[5] To support the claim, he describes in length his views on the history of Russia and Ukraine,[6] concluding that Russians and Ukrainians share a common heritage and destiny.

[9] According to Putin, the modern-day Ukraine occupies historically Russian lands,[9] and is an "anti-Russia project" created by external forces since the seventeenth century, and of administrative and political decisions made during the Soviet Union[5] (a BBC article traced the term "anti-Russia project" to some Russian conspiratorial writing of 2011–13).

[9] According to an April 2023 investigative report by the Russian website Vertska [ru], one draft of the essay included a direct threat of military action against Ukraine, although it was removed from the final version.

[14] Several months later, Dmitry Medvedev, the deputy chairman of the Security Council of Russia, also published an article on Ukraine in the Russian daily Kommersant.

[16][17] Vladislav Surkov, the personal adviser (2013–2020) of Putin, also published an article concerning Ukraine and other ex-USSR territories on the website Aktualnye Kommentarii.

[18][19] In a speech on 21 February 2022, following the escalation in the 2021–2022 Russo-Ukrainian crisis, Putin said that "modern Ukraine was wholly and fully created by Bolshevik, communist Russia".

[20] Sarah Rainsford wrote in BBC News that Putin's speech was "rewriting Ukraine's history", and that his focus on the country was "obsessive".

Titled "What Russia Should Do with Ukraine", the article openly accused the entire Ukrainian nation of being Nazis who must be wiped out and in some cases re-educated.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the president of Ukraine, criticized the essay on 13 July, comparing Putin's view on the brotherhood between the nations with the story of Cain and Abel.

[38] The Stockholm Free World Forum senior fellow Anders Åslund branded the essay as "one step short of a declaration of war.

[42][43] Alexandru Muraru, then a deputy of Romania, also replied to Putin's essay, declaring that Bessarabia was not occupied but "reattached" and "reincorporated" following "democratic processes and historical realities".