Russian irredentism
Russian troops currently occupy parts of three neighbouring countries: southern and eastern Ukraine, Abkhazia and South Ossetia in Georgia, and the Transnistria region of Moldova.
Specifically looking at the viewpoints of post-Soviet Russian leader Vladimir Putin, Erdi Ozturk, a professor at London Metropolitan University, has commented that irredentist ideology relies upon a "distinction between civilizations by synthesizing nationalism with nostalgic visions of history, memory, and religion.
[n 1] Few of these actions had irredentist justifications, though the conquest of parts of the Ottoman Empire in the Caucasus in 1877 to bring Armenian Christians under the protection of the Tsar may represent one example.
[14] Putin said that the dissolution of the Soviet Union had "robbed" Russia of territories and made Russians "the biggest ethnic group in the world to be divided by borders", calling this an "outrageous historical injustice".
[27] In announcing the invasion, Putin repeatedly denied Ukraine's right to exist, calling the country "an inalienable part of our own history, culture and spiritual space", and claiming that it was created by Russia.
Peter Dickinson of the Atlantic Council sees these comments as proof that Putin "is waging an old-fashioned imperial war of conquest".
[35][36][37] On 6 July, the speaker of the State Duma, Vyacheslav Volodin, threatened to "claim back" Alaska if the US froze or seized Russian assets.
[38] Previously, another member of the State Duma, Oleg Matveychev, had demanded in response to sanctions that the US return Alaska, in addition to Fort Ross, California (which was historically a Russian colony).
The Russian occupation authorities announced that all regions had overwhelmingly voted in favor of joining Russia and that there had been a high turnout despite the ongoing war and depopulation.
[51] Looking at the Russian efforts as a whole, the news network Al Jazeera has quoted University of San Francisco scholar Stephen Zunes as remarking, "The level of physical devastation and casualties thus far over a relatively short period is perhaps the [worst] in recent decades which, combined with the irredentist aims of the conquest, makes Russia's war on Ukraine particularly reprehensible in the eyes of the international community.
"[2] U.S. news publication The Washington Post has stated that the Russian government could start a chain reaction of irredentist mass violence, which then "could break the international order".
Soviet/post-Soviet territories that were never part of Imperial Russia: Tuva (1944–), East Prussia (1945–), western Ukraine (1939–1991), and Kuril Islands (1945–)
Imperial territories/states that did not become part of the Soviet Union: Finland (1809–1917), Poland (1815–1915), and Kars (1878–1918)
Soviet sphere of influence: Warsaw Pact (1945–1991; Albania until 1968; East Germany until 1990), Mongolia (1924–1991)
Imperial sphere of influence and Soviet military occupation: northern Iran (1914–1918; 1941–1946), Manchuria (1892–1906; 1945–1946), northern Korea (1892–1906; 1945–1948), Xinjiang (1934), eastern Austria (1945–1955), and Afghanistan (1979–1989)
