Igor Strelkov - New Interview(Eng Subs)

Identities aren't false or true, they are all imagined communities. Their only measuring stick is their spread and their power. Identities can however be based on fallacious history. For example, the theory that there exists a direct line favouring either Russia or Ukraine as the successor to Rus.

The Russian identity certainly has been influenced by the reality of Russians being the dominant force behind the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. Unfortunately in too many instances the Russians resorted in repressing not just Ukrainian nationalism but expressions of Ukrainian culture as well. Further more, the idea that Ukrainians are a brotherly people was also motivated by the reality of empire, it was a method of binding a population to the Russian state.

But despite all this, Ukrainian history for the last 300 years is intertwined with Russian history. It was under the tsars and Soviet dictators it produced most of its artists, scientists, statesmen and heroes. How could this be possible for a subjugated people? Probalby because unlike under the Poles and Austrians the Ukrainians were allowed to be more than peasants ruled by foreign elites. Sure, the ideology of a brotherly people kept the empire together but did that make it less genuine? It was a choice out of many which was threathened by the likes of Stalin, Alexander II and the architects of Russification. It's not because Strelkov is blabbing on about the Ukrainians and Russians being one, that throughout history the whole idea has always been a scam, or some kind of Russian mindgame. Kruschev may have reimplemented Korenizatsiya (hardly) but it was a Russian who started it.

That Ukrainians are now offended when a Russians sees them as a brotherly people is saddening. As if there always have to be ulterior motives. It seems more likely that Ukrainians are offended by their own past where they from time to time played second fiddle to a slightly different people.

/r/UkrainianConflict Thread Link - youtube.com