patriarchal order,” denounces the linguist Véronique Perry, who specializes in the discourse around the categories of sex and gender. Vladimir Putin wants to show that “this war is a moral, just war and that he is the defender of eternal values,” said General Vincent Desportes.
War, gas pipelines, nuclear weapons: who is to blame?
Imperative to raise the issue of fighting, Vladimir Putin also rejected the stone in the camp opposite, urging “the Kiev regime to end the war it started in 2014” to sit at the negotiating table. “He bases himself on his starting positions and blames the aggression on the attitude of Westerners,” recalls Vincent Desportes. “The West is trying to destroy us, to uproot our state,” even the Russian president condemned. “He justifies the mobilization afterwards,” explains the strategy professor at Sciences Po, and wants “to show Russia that the nation is in danger”.
Continuing the path of victimization, the Russian President also dismissed the suspicions hanging over Moscow over the leaks of the Nord Stream gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea. For him it is clear that crime benefits “the Anglo-Saxons”. “By blowing up the international gas pipelines that run on the bottom of the Baltic Sea, they have started to destroy Europe’s energy infrastructure,” he says. A “paranoia” for Véronique Perry, but also an “attempt to divert opinions in Europe,” emphasizes Vincent Portes.
In his “strategy of counter-caricature, of reversal,” as Véronique Perry put it, the President took advantage by targeting the United States: “Which is the only country in the world that has used nuclear weapons twice? At the same time, he warns that Russia will defend its new territories “with all its weapons.” “Putin is preparing the ground for the use of tactical nuclear weapons,” fears General Vincent Desportes, “his last card.” “Overall, this is not a speech that comes closer to a peaceful solution,” he concludes.