To Prevent Continuation of Imperialist Muscovite State, Ukraine and Its Supporters Must Focus on What Many Now Call Central Russia, Dushin Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Oct. 7 – Most discussions of the decolonization of the Russian Federation, a move that is the precondition for the demolition of the hyper-centralized imperial state that threatens its own people and the world focus on peripheries far from the center, Igor Dushin says.

            But that is a fundamental mistake because this focus on Siberia and the North Caucasus means that even if they break away, Moscow will be able to continue as an empire for some time to come, according to the Ukrainian activist who is a participant in the Free Ingria movement (region.expert/ukraine-ingria/).

            Of course, the freedom of these regions is important; but if Ukraine and Europe are to be saved from continuing Muscovite attacks, the focus of their decolonization agendas must shift to that section of the Russian Federation that is typically called “European Russia” and viewed even by Ukrainians and others threatened by Moscow as “European Russia.”

            In fact, this geographic region is home to many ethno-national and supra-national regionalist groups; and support for them, even more than support for groups further away from the center will do more and more quickly for the demolition of the Russian empire and the prevention of its continuation after the demise of Vladimir Putin.

            One of the key portions of this region is Ingermanland, the area in northwestern Russia including St. Petersburg and its surrounding lands, Dushin says. It has long sought to go its own way as a supra-national independent state; and if it succeeded, that would quickly reduce the Russian state to a Muscovy far less capable of threatening its people or its neighbors.

            Unfortunately, despite this history and the existence of the Free Ingria movement now, this region and what its independence could mean have attracted relatively little attention even in Ukraine, let alone elsewhere, as a key “submerged nation” whose emergence would help everyone except Russian imperialists. That, Dushin says, needs to change.

            (For background on the history of Ingermanland and today’s Free Ingria movement, see Ott Kurs , “Ingria: The Broken Landbridge Between Estonia and Finland,” GeoJournal 33.1 (1994): 107–113; Ian Matley, “The Dispersal of the Ingrian Finns,” Slavic Review 38:1 (1979): 1-16; windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2021/07/two-other-baltic-republics-remembered.html; windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2019/04/the-ingermanlanders-punished-people.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2013/10/window-on-eurasia-ingermanland-is-ready.html, and the numerous sources cited in these articles.)