How easy is it to prove that this story is a complete lie and that all other stories saying that Putin dreams for a recreation of the Soviet Empire?
http://www.politifact.com/punditfac...adimir-putin-call-breakup-ussr-greatest-geop/
Simply recall the facts.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/part-ii-vladimir-putin/
WALLACE: The collapse of the Soviet Union resulted in the liberation of Eastern Europe. Yes? But last week you called the collapse of the Soviet Union, "the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century." What does that mean?
TRANSLATOR: The United States carefully guards and protects the interests of its people. The United States protects the interests of its citizens. Just imagine that after the collapse of the Soviet Union, 25 million Russians living in the now-independent states found themselves beyond the Russian territory. Twenty five million turned out to be foreigners of Russia. Isn't that a tragedy? They just woke up one morning and learned that they had nothing to do with Russia anymore. They lived in other states, and so they have to become accustom to life in those countries as ethnic minorities. I can assure you they face significant problems in many of those countries.
Take for instance the Baltic states. Do you know that there are some IDs there in which on the line for "nationality," it says, "Non-citizen." Modern citizenship laws operate with such notions as citizen, foreigner, a person with double citizenship, an expatriate. For someone who lost his or her citizenship, who are those people? This is an absolute breach of the modern humanitarian law. Also, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, people lost all of their life savings. So definitely, in the light of the collapse of the social system, this was a great tragedy for millions of people.