Question - what, in your opinion, part of the territory of Russia is inhabited and used?
This is why I ask the question - new lands, theoretically, Japan or Bangladesh may be needed - where there is a huge number of people and a minimum area. In Russia, less than 25% of the territory is inhabited and used. No, not because somewhere there is permafrost. And because the Russian government does not care about people, money is invested only in 3 cities (Moscow, St. Petersburg, Grozny), and the rest - on populist-terrorist projects, to raise the rating of the Kremlin's under-fuhrer
Would you happen to recall the official, declared by the Kremlin, reasons for the invasion of Ukraine in 2014? Let me remind you - "protection of the Russian-speaking population"! Those. in Ukraine, where people lived so well, they decided to "save". No, not to raise the level of Russian speakers in Russia, no. And lower the standard of living of the occupied territories to the level of Russia!
That's a bullshit pretext but it's something that Moscow is likely to pull out more often in the future since they do have still have alot of Russians in former Soviet states.
I don't doubt the government there is quite corrupt and fund those "populist-terrorist projects" you are mentioning but I still believe they'd be more careful with something of this magnitude. They calculated the risk and it paid off for them. They'd need Crimea until we get to the point where the Arctic don't completely freeze over during winter.
I will tell you a secret - I myself am Russian by nationality! And yes - in Ukraine, Russians are the second largest nationality. BUT ! But, the inhabitants of Ukraine, Russians by nationality, do not want the "Russian world" or, to be honest, RASHISM in their own country! Do not confuse Russians with supporters of rashism or pro-Russian separatists, this is a huge difference, or rather, a complete lack of anything in common.
Whatever they do in thier own country is thier right to do. If they just develop 3 cities, it's thier own, It's thier choice. Moscow won the safest city to live declared by the UN recently. As far as I know, there are other Russian ethnic groups in the outskirts of their cities which the government respects their beliefs. Russia is a Catholic country in which people have Christian traits and they respect other beliefs out there. Whatever they do in thier own country, it's their own thing.
Crimea is Russia. The surrounding countries do not complain to it. It's just the news outside who complains as if they knew better.
So Ukraine has the right to do anything at home - join alliances, build defenses, defend its borders and its people, destroy terrorists. Or Ukraine does not have such rights?
As for Crimea, it is a temporarily occupied territory, more precisely, annexed. Moreover, Russia itself personally admitted that:
1. The territory of Ukraine has been inviolable since 191 and its borders, including the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, are single and indivisible.
2. In 2014, it was an operation planned by the President of Russia to seize the territory of a foreign territory.
verifying both facts is extremely simple. 1 - Read the Budapest Memorandum. 2 - watch the OFFICIAL speeches of the president of Russia, after 2015, including the official film "The Road Home", about the capture of Crimea, which the Russians call "return", although I can not explain what "return" has to do with it.
Let me remind you again - it was Russia that signed the treaty on ensuring the inviolability of Ukraine, as well as protecting its integrity, within the borders that were at the time of the signing of the Budapest Memorandum.
Siberia - should again be an independent, free republic, the Far East - historically belongs to China, the Kuril Islands - belong to Japan. Republics forcibly introduced into the Russian Federation - worthy of freedom!