Vladimir Putin points to history to justify his Ukraine invasion, regardless of reality

The Volodymyr the Great monument, erected in 1853, in Kyiv. Volodymyr was a warlord who became the first Russian ruler to convert to Christianity in the late 900s. A similar statue was erected in Moscow in 2016 as a counter to Ukraine's. (Shutterstock)

Vladimir Putin’s interest in history is well known. He has accused Poland of starting the Second World War. He maintains that the Soviet Union liberated the western world from Nazism and any discussion over that view is “historical revisionism.”

His focus has been four-pronged.