Cultural heritage under attack - Putin's motives for attacking Ukrainian cultural heritage

Abstract: On February 24th 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine. Since then Ukraine has reported damage to more than 1000 sites of cultural importance. There are plenty of studies which map out the destruction of culture in war, however there is still no clear understanding of exactly why cultural heritage is under attack - what the motives are for targeting cultural heritage in conflicts. I therefore deemed it interesting to study Putin’s motives for attacking cultural heritage in Ukraine. This paper analyses Putin’s statements through McWilliams (2022) framework to analyse motives for attacking cultural heritage. The study used postcolonial theory as a theoretical framework and Fairclough's critical discourse analysis as methodological framework. The main findings were those that Putin draws from colonial and imperial discourses in his speeches, and that his motives for attacking cultural heritage are mainly based on a misuse of history and as a part of ethnic and cultural cleansing. Attacking cultural heritage is not only a crime against international law, but also a loss of valuable parts of human history. In order to be able to protect cultural heritage in war, it is crucial we understand what the underlying motives for such attacks are, which is why studies like this are essential.