Ukraine Thread

[Gilrandir]

It could mean that Russia has greater motivation to attempt to further Finlandize, or outright absorb, the Central Asian states.

Unless those states openly proclaim their desire to take their way elswhere except Russia they are safe. But the moment they do Russia will play its traditional card of protecting Russian-speaking communities (and in Khazakhstan, for instance it is quite sizeable). But even without that Zhirinovsky claims that northern Khazakhstan (if not the whole of it) is historically Russian territory. Putin himself, in one his portentous historical speeches, commended Nazarbayev on creating a state where it has never existed.
http://www.eurasianet.org/node/69771
Whence there is one step to a claim that Russia has a right to own what Russian empire has owned for quite a time.