Earlier this year, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Vladimir Putin was living "in another world".

In a televised speech to his ambassadors, the Russian President set out his vision of that world.

This was a world becoming more unpredictable, he warned, where international law is being ignored, and the potential for conflict growing.

But none of that is Russia's fault, you understand.

Mr Putin, reason personified, set out his logic for annexing Crimea: they could not simply leave people to the mercy of "militant nationalists and radicals" (the forces Russia insists have come to power in Kiev).

They could not allow Russia's access to the Black Sea to be restricted, or Sevastopol and the Crimean coast, which are "steeped in the military glory of Russian soldiers and sailors" to be occupied by Nato forces.

Not to have acted, could have erased "almost everything Russia was fighting for from the times of Peter the Great, maybe even before".

History had spoken.

But he warned other countries, with no apparent sense of irony, against "meddling in the affairs of sovereign states".

His audience nodded along approvingly.

There was the familiar dig at the West and obligatory Cold War reference.

Events in Ukraine, he explained, had been provoked through the "so-called policy of containment towards Russia", whose roots go "far back in history", and had "unfortunately not ceased even after the Cold War ended".

He sees Nato advancing, in spite of western assurances: "Over the past two years our partners have convinced us they have good intentions … but at the same time they expanded the Nato alliance and moved their political borders closer to Russia's borders.

"When we lawfully ask: don't you think you should discuss this with us? We are told: no, it's none of your business."

Mr Putin’s world is a world in which Russia is repeatedly slighted, not treated with the respect it deserves as a resurgent superpower and 'equal partner' in international relations, despite its best efforts and general reasonableness.

"Bilateral relations with the US are not at their best, that is true," he said. "But this - and I want to emphasise - is not Russia’s fault.

"We always tried to be a predictable partner, but our rightful interests have been ignored."

He said he hoped "The West" would abandon its ambition to establish a "world barracks", conjuring an unfortunate image from Team America World Police, but pursue instead relations based on "equal rights, mutual respect and mutual consideration of interests".

All of which is fairly well-trodden ground for Mr Putin, but what was interesting is what he had to say about the "greater Russian world" - an idea he set out in a speech shortly after the annexation of Crimea.

The Greater Russian world includes Russian-speaking citizens and "compatriots" abroad - and invokes the imperative to protect the rights of all Russians, a vow he has repeated.

Some see this as a convenient pretext to intervene beyond the Russian border in future - wherever those citizens or interests might be.