he first time Russia annexed the Crimean peninsula, under the expansionist regime of Catherine the Great in 1783, Russia stood ascendant. Pushing west, south, and east simultaneously, covering steppe and coastline alike, imperial Russia swallowed territory at will. At the time, Crimea was but another jewel in the empress's crown. Claiming it fortified Black Sea security, chipped at the Ottoman Empire’s former territories, and guaranteed, as adviser-and-lover Grigory Potemkin told Catherine, “the security of the population of Novorossiya”—the Ukrainian territory whose deep Russian roots separatists claim legitimizes Russia's current incursion into eastern Ukraine.
Read Full Article »
