On January 27, an Iranian missile and drone strike destroyed an E-3 Sentry Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft at a U.S. Air Force base in Saudi Arabia. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy claimed Russia was behind the attack. He alleged that Russia provided Iran with satellite imagery of the U.S. military base in Saudi Arabia. Russia is also known to have stepped up military support to Iran, including providing drones and operational technology.
As Russia continues its war in Ukraine — now in its fourth year since the invasion — and intervenes in the Iran conflict, the world is paying close attention to Moscow's imperialist conduct. Russian President Vladimir Putin has made no secret of his ambition to restore the glory of the Russian Empire. He has openly declared that "the collapse of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century" and that "Russia will liberate its historical territories."
The newly published *Russia's Empire: A Study* surveys a thousand years of Russian history, from Kievan Rus through the Muscovite state, Imperial Russia, the Soviet Union, and the current Putin regime. It was co-authored by Ronald Suny, professor emeritus at the University of Michigan and the University of Chicago, and Valerie Kivelson, an endowed chair professor at the University of Michigan — two of the foremost scholars of Russian history in the United States.
What sets this book apart is its examination of Russia's vast history through the lens of "empire" rather than "nation." According to the authors, an empire is a political system in which a ruler claiming absolute sovereignty governs a vast territory composed of heterogeneous regions and ethnic groups. They also frame empire as being built on an unequal power relationship between the metropole and its periphery.
The book identifies "differentiation" and "reciprocity" as the core mechanisms of imperial governance. Differentiation refers to power structures built unequally along lines of ethnicity, language, religion, geography, status, and class. Reciprocity describes a bilateral relationship in which rulers use concession rather than coercion to instill in their subjects the perception that the oppressive order is legitimate. Based on these concepts, the authors characterize the history of Russian imperial governance as largely "authoritarianism to which the governed consented."
From this perspective, the book also addresses the histories of minority peoples on Russia's periphery — in Central-Eastern Europe, Ukraine, the Caucasus, and Central Asia. Vladimir Lenin, who seized power through the 1917 socialist revolution, adopted a position recognizing the autonomy of non-Russian minorities. But Joseph Stalin, who succeeded Lenin, pursued a centralized ethnic policy centered on Russians. On the anniversary of the October Revolution in 1938, Stalin declared: "In the Soviet Union, all nationalities are equal, but the most Soviet and revolutionary nationality is the Russian nationality."
The case of the Koryo-saram — ethnic Koreans — is also mentioned. More than 170,000 Koreans who had migrated to the Soviet Far East to escape Japanese colonial rule were forcibly deported by Stalin to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. The authors argue that when Soviet authority weakened during the era of Mikhail Gorbachev, the nationalities question became a key driver of the Soviet Union's dissolution.
In its final chapters, the book traces Russia's invasions of Chechnya and Georgia from the 1990s onward and the annexation of Crimea from Ukraine. The authors analyze that NATO's eastward expansion created a security dilemma for Russia. European measures intended to strengthen regional security were perceived by Russia as threatening and aggressive. Putin subsequently shifted policy toward opposing the U.S.-led unipolar order, exerting dominant influence over neighboring states, and seeking recognition as a regional hegemon.
Though originally published in 2016, the book includes a "Korean Edition Supplement" that addresses Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine. It diagnoses that Russia's sense of vulnerability as a state exposed to threats from surrounding rival powers combined with its ambitions to become a great power, leading to overextension beyond its own capacity. The authors also point to the irony that such ambition and excessive expansion have instead deepened Russia's instability, isolation, and vulnerability.
The authors warn that imperial practices have been a fundamental mode of Russian governance and that Russia's pursuit of hegemony will continue. "The images and practices of autocracy and empire continue to overwhelm the other available alternatives as Russia searches for a vision of its future."
At a time when North Korea has deployed troops to Russia and the alignment among North Korea, China, and Russia is intensifying, the book merits attention for its insight into how Russia's imperialist conduct is a significant variable affecting South Korea's security as well.
888 pages, 56,000 won.