The Second Disassembly of Russia - Oligarhs and Nation States

The Second Disassembly of Russia - Oligarhs and Nation States

The second stage of the Russian disassembly will take place at the peak of the Civil War between 1924-1927 and will be led by the self-made Russian oligarchs grown up during the Yeltsin era and the resource rich separatist regions at the Russian heartland, supported by the FSB covert operations. 

Buryatia

Buryats are the old ethnicity living on the large territory around the banks of the Baikal Lake. They are ethnically close to the Mongols and many of regular Buryats claim to be direct descendants of the Genghis Khan. This legend was so much instigated by the Russian propaganda (just to make claims on the Mongolian territory) that its looks like many truly believe in that. The legend always had a practical side for the Russian leadership - it allowed them to cheaply recruit ferous and cruel Buryat warriors; who were in fact often used as the cannon fodder throughout the modern Russian history (the russian "wisdom" no mercy to Russian soldiers - our women will give birth to more is in part attributed to Buryats due to their naturally high fertility rate and war readiness). All that together had resulted into the high level of intolerance to other cultures within the Buryat society, including the hatred to Russians too. So much that many Buryats fighting on the Russian side against Ukraine think they went to kill Russians in this war.

Now imagine a huge amount of Buryat soldiers returning back home to their cities, towns, and villages; many bringing the maraudered war trophies. Apparently, they would seek for the next war adventure; and civil war is an excellent chance to gain even more war trophies. Most probably, at first regular Buryats will take one of the sides in the Russian Civil War; because as usual their primary motif for the warfare will be maraudering rather than fighting. However, due to many reasons local leaders will soon realize the benefits of an independent state; having that it already has an army with real war experience. Also, we must not forget about the Chinese interests within Russia. After the relatively peaceful secession of Amuria as a really independent state the Chinese leaders would not waste the remaining chance of gaining their own share of Russia in the form of a client state.

Thus, somewhere in the middle of the Russian Civil War we will see the Chinese backed praclaimation of the independence of Buryatia within the borders of Republic of Buryatia, Zabaykalsky Krai, and Ust-Orda Buryat Okrug where Buryats make up a significant part of the population. Although in all three provinces officially Russians are the majority (over 70% Russians and only 25% Buryats), it is usual in Russia to officially claim its russian origins regardless of the real ethnicity from pragmatic concerns. As soon as the situation changes in favor of non-russian preference, many of these people will switch their nominal ethnicity. In case of Buryatia it is expected that over a third of de jure Russians are de facto Buryats. Also, there are over 200'000 settled migrants from China which are not counted in the official statistics. That shifts the tide towards the Buryat (not Russian) majority.

Unlike other states we discussed below which only seeked for the secession; Buryatia will quickly look for expansion. First - there are many Buriat populated areas inside the Irkutsk Oblast; second - they would need to somehow solve their problem of the Ust-Orda exclave; third - they will be instigated to expand by their Chinese patrons; and forth - their soldiers would like to gain some war trophies from rich neighbouring communities like e.g. Irkutsk. Thus, sooner or later, these four factors will reach the synergy; and as Russia becomes weaker - Buryats will start a crawling military campaign to meet several goals: make the land bridge to Ust-Orda exclave, unify bordering Buryat communities, expand north to sparsely populated and mineral rich territories, and finally (the unofficial goal of some militants to) ransack Irkutsk. In order to understand the last goal one must remember what happened in 2022 in small towns and villages near Kyiv where Buryats formed the significant portion of maraudering russian terrorist forces. Yes, as scary as it sounds, for some ransacking can still be the "reasonable" war goal. The desire to restore "historical justice" is often accompanied by the period of cruelty, be it intentional or accidental.

Soon after this invasion starts we will see the emergence of new states like e.g. Yenisey (discussed in the next paragraph). It seems realistic that Buryatia will succeed in expanding towards the Lena river to the north and west of its core lands; they might even succeed in temporarily occuping and ransacking rich villages near Irkutsk repeating the Bucha-Irpin and Mariupol tragedies on the russian territory. However, after the defensive operations of Yenisey to protect Kirensk, Ust-Kut, and Irkutsk the war will gradually move into the ceasefire and the victorious (for Buryatia) peace treaty. It is hard to say that this result would satisfy China, but it will significantly increase the Buryatia territory.

With the capital in Ulan-Ude, land area of around 1'100'000 sq km, and population of around 2'300'000 citizens; sparsely populated Buryatia will enter the top 30 of the largest states in the world, comparable to Colombia or Muritania by size; but much smaller states like Botswana or Slovenia by population. Landlocked, with poor infrastructure and sparse population, Buryatia will probably become the Chinese client state and resource appendage. However, for long it was the resource appendage of Russia; thus it cannot be considered the worsening of the situation. Opposite, rich China might become a much better patron, leading to the rapid increase in the Buryat standards of living; potentially serving as the soft power capable to gradually decrease their ferocity and intolerance.

There is an alternative future for Buryatia though, if their cultural elites are able to seize power from Russian puppet bureaucrats installed by Putin. However, that does not seem realistic: what was installed by blood, by blood will be dismantled. Still, after the most dark night there usually comes a bright day. So, it is quite possible that those cultural elites will be able to gradually replace poor militants in power, and supplement the Chinese hegemony by more balanced economic and trade cooperation with neighbouring Amuria, Yenisey, and Mongolia, serving as an important transit point with potential to build added value industries. Every nation has its pages of glory and the golden age awaits for Buryatia in the future. Source