Russia-Ukraine Identity Debate

russia and soviet union are not too far apart actually. Let's not make victim of poor russians, while so many of them fight now and fought in the past to kill independent nations.

Russian Federation != Russia and doesn't contain a region called "Russia". Actual Russia renamed itself into Ukraine.

Russians do not think that fellow Russians stuck on the other side of a newly drawn state borders are "other nations".Just as Hungarians do not consider Hungarians from Uzhgorod an other nation; ditto Serbs do not consider Serbs from Respublika Srpska another different nation.Russians actually care very little about what all of the remaining Eastern Europeans are up to. They aren't of much interest. Why do you need Warsaw if you can fly to Paris non-stop.

there is a difference between "russian" and "russian speaking" that is quite important to many eastern europeans that do not wish to be part of some kreml lead lingua-nation.

Not Russian territory but under Soviet (and then Russian) influence. No?

it's about the difference between "was" and "is". Sure, a bunch of states were formally parts of the Russian Empire as well as the USSR. That doesn't mean you can reduce them to "it's just Russia", those lands and peoples had history prior to being invaded and some have been lucky to have had some independence since the fall of the USSR. Considering that there are people out there literally fighting to the death not to be a part of the next russian im

Russian citizenship is not something that people cherish or want. Most of the Russian territory and population has been occupied at some point: Siberia long time ago, Caucasus in the past centuries, Crimea in 2014. Russians don't care about those people the same way the care about their own.

More like Ukrainian, given the birthplace. USSR wasn’t Russia.

I think it's hard to understand how people view their ethincity as different from their citizenship for people from countries with a colonial heritage. People who are of Russian ethnicity but live in another country like the Ukraine, or Latvia, or Lithuania, or Estonia, or any number of other former Soviet or Russian Empire states often consider themselves as Russian, they also often feel like they're marginalised in their homes and face racism so I could see the Russian ethnic regions

Russia doesn't believe a country called Ukraine exists. Instead they believe a region called 'the Ukraine' does. Funny your choice of words.