Dmytro Yagunov: Naturalising Empire: The Birch Tree as Instrument of Colonisation in Russian Imperialist Politics

Ukrainians’ attitude towards birch trees – not as trees, but as imperial symbols – is vividly reflected in an old anecdote. A Ukrainian man is cutting down a birch tree near his house. When his neighbour asks him why, he replies with the classic line: ‘What if a Muscovite comes along, sees the birch tree and says, “This is my Homeland!”’

This anecdote demonstrates a deep understanding of the mechanisms of colonisation through the symbolic appropriation of space. The birch tree functions as a natural marker of the ‘Russian World’ – a tree through which the empire marks the territory as ‘its own.’ The Ukrainian peasant anticipates the coloniser’s logic: any Russian symbol on Ukrainian soil becomes a basis for territorial claims.

The anecdote reveals the paradox of the colonial situation: Ukrainians have to change their own landscape not for aesthetic or practical reasons but to prevent the symbolic appropriation of territory. This is preventive resistance – the elimination of a potential reason for the imperial identification of space as ‘Russian’.

Humour here serves as a decolonial discourse, exposing the absurdity of imperial logic, where the presence of birch trees becomes a geopolitical argument. At the same time, the anecdote captures a traumatic experience: Ukrainian space is constantly under threat of redefinition through the cultural and natural symbols of the empire.

On the other hand, the anecdote is not really an anecdote, but reality. One can recall how in March 2019, in Russian-occupied Sevastopol municipal workers destroyed green spaces. In particular, their ‘victim’ was a birch. The ‘dismemberment’ of the ‘symbol of Russia’ by municipal workers caused hysteria in one of the local pro-Russian residents, who saw in this action an analogy with stories about ‘Banderivtsi’ who allegedly ‘dismembered people at sawmills in the Carpathian forests’. A video of the incident was posted on the Internet: ‘Since yesterday, I cannot shake the feeling that I am at a funeral because they are killing what is most precious’, the woman laments. “This birch tree, cut down like a young girl – look at its white trunk – is a symbol of our time” (Rakurs 2019).

The Birch Tree as Imperial Metaphor: Cultural Hegemony in Soviet Poetry

A systematic analysis of Soviet poetry about birch trees reveals a complex structure of strong imperial and colonial narratives, where a natural symbol is transformed into a powerful instrument of cultural hegemony. This poetic tradition does not simply celebrate the tree – it constructs a geopolitical reality where Russian identity is naturalised, territorial expansion is legitimised, and the colonisation of consciousness occurs through emotional attachment to a ‘native’ symbol.

A key mechanism of the imperial narrative is the construction of the birch as an exclusively ‘Russian tree’ that supposedly defines the very essence of Russia.

Rima Kazakova proclaims: ‘Russia is made by the birch tree’.Ivan Demyanov categorically asserts: ‘The white world would not be white / If there were no Russian birch trees!’ Nikolai Malyshev rhetorically asks and answers himself: ‘Why again about birch trees? / – Because this is Russia!’ (Chelyabinsk Central Library named after A.S. Pushkin 2025).

This narrative is based on a fundamental distortion of botanical reality. Birch is a circumpolar species that grows naturally throughout the Northern Hemisphere – from Scandinavia to Korea, from Canada to Kazakhstan. However, the Soviet poetic tradition symbolically expropriates this common natural phenomenon, transforming it into a marker of exclusively Russian identity. This appropriation works at the level of collective consciousness, creating the idea of a natural, biological basis for Russian exceptionalism.

Territorial expansion is recorded through the spread of the birch tree as a marker of Russian presence. Viktor Bokov openly celebrates imperial geography: “The white birch has reached Bratislava! / The white birch has reached Sakhalin!‘ – from Czechoslovakia to the Far East, the birch marks the space as ’Russian’”. Mikhail Dudin writes about ’The birch that grew in Rostock‘ (GDR), symbolically mastering East German territory through the ’Russian tree” (Chelyabinsk Central Library named after A.S. Pushkin 2025).

Particularly revealing is Nikolai Dorizo’s poem about a birch tree near Oslo. The lyrical hero considered the Norwegian birch tree to be a ‘Russian woman’ ‘because he first saw it in Russia / in his early childhood’. When the Norwegian quite logically considers it Scandinavian, because ‘he grew up with it in this little house near the station’, a rhetorical question arises: ‘How to convince him / That it is Russian?’ This fragment unexpectedly and honestly demonstrates the mechanics of cultural imperialism: the personal childhood experience of the Russian subject is transformed into a claim to universal appropriation of a natural phenomenon, and the Norwegian’s local connection to his land is delegitimised as a false perception of a ‘truly Russian’ tree (Chelyabinsk Central Library named after A.S. Pushkin 2025).

The birch functions as an instrument of symbolic mapping of the empire, where the biological spread of the species is reinterpreted as the cultural expansion of Russianness. The territory becomes ‘Russian’ not through political subordination, but through the presence of the ‘Russian tree’, which naturalises the imperial presence as an organic part of the landscape.

The systematic emphasis on the whiteness of the birch – ‘white-barked’, ‘white bark’, ‘whiteness’ – creates a powerful racial subtext. The colour of the trunk becomes a metaphor for racial identity, where whiteness is associated with purity, innocence, and moral superiority. The birch is implicitly contrasted with ‘dark’ foreign trees, and ‘whiteness’ becomes synonymous with ‘Russianness’.

This narrative resonates with the broader discourse of white racial identity, which was articulated during the Soviet period through the category of ‘Slavicness’ and the opposition to the ‘Asian’ or ‘southern’ Other. The whiteness of the birch functions as a natural metaphor for racial purity, which does not require explicit articulation but works on the level of visual and emotional associations.

The birch tree is consistently depicted as a sacrificial creature that suffers for the sake of others. It gives its sap even as it dies, its bark is used by people, it suffers from wounds but continues to give life. Nikolai Denisov rhetorically asks: ‘Who else could / Repay pain with grace?’ An image is created of the birch as a soldier, the birch as a soldier’s wife, the birch as a mother – always someone who sacrifices themselves for a higher purpose (Chelyabinsk Central Library named after A.S. Pushkin 2025).

This narrative normalises the idea of sacrifice as a natural role for subordinates in the imperial hierarchy. If the ‘Russian tree’ is sacrificial by nature, then sacrifice becomes an essential characteristic of Russian identity. This legitimises the mobilisation of the empire’s human resources, where peripheral territories and populations ‘naturally’ sacrifice themselves for the metropolis, just as the birch tree ‘naturally’ gives its sap.

The birch tree is consistently gendered as a woman or girl: ‘like a bride’, ‘maiden’s braids’, ‘slender beauties’. Its whiteness is eroticised through associations with nudity, creating an image of a passive, ‘defenceless’ beauty. This poetic device reproduces the classic colonial logic, where the conquered territory is feminised and eroticised, turning into a passive object of desire and possession.

The feminisation of the birch tree works on several levels simultaneously. First, it legitimises patriarchal power through the naturalisation of the gender hierarchy: if the ‘Russian tree’ is a feminine, passive, beautiful object of contemplation, then this role becomes ‘natural’. Secondly, through a metonymic shift, the birch-as-woman becomes the birch-as-territory, where the eroticised desire to possess a beautiful woman turns into the desire to possess a beautiful space. Thirdly, a narrative of protection is created: the ‘defenceless’ birch needs a protector, which legitimises the military presence as an act of noble protection rather than violent occupation.

The birch is systematically sacralised as an object of worship. Anatoliy Zhigulin writes: ‘I enter, as if into a temple, / Into a birch grove’. Viktor Bokov recalls: ‘My mother used to pray to the birch tree’. The birch tree is transformed into an icon, a temple, a sacred object that creates a quasi-religious cult of Russian identity (Chelyabinsk Central Library named after A.S. Pushkin 2025).

This sacralisation performs an important ideological function: it translates political loyalty into the realm of religious sentiment, where critical thinking is replaced by emotional reverence. When the birch tree becomes a sacred object, criticism of the ‘Russianness’ associated with it becomes sacrilege. The sacred is not subject to rational analysis – it requires faith and emotional devotion.

Systematic references to Sergei Yesenin create a literary genealogy that legitimises the entire narrative. Multiple dedications to Yesenin, the concept of ‘Yesenin’s Birch Trees’ as a standard, the transformation of the poet into a ‘saint’ of the birch tree cult – all this works to create a tradition that supposedly has its roots in authentic folk poetry (Chelyabinsk Central Library named after A.S. Pushkin 2025).

Yesenin functions as a mediator between ‘folk tradition’ and official Soviet culture. His tragic biography adds authenticity and emotional depth to the narrative, while his poetic mastery lends artistic legitimacy. Through Yesenin, the birch tree becomes not just a Soviet ideological symbol but an ‘eternal’ element of Russian culture that has supposedly always existed and naturally continues in Soviet poetry.

The anthology under analysis functions as a powerful instrument of cultural imperialism, which, through a natural symbol, naturalises Russian hegemony, marks the space as ‘eternally Russian’, creates an emotional attachment to the empire through the ‘native tree,’ and justifies expansion as the ‘spread of beauty’. This is a classic mechanism of how cultural production works to colonise consciousness, transforming a geopolitical project into a ‘natural’ and ‘eternal’ fact.

The birch tree becomes a point of condensation for multiple imperial narratives: racial (through whiteness), gender (through feminisation), territorial (through symbolic appropriation of space), moral (through sacrifice), religious (through sacralisation) and aesthetic (through literary tradition). All these levels work synergistically, creating a powerful emotional structure that captures the consciousness much more deeply than any explicit political propaganda.

It is fundamentally important that this colonisation of consciousness occurs through positive emotions – love of beauty, nostalgia for childhood, aesthetic pleasure from poetry. Imperial ideology is not imposed through fear or coercion but is embedded in the structure of desire and pleasure. To love birch trees is to love Russia; to feel nostalgia for the birch trees of childhood is to feel loyalty to the empire; to admire poetry about birch trees is to internalise the imperial narrative.

That is why this cultural complex proves to be extremely resistant and difficult to deconstruct. It operates not at the level of rational arguments that can be refuted, but at the level of deep emotional structures that are formed in childhood and maintained throughout life through cultural consumption. The birch tree becomes what Roland Barthes called ‘ex-nominated’ – a symbol that has become so natural that its ideological nature becomes invisible, and it itself becomes synonymous with reality itself.

Context and Political Geography

According to Chelyabinsk historian Igor Narskiy, the transformation of the birch tree into a national symbol began after the so-called ‘Great Patriotic War’ and was driven by the efforts of the frontline generation. From that moment on, the birch tree became a symbol of a liberated and victorious country. In this context, the birch tree became not just a feminine tree, but a tree of grieving mothers. It is not just a tree that is planted in a cemetery, but a tree that accompanies monuments to fallen soldiers of the ‘Great Patriotic War’ everywhere (Guberniya – Chelyabinsk 2025).

The formation of ‘patriotic feelings’ in preschoolers is carried out through the implementation of the project ‘Birch – a symbol of Russia’ (Bogdan 2024). Accordingly, conducting lectures for children that focus on the birch as a symbol of the state is part of state policy: “Russia also has unofficial symbols. Over many years, they have become an integral part of our homeland, its heart and soul. One of them is the birch tree is a symbol of the beauty of Russian nature” (Kameshkovsky Social Rehabilitation Centre for Minors 2024).

The portal ‘St. Petersburg. Network of City Portals’ contains information that “on the road from St. Petersburg to Lake Ladoga, there is an unusual birch grove. It is a memorial grove where 900 white-barked birches have been planted. This grove was planted in memory of each day of the siege of Leningrad. 900 birches – 900 days of the siege. A tradition has recently emerged where schoolchildren tie red pioneer ties to each birch tree in memory of the children who died during the blockade of Leningrad” (St. Petersburg. Network of City Portals 2025).

The occupying authorities in the Ukrainian city of Sevastopol are imposing a corresponding narrative on children: “The birch is the favourite tree of the Russian people. The people have composed songs, proverbs and sayings about it. Poets sang about birch trees in their poems; artists depicted them in their paintings. For Russians, there is no tree more native than the birch. In ancient times in Rus, the birch was considered their totem, progenitor and patroness. The Russian birch is a symbol of Russia’ (Books and theatre. Branch Library No. 10, Sevastopol 2015).

The Russian authorities even introduced the concept of an ‘ecological-patriotic campaign’, an example of which is the campaign in which 300 cadets from the Ministry of Emergency Situations of the Russian Federation planted the ‘Birch Grove of Heroes of Russia’ (Russian Geographical Society 2015).

More importantly, the birch grove has become an official tool for sacralising Russian occupiers who died during the Russian aggression in Ukraine.

Thus, in September 2023, birch trees were planted once again in Ulan-Ude in memory of the occupiers who died in the Special Military Operation (Infpol 2023). In September 2025, under the name of the children of participants in the ‘Special Military Operation’, five birch trees were planted in the village of Miass (Chelyabinsk Region), which is another example of ‘birch’ propaganda (Mayak 2025). In October 2025, the Legislative Assembly of the Irkutsk Region announced a new ‘alley of glory’ at the Birch Grove Cemetery in Angarsk, created in memory of the fallen occupiers (Official Internet portal for legal information in the Irkutsk Region 2025). In November 2025, occupiers from the Salavat Yulaev Battalion (a Bashkir unit of the Russian Guard) planted birch trees in the so-called ‘Donetsk People’s Republic’ (Bashinform 2025).

In fact, the policy of ‘birchification’ is not unique to Russia. It is also characteristic of countries under the control of the Russian Federation. In May 2025, a memorial sign called ‘Birch Grove’ was unveiled in Minsk, dedicated to Soviet soldiers who died during the liberation of the city in World War II (News from Belarus 2025).

Finally, it is important to note that the boom in attention to birch trees and birch groves occurred immediately after the Russian aggression of 2022 (Pskov Information Agency 2022).

In April 2024, a similar event involving children took place in the Russian-occupied Luhansk region (TASS 2024). The fact that this propaganda event, which took place in a kindergarten, was presented at the TASS level, speaks to the importance of such events for the leadership of the Russian dictatorship.

In October 2024, a similar large-scale event took place in the city of Krasnoyarsk (Our Krasnoyarsk Region 2024).

‘Of All the Arts, Cinema Is the Most Important To Us’ (Vladimir Lenin, 1922)

The birch tree as a symbol of Russian militarism found its reflection in Soviet cinema. It can be said without a doubt that there is not a single Soviet citizen who has not seen the film The White Sun of the Desert (1970), which continues to be popular among citizens of the modern Russian neo-empire.

The White Sun of the Desert is not an innocent adventure comedy, but an ideological construct that normalises imperial violence through cultural contempt and paternalistic rhetoric about a civilising mission. The film legitimises the violent Sovietisation of Turkestan, turning a Red Army soldier into an agent of ‘order’.

The Basmachi movement was an uprising against Imperial Russian and Soviet rule in Central Asia by rebel groups inspired by Islamic beliefs and Pan-Turkism. It was called probably the most important movement of opposition to Soviet rule in Central Asia.

However, in the movie, the Basmachi – real fighters for independence – are demonised as bandits. The Soviet occupation is aestheticized as a heroic mission, and the genocide of the Turkestan people is romanticised in an adventurous parable.

In the context of the ‘birch’ theme, it is worth mentioning an important moment when the Soviet occupier Sukhov writes letters to his beloved woman Katerina Matveyevna in Samara and imagines her not just anywhere but in a birch grove.

The Birch as a Symbol of ‘Mourning Mothers’: The Transformation of The Aggressor Into a Victim and the Mechanisms of Symbolic Inversion

The central element of this symbolic strategy is the consistent association of the birch with maternal grief instead of heroic military tradition. Memorials to ‘fallen soldiers’ in Russia and the occupied territories systematically include birch trees as an obligatory element of landscape design. This practice creates a specific narrative: Russian soldiers are portrayed not as aggressors, but as ‘children’ who have been ‘lost’ by their motherland.

Memorial complexes dedicated to the wars in Chechnya, Georgia, Syria and Ukraine are a telling example. Regardless of the nature of the conflict – whether it is the suppression of a national liberation movement or outright aggression against a neighbouring state – the symbolic design remains unchanged: ‘birch trees’, ‘eternal fire’, images of ‘weeping mothers’, etc. The context of military action, its legal classification, and the issue of aggression are completely eliminated from the symbolic space.

Emphasis on Losses Instead of Conquests

Traditional imperial symbolism usually glorifies conquests, emphasising power and expansion. The Russian symbolic system works differently: it systematically emphasises loss, grief, and sacrifice. The birch tree becomes a marker not of triumph, but of suffering. This strategy serves an important ideological function: it prevents critical reflection on the expediency and morality of military adventures.

When society is encouraged to mourn losses rather than celebrate victories, the question of the reasons for these losses becomes taboo. Criticism of military policy is interpreted as ‘disrespect for the memory of the dead’, ‘insulting mothers’, and so on. The birch tree as a symbol of mourning creates a protective ideological perimeter around any military actions of the state.

Memorialisation Without Contextualisation

The practice of erecting monuments to ‘fallen soldiers’ in occupied territories (Transnistria, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, Crimea, occupied areas of Donbas) demonstrates the next level of manipulation. These memorials systematically include birch trees, creating a visual code of ‘places of mourning.’

However, the context of this ‘mourning’ is carefully concealed: these ‘fallen’ soldiers participated in the occupation of foreign territories, torture, rape, ethnic cleansing, and violations of international humanitarian law. The birch tree serves as a symbolic whitewash: it supposedly testifies to ‘sacrifice’ and ‘suffering,’ but conceals the predatory nature of the actions.

Gender Manipulation: Feminisation as A Strategy of Legitimisation

In Russian cultural code, the birch tree is consistently gendered as a ‘female tree’ – as opposed to the ‘male’ oak tree. This gender labelling is not neutral; it carries a specific ideological load. The birch is associated with passivity, defencelessness, vulnerability, and submissiveness – qualities that in patriarchal culture are attributed to ‘true femininity’.

The combination of a national symbol with such characteristics creates a paradoxical situation: an aggressor nation represents itself through a symbol of defencelessness. This symbolic operation allows Russia to be constructed not as a predator, but as a ‘vulnerable victim’ that is ‘forced to defend itself’.

Maternal Grief as a Justification for Future Aggression

The cult of maternal grief, embodied in the symbol of the birch tree, performs an important prospective function. It not only legitimises past military actions but also creates the preconditions for justifying future ones. The logic of this manipulation is as follows: since mothers suffer from the loss of their sons, the state is obliged to ‘protect’ other mothers from similar suffering through preventive aggression.

This mechanism was particularly evident in the rhetoric surrounding the aggression against Ukraine: Russia allegedly ‘protects the Russian-speaking population’ (read: ‘mothers and children’) from ‘Nazis’. The birch tree on the memorials to those who ‘fell’ in previous wars becomes a symbolic justification for new aggression.

‘Protecting Mothers’ as A Legitimisation of Russian Colonial Expansion

The feminisation of the national symbol creates an opportunity for a specific rhetorical figure: military aggression is presented as ‘protecting women and children’. This strategy has deep roots in patriarchal culture, where ‘protecting the defenceless’ is the main justification for male violence.

The birch tree as a ‘feminine’ symbol embodies this rhetoric: it supposedly embodies those ‘defenceless elements’ that need ‘protection’. At the same time, the real victims of Russian aggression – women and children in the occupied territories – are completely excluded from this narrative.

The Colonial Function of the Symbol: Naturalising Occupation and Masking Imperialism Through ‘Naturalness’

The birch is one of those plants that can grow in different climatic zones – from the tundra to the steppe. This biological feature is used to symbolically mask imperial expansion. When birch trees are planted near military memorials in the occupied territories (from Kaliningrad to the Kuril Islands, from Transnistria to Syria), it creates the illusion of the ‘naturalness’ of the Russian presence.

‘Look’, this symbol says, ‘birch trees grow here as naturally as they do in Russia. Therefore, Russia’s presence is also natural’. The biological adaptability of the plant becomes a metaphor for the ‘right’ to occupation: if birch trees can grow everywhere, then Russia can also be everywhere.

Monuments to the ‘Fallen’ as Markers of Colonisation

The practice of erecting memorials to ‘fallen Russian soldiers’ in occupied territories is a classic colonial tool. These monuments serve as symbolic markers, designating the territory as ‘Russian’. Birch trees reinforce this effect: they are not just markers, but ‘living’ symbols that ‘grow’ into the landscape.

It is significant that such memorials are almost always erected in the most prominent places – central squares, parks, and near administrative buildings. Their function is not so much to honour the memory (after all, these ‘fallen’ are often aggressors) as to demonstrate ownership: ‘This land is now ours, here is a monument to our dead as proof’.

Naturalising Presence Through a ‘Natural’ Symbol

The use of a living plant (birch) instead of dead stone (traditional monuments) creates a specific effect. The living birch ‘grows’ into the local landscape, becoming part of it. Over time, it may even be perceived as ‘local’, especially by younger generations who do not remember the time before the occupation.

This strategy is particularly effective in areas that have been under occupation for a long time. For example, in occupied Königsberg, the birch trees near the Soviet monuments are already perceived by many residents as a ‘natural’ element of the urban landscape, although in reality they are markers of colonisation and ethnic cleansing.

Exporting Sacrifice: Creating the Illusion of a Shared Destiny

The systematic planting of birch trees near memorials to ‘Soviet liberators’ and ‘fallen Russian soldiers’ in Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, and Central Asia creates a visual code of ‘shared sacrifice’. These birch trees seem to say: ‘We all suffered together, we all lost together’.

However, this ‘commonality’ is a manipulation. The birch tree does not mark shared suffering, but rather one-sided sacrifice: local peoples are sacrificed to Russian imperial ambitions, and the birch tree symbolises not their sacrifice but the ‘grief of Russian mothers’ for the fallen occupiers.

The Illusion of ‘Shared Sacrifice’

Particularly cynical is the practice of planting birch trees near memorials at sites of mass crimes committed by the Soviet regime against the local population. When a birch tree grows next to a monument to deported peoples or victims of Stalin’s repressions, it creates a visual connection between different types of victims: as if the occupiers and the occupied are equal victims of ‘tragic history’.

This strategy erases the distinction between the aggressor and the victim of aggression, between the executioner and his victim. The birch tree becomes an instrument of revisionist historical policy: it visually equates the victims of the Holodomor with ‘fallen’ Soviet soldiers, the victims of deportations with the occupiers.

Erasing the Difference Between Aggressor and Victim

The deepest level of this manipulation lies in the complete erasure of the moral and legal difference between those who commit aggression and those who suffer from it. When birch trees grow both at the memorial to the victims of occupation and at the monument to the occupiers, they create a visual and symbolic equivalence.

This strategy is particularly dangerous in the context of post-colonial memory. Younger generations, who have no personal memory of the events, may perceive this visual equivalence as historical truth: as if ‘everyone suffered equally’, as if there were no aggressors and victims, only ‘the tragedy of war’.

Sacralisation Through ‘Naturalness’: The Birch Tree as a Quasi-Religious Symbol

In Russian symbolic space, the birch tree is gradually transforming from a natural object into a quasi-religious symbol. This transformation is carried out through a system of rituals, narratives and visual practices.

Planting a birch tree is becoming a sacred act, similar to erecting a cross or icon. The tree is becoming an object of ‘pilgrimage’ – schoolchildren are taken on excursions to memorials with birch trees, and veterans hold solemn ceremonies there. The birch tree acquires the status of a ‘witness’ to historical events and is attributed with the ability to ‘remember’ and ‘mourn.’

Sacrifice as a Category of the Sacred

In religious systems, sacrifice usually has a sacred status: it sanctifies, purifies, and creates a connection between the profane and the sacred. The birch tree as a symbol of sacrifice brings this religious subtext into the secular sphere of memorialisation.

The ‘fallen soldiers’ in whose memory the birch trees are planted acquire the status of quasi-religious victims. Their death is sacralised, transformed into a sacred act. At the same time, the context of their actions (aggression, occupation, war crimes) is completely eliminated from this sacred narrative.

This sacralisation makes critical reflection impossible. To question the appropriateness of the war in which these ‘sacred victims’ died is to commit sacrilege, to offend the sacred.

Nature as a Legitimisation of Culture: The Ecological Facade of Imperialism

The use of a living plant as a national symbol creates an ecological facade for imperialist politics. The birch tree supposedly embodies harmony with nature, organicity, life. How can a state that has chosen such a symbol be aggressive?

This manipulation is particularly effective in the current context of growing environmental awareness. The birch tree allows Russia to construct an image of an ‘environmentally conscious’ state that ‘cares for nature’, even when its military actions lead to environmental disasters (the destruction of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant, the contamination of territories with rocket debris, etc.).

Conclusions: Deconstruction of Symbols as a Tool For Decolonisation

This article has demonstrated how the birch tree functions as a sophisticated instrument of Russian symbolic colonisation, operating through multiple interrelated mechanisms that transform natural imagery into Russian imperial ideology. The analysis reveals that botanical imperialism constitutes not merely cultural appropriation but an active form of violence that legitimises territorial conquest, manufactures consent for military aggression, and creates durable structures of colonial domination that persist across generations and political regimes.

The study has established that the birch tree operates simultaneously across multiple registers of Russian imperial power. As territorial marker, it naturalises Russian presence in occupied territories, transforming sites of colonial violence into monuments celebrating perpetrators while systematically erasing the distinction between aggressor and victim. Through feminisation and associated narratives of vulnerability, the birch enables the paradoxical construction of Russia as simultaneously powerful aggressor and defenceless victim requiring protection, thereby legitimising violence as defensive necessity. The sacralisation function transforms military losses into quasi-religious sacrifices that cannot be questioned without committing symbolic sacrilege, creating protective ideological perimeters around state violence. Through affective manipulation, particularly mobilisation of maternal grief, the symbol generates emotional structures that bypass critical consciousness and embed imperial ideology at the level of embodied experience.

This article proves that symbolic colonisation through birch imagery constitutes a form of violence that operates precisely through its appearance of innocence. Unlike explicit propaganda that announces its political intentions, birch symbolism works through positive emotions – aesthetic pleasure, nostalgia, love of nature, mourning – that make imperial ideology feel natural, eternal, and morally good. This mechanism proves particularly effective because it transforms resistance into apparent cruelty: to reject the birch symbol appears to insult grieving mothers, desecrate memory of the dead, or deny aesthetic beauty.

The intensification of ‘birchification’ campaigns in occupied Ukrainian territories since 2014 demonstrates the system’s escalation during active military aggression. The mobilisation of children in ecological-patriotic rituals that combine environmental discourse with nationalist indoctrination represents particularly insidious manipulation, embedding imperial ideology through bodily practice and sensory experience before critical consciousness develops. These practices transform botanical colonisation into preparation for permanent territorial annexation, creating populations who experience Russian presence as natural element of landscape rather than military occupation.

The comparative analysis situates Russian practices within global patterns of colonial symbolic appropriation – British oaks in empire, French republican trees, Japanese cherry blossoms in occupied territories – while identifying distinctive features of the Russian case. The systematic emphasis on victimhood rather than triumph, the feminisation of the national symbol, and the inversion of aggressor-victim roles constitutes specific strategic adaptations that enable simultaneous projection of power and claims to historical injury. This dual positioning allows Russia to present territorial expansion as self-defence, ethnic cleansing as protection of vulnerable populations, and genocide as prevention of genocide.

The research contributes to broader theoretical understanding of how symbolic violence operates within colonial systems. It demonstrates that symbols do not merely represent political realities but actively constitute them, creating conceptual frameworks that make certain forms of violence appear necessary, beneficial, or even benevolent. The study reveals how cultural production under conditions of empire functions not as autonomous aesthetic sphere but as integral component of colonial apparatus, generating the affective structures and collective identifications that sustain material domination. This finding challenges analytical approaches that separate ‘culture’ from ‘politics’, demonstrating their mutual constitution within structures of imperial power.

The practical implications of this research extend beyond academic understanding to decolonial praxis. Recognition that birch symbolism constitutes active violence rather than innocent cultural expression creates foundation for resistance strategies that address not merely military occupation but the symbolic systems that legitimise it. Decolonisation requires not only territorial liberation but systematic deconstruction of the conceptual frameworks through which empire naturalises its domination. This includes exposing mechanisms through which positive emotions become vehicles for consciousness colonisation, demonstrating connections between aesthetic productions and material violence, and creating alternative symbolic systems that do not reproduce imperial logics.

The analysis suggests several directions for future research.

Comparative studies of how colonised populations experience and resist botanical imperialism would illuminate indigenous perspectives systematically excluded from Russian cultural production. Investigation of how symbolic systems transform across different media – from Soviet cinema to contemporary social media – would reveal adaptation strategies as imperial power encounters new communicative technologies. Examination of internal variations within Russian symbolic politics – how birch imagery functions differently across regional, class, and generational divides – would complicate monolithic representations of imperial culture. Analysis of moments when symbolic systems fail or generate unintended meanings would identify potential points of intervention for decolonial resistance.

The research demonstrates that seemingly apolitical cultural symbols constitute active instruments of colonial violence that require sustained critical attention. The birch tree’s transformation from circumpolar species into a marker of exclusively Russian identity, from natural object into quasi-religious symbol, from aesthetic subject into territorial claim, exemplifies mechanisms through which empire inscribes itself into collective consciousness. Recognising these mechanisms represents an essential first step toward their dismantling. Decolonisation demands not merely political sovereignty but liberation of symbolic space, creation of alternative narratives that do not position beauty, mourning, and belonging as vehicles for imperial expansion.

As Russian aggression against Ukraine continues, intensifying rather than diminishing birchification campaigns in occupied territories, the urgency of this decolonial work increases. Each birch tree planted near a memorial to fallen occupiers extends colonial violence into the future, creating durable structures that will continue generating imperial consciousness long after the current hostilities cease. Resistance requires immediate intervention not only against military occupation but against the symbolic systems that prepare populations to experience that occupation as natural, inevitable, even beneficial. The stakes extend beyond academic analysis to the fundamental question of whether colonised peoples can reclaim their landscapes – both material and symbolic – from imperial appropriation.

This study has revealed the birch tree as neither innocent cultural symbol nor neutral natural object but as active instrument of colonial domination. Recognition of symbolic violence as violence, of cultural imperialism as imperialism, of botanical colonisation as colonisation, constitutes necessary foundation for decolonial resistance. Only through sustained critical deconstruction of the mechanisms through which empire naturalises itself can colonised peoples begin the long process of reclaiming not merely territory but the very structures of consciousness through which territory is experienced and understood.

References:

Bashinform (2025). Soldiers from the Salavat Yulaev Battalion planted Bashkir birch trees in the Special Military Operation zone [Voiny batal’ona imeni Salavata Yulaeva vysadili v zone SVO bashkirskie beryozy]. Bashinform. November 3. 2025. URL: www.bashinform.ru/news/svo/2025-11-06/voiny-batalona-imeni-salavata-yulaeva-vysadili-v-zone-svo-bashkirskie-beryozy-4454455

Bogdan, N. (2024). Fostering patriotic feelings in preschoolers through the implementation of the project ‘Birch – a symbol of Russia’ [Formirovanie patrioticheskikh chuvstv doshkolnikov cherez realizaciyu proekta «Bereza – simvol Rossii»]. Interactive education. Electronic newspaper [Interaktivnoe obrazovanie. Elektronnaya gazeta]. Issue № 112, April 2024. Patriotic and spiritual-moral education. URL: https://io.nios.ru/articles2/129/14/formirovanie-patrioticheskih-chuvstv-doshkolnikov-cherez-realizaciyu-proekta-bereza

Books and theatre. Branch Library No. 10, Sevastopol [Kniga i teatr. Biblioteka-filial № 10 g. Sevastopolya] (2025). Birch tree – symbol of Russia [Bereza – simvol Rossii]. URL: https://luchik.cbssev.ru

Chelyabinsk Central Library named after A.S. Pushkin (2025). Birches: 220 poems by Soviet poets [Beryozy: 220 stikhotvorenij sovetskikh poehtov]. Chelyabinsk Central Library named after A.S. Pushkin. URL: https://vokrugknig.blogspot.com/2021/06/110.html

Guberniya – Chelyabinsk (2025). Chelyabinsk expert explains why birch trees became Russia’s national symbol [Chelyabinskij ehkspert obyasnil, pochemu bereza stala nacional’nym simvolom Rossii]. Guberniya – Chelyabinsk. February 27, 2025. URL: https://gubernia74.ru/articles/news/1131636/?sphrase_id=235678

Infpol (2023). Birch trees were planted again in Ulan-Ude in memory of the soldiers who died in the Special Military Operation [V Ulan-Udeh vnov’ vysadili beryozy v pamyat’ o pogibshikh na SVO boitsah]. Infpol. September 25, 2023. URL: www.infpol.ru/256666-v-ulan-ude-vnov-vysadili-beryezy-v-pamyat-o-pogibshikh-na-svo-boytsakh

Kameshkovsky Social Rehabilitation Centre for Minors [Kameshkovskij social’no-reabilitacionnyj centr dlya nesovershennoletnikh] (2024). Birch – symbol of Russia [Beryoza – simvol Rossii]. Kameshkovsky Social Rehabilitation Centre for Minors. April 12, 2024. URL: https://kamsocentr.social33.ru/novosti/glavnye-novosti/beryeza-simvol-rossii/

Mayak (2025). Five birch trees were planted today by the children of SVO participants in the village of Miass [Pyat’ beryozok vysadili segodnya deti uchastnikov SVO v sele Miasskom]. Mayak. News of Krasnoarmeysky District Chelyabinsk Region. September 29, 2025. URL: https://mayak-74.ru/news/specoperaciya/13280

News from Belarus (2025). A memorial sign called ‘Birch Grove’ was unveiled in Minsk, dedicated to Soviet soldiers who died during the liberation of the city [U Mіns’ku otdkryli pamyatnij znak «Berezovyi gaj», prisvyachenij radyans’kim voїnam, yakі zaginuli pіd chas vizvolennya mіsta]. News from Belarus. May 7, 2025. URL: https://news.sb.by/articles/v-minske-otkryli-pamyatnyy-znak-berezovaya-roshcha-posvyashchennyy-pavshim-pri-osvobozhdenii-goroda

Official Internet portal for legal information in the Irkutsk Region [Oficial’nyj internet-portal pravovoj informacii Irkutskoj oblasti] (2025). Two memorials commemorating SVO soldiers were unveiled in Angarsk [Dva memoriala pamyati bojcov SVO otkryli v Angarske]. Official Internet portal for legal information in the Irkutsk Region. October 3, 2025. URL: www.ogirk.ru/2024/10/03/dva-memoriala-pamjati-bojcov-svo-otkryli-v-angarske/

Our Krasnoyarsk Region (2024). Twenty young birch trees were planted near the Victory Memorial in Krasnoyarsk. They became a continuation of the road, symbolising the soldier’s path to victory [20 molodyh beryoz vysadili vozle Memoriala Pobedy v Krasnoyarske. Oni stali prodolzheniem dorogi, simvoliziruyushchej put’ soldata k Pobede]. Our Krasnoyarsk Region. October 31, 2024. URL: https://gnkk.ru/news/20-molodykh-berez-vysadili-vozle-memoria

Pskov Information Agency (2022). A birch grove in memory of local residents burned during the Great Patriotic War will appear in the Plyussky District [A birch grove in memory of local residents burned during the Great Patriotic War will appear in the Plyussky District]. Pskov Information Agency. April 17, 2022. URL: https://informpskov.ru/news/386750.html

Rakurs (2019). ‘They chopped up the symbol of Russia, just like the Bandera followers chopped up people at the sawmills’: Crimea mourns the birch tree cut down by municipal workers [Raschlenili simvol Rossiyu, kak banderovcy lyudej na lesopilkakh»: v Krymu sokrushayutsya o spilennoj kommunal’shchikami bereze]. Rakurs. March 1, 2019. URL: https://racurs.ua/n118800-aeroport-v-ujgorode-vozobnovit-rabotu-s-15-marta.html

Russian Geographical Society (2015). Birch rose of remembrance. Russian Geographical Society. June 11, 2015. URL: https://rgo.ru/activity/redaction/news/beryezovaya-roshcha-pamyati

St. Petersburg. Network of City Portals (2025). Memorial Grove of 900 Birches [Pamyatnaya roshcha “900 berez”]. St. Petersburg. Network of City Portal. URL: http://spb.holme.ru/sight/598ccae23620ebcc3ff53b29

TASS (2024). Birch trees planted in LPR kindergarten as part of ‘Garden of Remembrance’ campaign [V LNR v detsadu vysadili berezy v ramkakh akcii “Sad pamyati”]. TASS Russian News Agency. April 14, 2024. URL: https://tass.ru/obschestvo/20531673