What Russia should do with Ukraine

The article advocates for "brutal censorship" of the Ukrainian culture, large-scale "re-education" and "de-ukrainization" of Ukrainians on the territories occupied by Russia in the 2022 invasion of Ukraine.[4][11][7]

The author insists that Ukraine's ethnocentrism is an artificial perversion,[12] that Ukraine's existence is "impossible" as a nation-state,[11] and that the word "Ukraine" itself cannot be allowed to exist.[3][4] According to the author, Ukraine should be dismantled and replaced with several states under direct control by Russia.[13] He adds that the "ethnic component of self-identification" of Ukraine would also be rejected after its occupation by Russia.[11]

The author claims that "most likely the majority" of Ukrainian civilians are "Nazis"[11] who "technically" cannot be punished as war criminals, but can be subjected to "denazification".[14] While Sergeytsev notes that there are no Nazi parties, symbols, racist laws, or other evidence of actual Nazism, he counters that by asserting that "Ukrainian Nazism is unique due to its amorphism and ambiguity", which is, per Timothy Snyder, equivalent to a "special Russian definition of Nazism".[5] The author asserts that Banderites are actually marginal to "Ukro-nazism", and that the real menace is Pro-Europeanism.

He claims that Ukrainians must "assimilate the experience" of the war "as a historical lesson and atonement for [their] guilt". After the war, forced labor, imprisonment and the death penalty would be used as punishment. After that, the population would be "integrated" into "Russian civilization".[11] The author describes the planned actions as a "decolonization" of Ukraine.[12][13]

The author of the text, Timofey Sergeytsev, advised Victor Pinchuk projects from 1998 to 2000, including Pinchuk's 1998 parliamentary election campaign in Ukraine, and was a member of the Board of Directors of Interpipe Group.[15]

He was born in 1963.[16] He studied at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology in 1980, where he was a student of Georgy Shchedrovitsky.[17][18]

In 1999, he worked for the presidential campaign of then incumbent Ukrainian president Leonid Kuchma. In September 2004, he was a consultant to Viktor Yanukovych. In 2010, he worked with Arseniy Yatsenyuk.[15] In 2012, Sergeitsev co-produced the Russian feature film Match which was criticized for Ukrainophobia. In 2014, it was banned on the territory of Ukraine as propaganda.[19][20]

According to Der Tagesspiegel, Sergeitsev supports the pro-Putin political party "Civic Platform" financed by one of the oligarchs from Putin's inner circle.[4] According to Euractiv, Sergeitsev is "one of the ideologists of modern Russian fascism".[21]

According to Mika Aaltola, director of the Finnish Institute of International Affairs, the article showed Russian war propaganda "developing in a worrying direction".[27]

According to Meduza, the article is "essentially a blueprint for the genocide" of Ukrainians.[12]

According to Oxford expert on Russian affairs Samuel Ramani, the article "represents mainstream Kremlin thinking".[22]

The American historian Timothy Snyder wrote that the text "advocates the elimination of the Ukrainian people as such".[28] He later noted that it uses a special definition of the word "Nazi": "a Nazi is a Ukrainian who refuses to admit being a Russian". In his opinion, the article reveals the genocidal intent of Russia.[5]

• "On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians", 2021 essay by Vladimir Putin
• "On conducting a special military operation", 2022 speech by Putin
• Foundations of Geopolitics
• Final Solution of the Czech Question
• Russian imperialism
• Russian nationalism
• Rashism
• Bucha massacre

• Sergeytsev, Timofey (3 April 2022). "Что Россия должна сделать с Украиной" [What Russia should do with Ukraine]. RIA Novosti (in Russian). Rossiya Segodnya. Archived from the original on 3 April 2022. Retrieved 3 April 2022.