The idea of Russian empire, then, comes naturally to Putin. But his version of empire isn’t an exact replica of Nicholas II’s. Instead, it is an imagined, virtual empire, encompassing the traits of the Soviet Union, Russian Orthodox Christianity, sovereignty, populism, Joseph Stalin, victory in World War II, Yuri Gagarin’s trip into space, and the palaces of Catherine the Great. Putin’s ideology is built on a feeling of Russia’s inherent greatness, the idea that it is a country to be feared and respected. A world in which CNN airs a documentary about Putin called “The Most Powerful Man in the World” is his best world.

The conventional wisdom is that, during Putin’s first term, the people of Russia traded their political freedom for a sense of security and prosperity. In the 2000s, thanks to high oil prices, many Russians were better off than ever before. But that’s changed since then. Russians are now willing to forego a part of their prosperity in exchange for a sense of national pride, willing to suffer the sting of sanctions or economic crisis as long as Crimea is part of Russia. Most Russians haven’t felt pride in their country since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Because of the economic turbulence that followed, many of them felt humiliated.

Now, for many, Putin has restored a sense of pride. It’s like what you feel when your favorite football team wins. Nothing actually changes: You don’t become smarter, healthier, or richer; your personal life doesn’t improve. You simply, irrationally, feel happier, proud of an accomplishment in which you played no role. To millions of Russians, Putin is that football team. And all he does is win.

Russia’s glories of yesteryear are far more important than some new, unprecedented victory, providing fuel for the Russian propaganda machine. As oil prices tumbled to historic lows, Russian history has replaced the bounty of the boom years as the eternal spring of Putin’s popularity.

Viewed through this lens, 1917 is the most uncomfortable year possible for Russian propaganda. In the story of the fall of the Russian empire, there is no character for Putin to equate himself with. Not Stalin, the man who led his countrymen to victory in the war (he has never compared himself with Stalin personally), and not Nicholas II, that loser who surrendered an empire. Nor can he equate himself with Vladimir Lenin, the revolutionary who wrecked an empire. (Putin doesn’t hide his antipathy for Lenin, referring to him as the man who put a ticking atomic bomb under Russia.)

And Putin certainly cannot compare himself to the democratic revolutionaries who governed the country from the February and October 1917. Thanks to their efforts, Russia became, for a short time, the most progressive country in the world, the first nation in Europe to abolish the death penalty, and one of the first to introduce universal suffrage, including for women.