Shortly after the breakup of the Soviet Union into its constituent republics in 1991, Russia set about reestablishing its empire, piece by piece. These efforts included Russian-instigated separatist movements in neighboring countries, military invasions, illegal annexations, mercenary deployments, cyberattacks, manipulated elections, the poisoning of politicians, and massive disinformation campaigns. Inside Russia, which remains a tapestry of lands and peoples conquered and colonized under tsars and communists, these efforts have included warfare and mass atrocities, as in Chechnya.

As a fact of history and problem of contemporary geopolitics, Russia’s nature as an imperial power is incontrovertible. After World War I, the Russian Empire avoided the permanent dismemberment that befell other multi-ethnic land empires, such as the Ottoman Empire and Austria-Hungary. The Soviet Union not only reconquered most of the non-Russian lands that had declared independence from Moscow in the wake of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution (including Ukraine, Belarus, Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan)—but even expanded the empire in the course of World War II, annexing Moldova, the western part of Ukraine, and other lands. Nor did the Soviet Union participate in the decolonization era. Even as the French and British empires were being dissolved, the Soviet Union was expanding its colonial reach, tightening its grip deep into Eastern and Central Europe with bloody crackdowns and military actions.

As a fact of history and problem of contemporary geopolitics, Russia’s nature as an imperial power is incontrovertible. After World War I, the Russian Empire avoided the permanent dismemberment that befell other multi-ethnic land empires, such as the Ottoman Empire and Austria-Hungary.