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Concept
Russian irredentism
Summary
Russian irredentism (Русский ирредентизм), sometimes expressed by the term Greater Russia (Великая Россия), refers to territorial claims made on behalf of the Russian Federation to parts of the former Russian Empire and/or the former Soviet Union. It seeks to politically incorporate Russians who are living in territories that fall outside of Russia's modern borders.
Since it began in 2014, the Russo-Ukrainian War has been described as a culmination of Russia's irredentist policies towards Ukraine. Specific examples of these irredentist policies being implemented in the Ukrainian conflict include the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014 and the Russian annexation of southeastern Ukraine in 2022, with the latter having occurred amidst the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine.
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 civilisations by synthesising nationalism with nostalgic visions of history, memory, and religion."
From roughly the 16th century to the 20th century, the Russian Empire followed an expansionist policy. 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.
After the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, it was thought that the Russian Federation had given up on plans of territorial expansion or kin-state nationalism, despite some 25 million ethnic Russians living in neighboring countries outside Russia. Stephen M. Saideman and R. William Ayres assert that Russia followed a non-irredentist policy in the 1990s despite some justifications for irredentist policies—one factor disfavoring irredentism was a focus by the ruling interest in consolidating power and the economy within the territory of Russia.
Official source
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