In occupied parts of Ukraine, Russia has been busy creating, rebuilding, and demolishing a large number of monuments. According to Ukrainian historian Yurii Latysh, this activity fits a clear ideological pattern. Meduza examines Latysh’s findings, which he presented in a recent article for Novaya Gazeta Europe.

Russia is rapidly and deliberately reshaping the memorial landscape in Ukraine’s occupied territories, restoring Soviet monuments and erecting new ones that fit a unified historical-political narrative. In this framing, the current war is presented as a direct continuation of earlier conflicts in which Russia invariably fought as a liberator.

As expected, the new and remodeled monuments give prominence to the Great Patriotic War, as the Soviet front of the Second World War is known in Russia. World War II serves as the ideological foundation for justifying the Kremlin’s “special military operation” in Ukraine. The Russian authorities have also taken liberties in this restoration work, “improving” existing memorials by adding elements that alter their meaning and link past events to the present.

For example, in 1967, Soviet officials in the Donetsk region built a memorial complex at Savur-Mohyla, at the site of fierce fighting in 1943. In 2014, during fighting ahead of Russia’s full-scale invasion, the complex was completely destroyed. Russia has since built a new memorial in its place, modeled on the original but featuring depictions of “Donetsk People’s Republic” heroes. Statues honoring Lieutenant Hryhoriy Shevchenko and other WWII figures now stand alongside those of Mikhail Tolstykh (“Givi”), Arsen Pavlov (“Motorola”), Volodymyr Zhoha, and Olga Kachura. Today, the ceremonies at Savur-Mohyla symbolically fuse the events of the 1940s with those of the 2010s and 2020s.

Another “updated” Soviet memorial — this one in the city of Khrustalnyi, in Ukraine’s Luhansk region — now bears an image of an ancient Rus’ warrior dated “1185” (the year of Prince Igor’s campaign against the Polovtsians, recounted in the Old East Slavic epic poem The Tale of Igor’s Regiment) and a “special military operation” combatant dated “2025.” The site also features a T-72 tank used in Russia’s invasion and an eternal flame lit from the one in Moscow.

These remodeling decisions, like Russian propaganda generally, emphasize the notion of “continuity between generations as defenders of Russian land.” This same sense of historical mission, Yurii Latysh argues, permeates the speeches of Russian officials, including at the openings of memorials in the occupied territories. All previous history effectively becomes the invasion’s prehistory.

This logic fuels the broad use of Kyivan Rus’ imagery, including elements from The Tale of Igor’s Regiment. These symbols are appropriated, with modern Russia portrayed as the only legitimate successor to Ancient Rus’.

At the same time, Russian occupation authorities have purged the memorial landscape of monuments Moscow considers ideologically hostile, including sites that affirm Ukrainian national memory and identity. This has been especially true of monuments dedicated to victims of the Holodomor (the man-made famine that claimed the lives of millions of Ukrainians in the early 1930s), to those killed in Soviet political repression, and to historical figures who opposed Russian influence.

Alongside overtly confrontational war memorials, Russian occupation officials have also erected more “peaceful” tributes — for example, a monument to the Soviet actor Yevgeny Matveev in his native Kherson region. These memorials promote the idea of a “common history” between Russia and Ukraine, encouraging Ukrainians to view their history as something intertwined with and dependent on Russia.

The Russian Military-Historical Society has played a key role in shaping this approach to memorials. The group oversees the construction and restoration of monuments and promotes the “correct” version of history. Regional branches have cropped up in occupied parts of the Donbas, and they are closely involved in organizing ceremonies and educational initiatives related to local monuments.

Latysh concludes that the reshaping of occupied Ukraine’s memorial landscape is a large-scale ideological operation through which Russia seeks to legitimize its rule, present eastern Ukraine as a natural part of Russia, and thereby portray the invasion as a just war of liberation.