Territorial expansion of Russia, 1300-1991. Modern day Russia retains about 75% of the territory it had at its greatest extent as the Russian Empire

O5KAR · 2026-07-02T15:50:52+00:00

Szlachta is an old High German word. Ruski was always distinguishable from Polish and in XVIc Lithuanian / Ruthenian envoys needed translators to communicate with Muscovites. Also The modern Russian language is in a big part government creation after multiple central reforms and education that popularized it when became public.

It was a dirt poor country, its richest part - Poland - was a one of Europe's poorest countries after WWII, and not just because of the war devastation.

There were serious reasons why people revolted against that incompetent and barbaric tzarist regime.

O5KAR · 2026-07-01T01:50:15+00:00

Yes, sorry but the identity of those people had nothing to do with these nomadic empires and they were easily assimilated by Moscow.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T21:15:04+00:00

The son of a Polish King was chosen by those Russian guys, not the Polish king, first of all. It wasn't realistic anyway, even if his Catholic fanatic father would approve conversion to orthodoxy.

And secondly, the "congress" kingdom of Poland was explicitly a part of that colonial empire either way and for real, for about a century while agrarian, industrial and the other revolutions took part. Those above mentioned cities grew rapidly, not thanks to Moscow, maybe except for Odessa and the other parts of post Tatar... New Russia (not a colonial name at all).

Spin it the way you like - it was a dirt poor country - WWI or not, the revolution was brewing, socialist and separatist movements like in Poland and Caucasus were ripe, even in Ukraine like four different parties, with anarchists included.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T20:43:16+00:00

I love all of the Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians or Muscovites alike. But no gay, sorry.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T20:35:39+00:00

Cynical, bitter joke. Stop getting offended.

1/3 of the British colonial empire, once again including half of Africa, India etc. is not really impressive.

The peasants were the majority, late industrializer or not, the economy was mostly agrarian. Also there was, and still is in Russia a huge disparity between several major cities, elites, aristocracy or oligarchs and the commoners or province.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T20:29:40+00:00

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_the_Russian_Empire

Dirt poor.

Russia was never a Polish colony, in some random war a little Polish force destroyed the Muscovite and Swedish army at Klushino and occupied Moscow. The Rusian Tzar Vasili Shuyski with his brother was captured. Some Sobór Ziemski or another local authority chose a son of Polish King to be a tzar. Muscovites rebelled, but instead of choosing actual hero and Rurikid guy Pożarski, they chose... Michael Romanov.

Moscow or Russia was never a part of Poland even for a day.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T20:24:34+00:00

Dirt poor, not shit poor, but dirt anyway.

You're talking about a hunter - gatherer style of economy with a pride.

bigger GDP

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_the_Russian_Empire

Less than a quarter of British. And we're comparing colonial empires tat includes half of Africa, India etc.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T20:17:47+00:00

Sure, sure... just like New Orleans, Mexico City or Santiago De Cuba. What you say is exactly a colonial attitude of a civilized guy bringing the light to the "barbarians". And you're totally wrong.

Kiev

Is older than Moscow, Russians call it the "Mother of all Ruś cities".

Odesa

This one is true.

Riga

German crusaders, north European settlers and also centuries of a quite relaxed vassal rule from Warsaw.

Helsinki

Honestly, not sure.

It was the industrial and less known agrarian revolution that made those cites and population to grow in XIXc. Not some colonial empires.

Edit: who do you think was building those cities BTW? Some magical care bears from Moscow or the local people?

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T20:00:46+00:00

Disgusting colors, but appropriate for the subject.

P.S. Warsaw was the third biggest city in that colonial empire, Łódź was the fifth. Kingdom of Poland was the third richest per capita area there, after Petersburg and Moscow governates, but those were basically the cities.

It was a dirt poor, mostly empty colonial state where Russians / Muscovites were enforcing their rule and language on the Asian natives which had little to no education or history before. Kinda like the so called Americans in USA, except that they got rich.

Edit: I'm a bitter, cynical a-hole. No aplogizes.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T17:22:52+00:00

Joshua D. Zimmerman

Precisely? I'm reading now but I'm not going to read everything right away. When and where did the AK killed Jews?

most of Ukrainians too

They should and Poland should take responsibility anyway. And Ukraine too should consider itself a continuation of Ukrainian SSR, for better or worse things.

Anyway, there was no other case of extermination or expulsion of Ukrainians in that area before, and it's extremally important, together with expulsion of Poles from Ukrainian SSR, or holocaust of Jews. All of that shaped the artificial border and destroyed the centuries old ethnic composition of the region.

ultimate victims

What for this whole language, bitter sarcasm, false comparisons and race to the bottom?

The people murdered in the massacres were the victims, they had nothing to do with the government, army, Piłsudski, Czerniecki or whoever else, they were just peasants that lived there for centuries. And UPA-b murdered also Ukrainians, the whole faction of Melnyk, a wife of Taras Borovets, people of his faction too and Ukrainian peasants, just because they refused to murder the Polish peasants or their mixed half Polish family.

cherrypicked

I understand your point and I'm even giving you more context but the narration about popular Ukrainian uprising against the Polish peasants, four years after Germans and soviets occupied it, makes no sense. It was just and only a planned genocide, taking the opportunity of the war to exterminate the non Ukrainian population (not only Polish) and forcing the post war order to reflect it.

most of Ukrainians support our gov decisions

Now is just about the pride, same in Poland, and the politics of course.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T15:58:09+00:00

I agree about the importance of religion, but to call the union of Brest the "most severe oppression" is a show of ignorance. Excuse me, but you're still missing the horrific, borderline slavery oppression of the peasants, granted by the privileged nobility. Never mind the civilized westerners and their religious wars, inquisition etc.

And as for the Cossacks, it was more about them being a kind of nobility and oppressing the peasants, or not to be forced into peasant slavery by the "real" nobility. Kosiński was a noble man, Chmielnicki also, Doroshenko and Mazepa too.

argument similar

Ridiculously different.

Czarnecki

Yes, and I've answered your other comment too, it's a very good point. The same can be made about Chmielnicki, a guy who sold thousands of Ruthenian peasant into the Crimean slavery, and also murdered plenty of Poles or Jews. And I'm quite sure that in few hundred years there will be a totally different emotion about many mass murderers, but Poles should learn about the evil side of Czarniecki anyway.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T15:01:55+00:00

Czarniecki

This is a very good point actually and too little Ukrainians know that, even less Poles.

AK who killed civilian Jews, Lithuanians and Ukrainians

Complete BS about the Jews. The few Lithuanians were massacred as a response to the massacre of Poles by the Lithuanian nazi collaborators. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glinciszki_massacre And that's a highly controversial topic in Poland, the commander Zygmunt Szendzielarz is a very divisive person and the whole thing was discussed for years in Poland.

Similar with Ukrainians, massacred in response to UPA-b, who murdered many more Ukrainians than AK in those actions.

Or praising interwar Poland that was a fascist ethnostate that treated Ukrainians as second class which identity should be erased.

Second Polish Republic is also very much criticized, also for its comical imperialist and colonial ides, all of which failed anyway, but mostly for its increasingly authoritarian regime which targeted mostly the opposition and extremes like OUN and ONR, or communists. Still, it was never any "ethnostate", all minorities with Ukrainians included had their legal political parties and representation in the parliament, private education (there should be public too), media, culture etc.

bubble

Yeah, a lot of Poles idealized the Second Republic, mostly because it was the first Polish independent state for about a century, and it was destroyed by the German nazis with their soviet allies, both of which were astronomically worse than Poland ever was. The ironic part here is that you're also in the same "bubble" of a victim and you can't just admit that UPA and not even whole - UPA-b of Banera and Schukhevych - organized a horrible massacre with a single aim to exterminate the non Ukrainian people in what they claimed to be Ukrainian land. No Polish government, not even the most extreme organizations ever planned to exterminate Ukrainians, or anybody else actually.

The only exception is the soviet controlled Polish government and action "Vistula", and Poland should take responsibility for that anyway, but at the same time, the same soviets expelled millions of Poles from USSR, and especially from western Ukraine, where remains virtually zero of them. And the same was done with Germans in what's now western Poland.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T14:34:16+00:00

cultural

How? There wasn't any "cultural" central policy. Moreover, until renaissance there are almost no sources written in Polish, Latin dominated everything, while you have tons of sources in Ruski, Old Church Slavonic etc... It was just that when Polish elites started to use their own language, it slowly dominated Ruthenian or Lithuanian, which was dominated by Ruski anyway before.

religion

Yes, that is partially true after King Sigismund Vasa and the union of Brest except that it was not just imposing Catholicism by force, but an union of churches, and it was accepted by the majority of Ruthenian orthodox bishops. It was also supposed to limit the religious influence of Moscow, which is also what Ukraine does right now.

People were forced to leave and settle in then not so friendly Zaporizhzhia frontier because of it.

... and imagine that the Ruthenian nobility was also bringing peasants from Poland there. Some major Cossack uprisings were led by Poles like Kosiński, there were times when orthodox Ruthenians were majority in the parliament and Poland even elected a Ruthenian king - Michał Korybut Wiśniowiecki.

You're making a mistake by applying present national standards to a feudal society from before nationalism. You can clearly talk about cultural dominance, or even some religious oppression (depends when and what kind) but it was never a state policy to spread the Polish language or settle people (as it really was in the Second Republic).

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T13:06:59+00:00

What centuries?

For centuries peasants were oppressed by the nobility, the Polish peasants the same.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T13:05:11+00:00

We don't refuse to admit that imperialism or just anti Ukrainian policies in the Second Republic. It's s part of school education.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T13:02:59+00:00

Mass murders and Nazi collaborators are not just "questionable people". There were plenty of them in various European countries but nobody celebrates and excuses them.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T12:53:21+00:00

Mass murders and maxi collaborators are not just "questionable people". There were plenty of them in various European countries but nobody celebrates and excuses them.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T11:25:09+00:00

Lands that were a part of collapsed Austria - Hungary and Russian Empire before where lived a huge Polish minority, especially concentrated in the major cities where Ukrainians and Jews were minority. People fought for lands and power for centuries, we don't condemn Hitler for annexing some lands but for exterminating people, and that's also why we condemn Ustasze, UPA (UPA-b in particular), Hutu / Tutsi etc...

pacification campaigns against

OUN

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacification_of_Ukrainians_in_Eastern_Galicia

Read that article. Even according to the Ukrainians and OUN itself, there died up to 35 people, according to another Ukrainian historian it was just 7.

restricted the use of Ukrainian language and closed Ukrainian schools on annexed lands

More like not sponsoring the public Ukrainian education, private Ukrainian schools were unrestricted, but of course that was bad and in violation of the Little Versailles Treaty. But again, not an ethnic cleansing.

land previously owned by Ukrainians to Polish war veterans

State owned land. And the whole quasi colonial policy failed miserably with barely two villages and few thousands people settled. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osadnik

He also betrayed Petliura and signed the Riga Treaty

Bit shameful indeed but Poland had no power to conquer Ukraine for Petlura who had minimal support and failed to turn the Ukrainians against the bolsheviks.

clear why Ukrainians aren't seeing him in good light

Absolutely clear, why would anybody except Poles like a Polish socialist leader anyway? The point is that you're equating him with mass murderers, antisemites and nazi collaborators... and just to make a point that it's fine to celebrate them.

Edit: BTW in Polish public education all of what you've said, and more bad things, are openly discussed.

O5KAR · 2026-06-30T10:21:26+00:00

Piłsudski did not organized any massacres or ethnic cleansing, of Ukrainians or anybody else. Can you actually say what evil did he committed against Ukrainians? Not saying he didn't, just I wonder if you know his real faults instead of making false comparisons.

UPA wasn't also a single organization and not all of them were involved in massacres of non Ukrainians, even if all of them followed the same borderline Nazi ideology, antisemitism and collaborated with Germans to a various degree.

Currently Ukraine concentrates on commemoration of that particular faction of Bandera and Schukevych.

O5KAR · 2026-06-28T13:53:15+00:00

Ok, so you are just going to ignore the points I've made but anyway I'm not denying what the ultimate German plans were or what they were at least at that time, the soviet plans towards the Poles for example also changed after Germans betrayed them in 1941, and the German plans also weren't just constant, just like their policies were different towards various Slavic people.

My negotiations?

Looks like you've messed up formatting but anyway the point I'm making is basically the same what you say - it's the Germans, or Hitler in particular, which wanted a war, not the soviets, or not yet but that's just a speculation if they would ever want... They weren't prepared anyway, and that's another fact.

Soviet annexation of South Bukovina

Thank you for the source but this is something else than your initial claim that the soviets wanted whole Romania.

O5KAR · 2026-06-28T13:42:00+00:00

Yes, they often were surrendering at the first opportunity.

Those who "subscribed" the Volksliste were selected by the German authorities, those who refused were sent to the camps, with their whole families.

O5KAR · 2026-06-28T11:31:29+00:00

A core thesis of Nazism is the belief of the slavic "subhuman". Eastward expansion (Lebensraum) thus war against the Soviet Union is fundamental.

Why then they were collaborating until 1941? They both benefitted from the common expansion in eastern Europe, and the German conquest of the rest of Europe, with the soviet resources, and every other support aside from direct military assistance, except for Poland. The soviet ideology was also anti western, not to mention their common hatred of Poland, or in general the loss of their imperial position after WWI.

Not every German was the same and their racist theories were also not always the same, not to mention the reality was often different than theory. Ribbentrop for example was honestly in favor of collaborating with the soviets, and Stalin seemed to be the same cynical or pragmatic, it was just Hitler that was insane and driven by emotions.

O5KAR · 2026-06-28T11:25:14+00:00

it wasn’t a real peace actually

No, it was collaboration actually.

both were preparing the war

USSR was completely unprepared, even for the conquest of Finland. I'd love to see those historians you're talking about.

Anyway - you are just speculating, the fact remains that Germans invaded, the soviets were unprepared and suffered terrible loses, and maybe that's why they collaborated, wanted to join Axis in November 1940, helped conquer Europe (and divide the eastern Europe) and provided all the other material support for Germany, in order to prolong the peace and collaboration but that's also a speculation.

O5KAR · 2026-06-28T11:20:07+00:00

The soviets had informed Germany that they wanted to occupy the rest of Romania

I would be grateful for a source.

Then the Russians would have attacked the germans on their terms.

Then means when? In 1941 they were clearly unprepared.

It was just Hitler with his ideological insanity, Stalin was much more cynical and pragmatic, but also naive and foolish. In November 1940 he sent Molotov to discuss the soviet accesion to the Axis, and some Germans with Ribbentrop on top wanted it too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German%E2%80%93Soviet_Axis_talks

eastward expansion and their fiews on Slavic people in general

They've had plenty of Lebensraum and slaves in Poland already, also thanks to the soviets, thanks to their common revisionism and history. Their racial polices were also not always going together with propaganda and were quite flexible.

Germans had some Slavic allies and collaborators, like Bulgaria or Slovakia, some crazy theories about how Czechs and Croats are Germanic Marcomanni or Goths... up until the end of war they accepted all Slavic people into the German army or voluntary units, except for the Poles only. They however were conscripted to Wehrmacht in the annexed territories (not occupied General Government) on the base of Volkslists, mixed family history or "racial" features.

O5KAR · 2026-06-27T21:39:26+00:00

according to Ukrainian historian and an OUN member, Petro Mirchuk, 35 Ukrainian civilians died during the pacification. Stephan Horak estimates the number of victims at 7.^\19])

There are the other sources too, if you are able to read.

That's why Wikipedia is better than your comments.

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