by Leon Aron
Russians are hardly the only people in modern history to be intoxicated by the ideological cocktail of national victimhood and triumphalism, by the vision of a heroic nation on a mission, abused by foreigners yet always ultimately victorious.
State-sponsored campaigns of national "uniqueness" suggest that the regimes and leaders that flatter their peoples most shamelessly are precisely the ones that end up decimating them with the greatest indifference and in the largest numbers, whether through war, starvation, concentration camps, or firing squads.
It is hard, then, not to be troubled by Mr. Putin's suddenly opining about the "generous Russian soul" and the "heroism and self-sacrifice" that allegedly sets ethnic Russians apart from "the other peoples."
The last time Russians were praised in similar terms
was in Stalin's famous toast at the May 24, 1945
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