His intentions have been obvious for a very long time for anyone who wants to see them.

The recent Tucker Carlson interview confirmed that Putin has an uncontrollable obsession with a made up version of history, and he gets visibly upset when his long rants about Ukrainian statehood being an anti-Russian conspiracy by the Austrian General Staff and the Pope get interrupted. Nazis running Ukraine is only a small part of that persecution complex.

Putin's speeches deserve as serious consideration as Hitler's. Until tanks started rolling, his speeches were also dismissed as rhetoric.