By EUvsDisinfo
Russia’s obsession with framing Ukraine as a Nazi state serves to justify the ongoing invasion and to distract from Russia’s own historical baggage. This manipulative narrative, a cornerstone of Kremlin disinformation, relies on historical revisionism to falsely depict Ukraine as a haven for fascists. This grotesque distortion of history trivialises the horrors of Nazism and manipulates public perception both at home and abroad.
The Kremlin has long played fast and loose with history to bolster its legitimacy, particularly regarding its World War II past. It insists that the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, a 1939 agreement between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, was merely a ‘necessity’ and should not be viewed as a complicity in fuelling Nazi war efforts and paving the way for the outbreak of World War II. By downplaying its role in enabling the Nazi regime, Russia deflects attention from its own murky historical actions, creating space to level baseless accusations against Ukraine.
The claim of ‘Nazism in Ukraine’
Since the Euromaidan protests of 2013-2014, Russian state-controlled and other pro-Kremlin disinformation outlets have repeatedly smeared the Ukrainian pro-European movement a ‘Nazi coup’, twisting the aspirations of millions of Ukrainians for democratic change into a far-right conspiracy. Ukrainian nationalists, who are frequently cited as proof of Ukraine’s alleged Nazi character, hold little power in the country. The far-right received minimal support in Ukraine’s 2014 elections, and by 2019, had been effectively marginalised in the political mainstream.
The claim of ‘Nazism in Ukraine’ has served a dual purpose. First, it demonises Ukraine’s government, which, under President Volodymyr Zelenskyy—a Jewish leader with family members who perished in the Holocaust—has been labelled a ‘Nazi regime’. Secondly, it builds domestic support in Russia by invoking the sanctity of the Soviet victory over the Nazis. This narrative turns the invasion of Ukraine into a ‘de-Nazification’ campaign, a term that, when stripped of its historical meaning, becomes a tool to justify violent repression and war crimes.
The Kremlin’s “de-Nazification” narrative has also gained limited traction outside Russia’s borders, particularly among fringe groups, absurdly framing Russia’s invasion as a mission to ’save’ Ukraine. By misrepresenting the facts, the Kremlin seeks to manipulate international perceptions and justify its aggression, exploiting global ignorance of the conflict’s true nature.
Distorting the memory of the Holocaust
Since Russia’s full-scale invasion, pro-Kremlin outlets have gone beyond merely labelling Ukraine as Nazi; it now casts the entire West in this light for supporting Ukraine. Putin’s foreign policy mouthpiece Sergey Lavrov has gone as far as accusing the West of trying to find a ‘final solution’ for Russia, a grotesque insult to the memory of the six million Jewish people and countless other victims who were systematically murdered during the Holocaust.
Last year, Kremlin propagandist Vladimir Solovyov, crossed yet another line in smearing the memory of the Holocaust, distorting the meaning of Nazism, insisting ‘it does not necessarily have to be anti-semitism’ but could also appear as so-called ‘Russophobia’. This follows the continued pro-Kremlin line of watering down the actual meaning of Nazism and trying to disconnect Nazi ideology from its historical roots, such as by suggesting that it doesn’t matter if Zelenskyy is Jewish, since even Hitler ‘had Jewish blood’ – which is false.
The line between reality and fiction blurs, as the Kremlin distorts history to stir up nationalistic fervour, instigate violence, and legitimise war. The misuse of Nazism as a weapon of information manipulation is not just an insult to historical memory – it is a tool of destruction.
By EUvsDisinfo
