

From your link:
[Stalin said] “The Russian tsars did many bad things. They plundered and enslaved the people. They waged wars and grabbed territory in the interests of the landowners. But they did do one good thing—they created a huge state that stretches all the way to Kamchatka. We have inherited that state. And for the first time we, the Bolsheviks, have brought together and consolidated this state as a single, indivisible state… for the benefit of the workers”
At the Berlin train station on the eve of the Potsdam Conference in 1945, U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union Averell Harriman asked Stalin how it felt.to arrive in the capital of a defeated enemy as a victor. Stalin replied, “Tsar Alexander made it all the way to Paris.”
That is absolutely not a territorial claim, it’s a statement about Russian history. He specifically mentioned the horrors of the tsarist empire, which you will never hear Putin do
Thanks for the charitative reading of my post, I appreciate that you took the time and we’re having a discussion and not a dunk contest.
I generally agree with mostly everything you’re saying in your comment, except for a few things like non-proliferation treaties for nuclear weapons, and sanctions not starving Russians.
On the first hand, I simply don’t think it’s fair that the “international rule-based order” that allows the genocide of Palestinians gets to decide who has the right to nuclear weapons and who doesn’t. Historically, it’s one of the best assurances against western invasion, and for example Iran clearly regrets now not pursuing nuclear weapons, as regardless of whether it does or not, it has been treated as though it does (we’ve been seeing news headlines of Iran being a year away from nuclear weapons for 30 years). I do not like nuclear weapons, but I can’t blame a country whose history with the US is that of invasion and bombing, for wanting to ensure its own retaliation capabilities.
On the other hand you’re right that the sanctions in Russia aren’t having the impact that they have on, say, Venezuela or Cuba, if only simply because of the dynamics of economic development and resource availability. That said, I just wanna make it a point that the sanctions include the medical and pharmaceutical sector, and the Russian economy, being capitalist, relied on import of such medical goods for treatment of certain conditions. Applying sanctions to the medical and pharmaceutical industry also amounts to murdering people, although ofc not on the same scale as the sanctions to NK or Cuba.