Putin Defends Russia: ‘We did not Start any War.’

Showing an extreme degree of audacity – or as we say in New York chutzpah – Russian führer Vladimir Putin again denied ever starting a war against Ukraine.

Putin has once again refuted the commonly held knowledge that Russia started the war against Ukraine, repeating an established Kremlin narrative that Moscow merely responded to actions by Kyiv backed by the West, according to the Kyiv Post.

Speaking at a meeting with Russian navy personnel in St. Petersburg on Sunday, July 26, Putin claimed Russia was forced to respond to a war allegedly launched by the “Kyiv regime.”

“We did not start any war. We only began responding to the military actions, to this war, which the current Kyiv regime launched with the support of the West,” Putin said.

He also claimed that “left-bank Ukraine” had historically been “not just oriented toward Russia, but part of Russia” – a narrative rejected by Ukraine and historians. Left-bank or Eastern Ukraine has always been Ukrainian by nature, and its key city, Kharkiv, was the birthplace of Ukrainian nationalist thinkers and writers. And its Russian-speaking population has always supported Ukrainian independence and opposed Russian dictatorship and subjugation.

Putin has denied that Russia started the war against Ukraine multiple times across public addresses, press conferences, and interviews since the 2022 invasion. An exact cumulative numerical count of these denials is not tracked or officially documented, as he routinely repeats the assertion that Kyiv and the West initiated the conflict.

Blaming Ukraine: Putin frequently claims that Russia did not start the war, asserting instead that hostilities began due to the 2014 political events in Kyiv and subsequent actions by the Ukrainian government in the Donbas region.

Special Military Operation: When launching the full-scale invasion on February 24, 2022, he framed it as a “special military operation” rather than a war, deflecting responsibility for initiating armed conflict.

Ongoing Rhetoric: He continues to reiterate these talking points during major media appearances and international forums to counter global consensus and legal accountability

Putin further repeated disputed claims about Donbas, saying Soviet authorities had originally intended to include the region in the Russian Soviet republic before Bolshevik leaders transferred it to Soviet Ukraine, wrote the Kyiv Post.

“Now you have to return everything to its proper historical course,” he said, echoing one of the Kremlin’s recurring justifications for its invasion.

The remarks are the latest in a series of attempts by Putin to deny responsibility for Russia’s war against Ukraine.

In December 2025, the Russian leader similarly rejected any blame for the tens of thousands of deaths caused by its brutal war against Ukraine.

During his annual televised press conference, he told NBC News that Russia “did not start this war,” instead claiming it began after what he described as “an unconstitutional armed coup in Ukraine.”

“We do not consider ourselves responsible for the loss of life, because we did not start this war,” Putin said at the time, as the administration of President Donald Trump sought to broker a peace agreement between Moscow and Kyiv.

As one point of departure, the world remembers the 40-mile-long tank column that crossed Ukraine’s border from the north as it headed toward Bucha. The subsequent murder of innocent Ukrainian men, women and children and their rape by Russian cutthroats sickened and revolted people around the world.

The irony of Russia’s latest embarrassing setback is that the 40-mile long tank column simply turned off the engines and the soldiers disappeared. The convoy stalled eight days into the war, at approximately 30 kilometers (19 miles) from the center of the city of Kyiv, which Russia was to take in three days and then occupy all of Ukraine in three weeks, according to Russian braggadocio. By March 7, 2022, according to US defense officials, the column had not moved at all for a few days.  

There has been much discussion about why the convoy stalled. The UK Defense Ministry noted that by March 7, it had been “delayed by staunch Ukrainian resistance, mechanical breakdown and congestion. The column has made little discernible progress in over three days.”

So much for the military prowess, skills and intellect of the armed forces of mother Russia.

Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, following its illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014 and years of Russian-backed fighting across Ukraine. Ukraine, its Western allies, and international courts have consistently rejected Moscow’s claims that Kyiv was responsible for starting the war, describing them as false narratives used to justify Russia’s aggression. The United Nations, among other international bodies, designated Russia, a member of the vaunted UN Security Council, an aggressor state.