Imminent disintegration of Russia
Intro
Entering the pointless and cruel war against Ukraine, Putin's regime routinely approaches the point of no return when he as a politic and living being, but also Russia as a state, head towards the eclipse. It is no wonder: the history knows many examples of huge empires which ceased to exist during historically short periods of time. Vladimir Putin likes to talk about the so-called historical justice; but he constantly forgets to mention that the historically justified territory of so-called Russia is at most a small chunk of land called Moscowia; all the rest being temporary occupied territories, as shown on the cover image.
This essey analyses the historic parallels in the Russian past that provides clues to the understanding that Russia gallops into its final days which are now counted. It is a huge free of charge personal work based on many open sources and structured logical deduction. Unlike the majority of my posts, it is almost free of proof links; it is up to the reader to find the truth.
Due to the high volume of material this essey is split into 3 parts together forming the Russian Disassembly Trilogy:
Over some time I promise to do several concise extracts from this essey for those lazy souls who have no time to read it in full at once.
Overview
In the following TL;DR paragraphs each phase of the russian disassembly will be discussed in more details. This short extract just summarizes the final result.
When the process of the Russian disassembly finishes, what is left off the once the biggest empire on the globe will be just a small part of its past glory. Yet, it will remain one of the biggest countries in the world by land area. Russia will lose almost all its colonies esat of the Volga river and south of the Don river shrinking to the size slightly bigger than its XV century predecessor the Moscowian Tsardom.
New top 20 of biggest world countries by size
This table shows how will the list of top 20 biggest states in the world look like after the disassembly of the Russian Federation, capturing the state name and capital, along with their land area in square kilometers, total population, and population density in people per square kilometer. New states emerging from the Russian Federation are marked with an asterisk. All numbers are rounded to two digits.
?#? | State??????? | Capital????? | Land Area | Population??? | Density
----|--------------|--------------|-----------|---------------|---------
?1? | China??????? | Beijing????? | 9'400'000 | 1'440'000'000 | 150??? ?
?2? | USA????????? | Washington?? | 9'100'000 | 330'000'000?? | 36???? ?
?3? | Canada?????? | Ottawa?????? | 9'100'000 | 38'000'000??? | 4.2??? ?
?4? | Brazil?????? | Brazilia???? | 8'400'000 | 210'000'000?? | 25???? ?
?5? | Australia??? | Kanberra???? | 7'700'000 | 25'000'000??? | 3.3??? ?
?6? | * Sakha????? | Yakutsk????? | 4'700'000 | 1'500'000???? | 0.32?? ?
?7? | India??????? | Dheli??????? | 3'000'000 | 1'380'000'000 | 460??? ?
?8? | * Yenisey??? | Krasnoyarsk? | 2'800'000 | 5'600'000???? | 2.0????? ?
?9? | Argentina??? | Buenos Aires | 2'700'000 | 45'000'000??? | 17???? ?
?10 | Kazakhstan?? | Nur-Sultan?? | 2'700'000 | 19'000'000??? | 7.0????? ?
?11 | * Siberia??? | Novosibirsk? | 2'500'000 | 23'000'000??? | 9.2??? ?
?12 | Algeria????? | Algiers????? | 2'400'000 | 44'000'000??? | 18???? ?
?13 | DR Congo???? | Kinshasa???? | 2'300'000 | 90'000'000??? | 39???? ?
?14 | Saudi Arabia | Er-Riadh???? | 2'100'000 | 35'000'000??? | 17???? ?
?15 | Mexico?????? | Mexico?????? | 1'900'000 | 130'000'000?? | 68???? ?
?16 | Indonesia??? | Jakarta????? | 1'800'000 | 270'000'000?? | 150??? ?
?17 | Sudan??????? | Khartoum???? | 1'800'000 | 44'000'000??? | 24???? ?
?18 | Libya??????? | Tripoli????? | 1'800'000 | 6'900'000???? | 3.8??? ?
?19 | * Moscowia???| Moscow?????? | 1'700'000 | 43'000'000??? | 25?????
20 | Iran | Tehran | 1'600'000 | 84'000'000 | 53?????
Basic stats of new states emerging from Russia
This table shows all new states emerging from the disassembly of the Russian Federation, along with their capital city, land area in square kilometers, total state population, as well as the dominant ethnicity and religion (blank if no ethnicity or religion has more than 51% of total population).
?State???? | Capital?????? | Land Area | Population | Ethnicity | Regilion
------------|---------------|-----------|------------|-----------|----------
?Sakha???? | Yakutsk?????? | 4'700'000 | 1'500'000? |?????????? | Tengri? ?
?Yenisey?? | Krasnoyarsk?? | 2'800'000 | 5'600'000? | Russian?? | Orthodox
?Siberia? ? | Novosibirsk?? | 2'500'000 | 23'000'000 | Russian?? | Orthodox
?Moscowia? | Moscow??????? | 1'700'000 | 43'000'000 | Russian?? | Orthodox
?Amuria??? | Amursk??????? | 1'400'000 | 4'500'000? | Russian?? | Orthodox
?Buryatia ? | Ulan-Ude????? | 1'100'000 | 2'300'000? | Buryat??? | Orthodox
?Komi????? | Pechenga????? | 740'000?? | 940'000??? |?????????? | Orthodox
?Volga???? | Samara??????? | 360'000?? | 9'900'000? | Russian?? | Orthodox
?Perm????? | Perm????????? | 320'000?? | 5'300'000? | Russian?? | Orthodox
?Novgorod ? | St Petersburg | 260'000?? | 8'900'000? | Russian?? | Orthodox
?Don??????? | Rostov-On-Don | 260'000?? | 7'500'000? | Russian?? | Orthodox
?Tuva?????? | Kyzyl???????? | 170'000?? | 300'000??? | Tuvan???? | Buddhism
?Kuban????? | Krasnodar???? | 150'000?? | 8'900'000? | Russian?? | Orthodox
?Bashkiria? | Ufa?????????? | 144'000?? | 4'000'000? |?????????? | Sunni?? ?
?Kalmykia?? | Elista??????? | 95'000??? | 1'000'000? |?????????? |???????? ?
?Altai????? | Kosh-Agach??? | 90'000??? | 200'000??? | Altai???? |
?Tatarstan? | Kazan???????? | 68'000??? | 4'000'000? | Tatar???? | Sunni?? ?
?Dagestan?? | Makhachkala?? | 50'000??? | 3'000'000? |?????????? | Sunni?? ?
?Chirkassia | Nalchik?????? | 28'000??? | 1'400'000? |?????????? | Sunni?? ?
?Belgorod?? | Belgorod????? | 27'000??? | 1'500'000? | Russian?? | Orthodox
?Mordovia?? | Saransk?????? | 26'000??? | 770'000??? |?????????? | Orthodox
?Mari-El??? | Yoshkar-Ola?? | 23'000??? | 670'000??? | Mari????? | Orthodox
?Ichkeria?? | Grozny??????? | 20'000??? | 2'000'000? | Chechen?? | Sunni?? ?
?Chuvashia? | Cheboksary??? | 18'000??? | 1'200'000? | Chuvash?? | Orthodox
?Prussia??? | Krolewec????? | 15'000??? | 1'000'000? | Russian?? | Orthodox
?Osetia???? | Vladikavkaz?? | 7'000???? | 700'000??? | Osetin??? | Orthodox
Detailed Story of the Russian Disassembly
TL;DR
As described in the Part 1 of the Russian Disassembly Trilogy, the disintegration of the Russian Federation will happen in several phases. Although the boundaries of these phases are somewhat vague, they will still appear in order when each distinct phase will serve as a trigger for the next phase:
The First Disassembly of Russia - Caucasus and Far East
The first stage of the Russian disassembly will happen as soon as the Civil War starts between 2023-2026 and will be led by the clearly separatist regions on the Russian periphery which are already waiting for the Russian period of weakness.
Amuria
Although Russia is called the prison of nations, the first region to part with Russia and accelerate the further disassembly is, ironically, populated primarily by russians - the far-east Khabarovsk Krai. This region is known as the least controlled region of Russia, and is constantly protesting against the Putin's regime even during recent years when other regions were mercilessly "pacified". Moreover, even the Khabarovsk Krai governor was assigned by local elites, not personally Vladimir Putin - something unimaginable for the russian autocracy. Thus, as soon as the Russian Civil War starts on the european part of Russia, the far east will seek for the ways to escape. The Khabarovsk Krai elites are known to be strong in covert ops and palace intrigues. Thus, there would be no surprise if they will side with the local branch of FSB (Federal Security Service, an internal intelligency agency of the Russian Federation) and the Navy commandment of the Russian Pacific Fleet which headquartered in the city of Vladivostok. As this region is already more tied economically to China and Japan than it is to Russia, regional elites might seek political support from these states as well. After these preparations (which might be ongoing while I write this), as soon as the Russian Civil War starts, these elites will declare the independence of the far east region of Russia.
Most probably, it will be a joint declaration by the economically tied Khabarovsk Krai, Primorsky Krai, Amur Oblast, Sakhalin Oblast (including Kuril Islands), and Jewish Autonomous Oblast. A new name of this state is hard to guess, but Amuria seems just nice to me. The capital will most probably be moved from Khabarovsk (which is the home to many local businesses and the regional bureaucracy of the richest and the biggest of these provinces) to a more distant from the Chine border and safer small city Amursk. With land area of over 1'440'000 sq km and population of over 4'500'000 citizens (over 85% - Russians), sparsely populated Amuria will enter the top 20 largest states in the world, comparable to Mongolia or Peru by size, but much smaller Mauritania or Panama by population.
Russia might decide to invade the new state in order to prevent its independence, however, if the russian Pacific Fleet (headquartered in Vladivostok) is seized during the first days of the independence, any land-based campaign would be extremely difficult to undertake by the russians. Potentially, Russia would be able to occupy the mineral-rich northern regions of the Khabarovsk Krai, but no more than that. The control over the Pacific Fleet would allow Amuria to protect its sovereignty over the Kuril Islands. The return of the southern Kuril Islands - Kunashir, Shikotan (and smaller Habomai Islands), but maybe also Iturup and Urup - to Japan would allow Amuria to sign the historic peace treaty with Japan or even secure the economic and defence treaty with Japan. Similarly, Amuria might return several distutable islands on the Amur river to China in exchange for its political protection and economic ties.
At a later time Amuria might compete for the regions of Magadan Oblast, Kamchatka Krai, and Chukotka Autonomous Okrug; but most probably their residents would not agree to join Amuria. Also, the world powers would not be interested in such turnaround; therefore this outcome is less probable. See the section below about Yakutia (Sakha) for the more detailed explanation.
Properly balancing between the top political, military, and economic neighbouring powerhouses - USA, Japan, and China - Amuria has all the chances to become more prosperous alone than under the rule of russian kleptocracy. A fact that the majority of Amuria residents are and will remain russian-speaking will not stop their independence, as it will be driven primarily by the economic factors. Despite Amuria citizens seeming unified by one language (a far-east dialect of Russian), ethnically more than third of its population are ethnically rusified Ukrainians, Manchurians, Koreans, and Ainu - ethnicities with the strong liberty gene; no more than one third are pure Russian colonists. Thus, within 2 decades this young nation of multi-ethnic origin have all chances to become the east eurasian forthpost of democracy, at the same stage in its evolution like Ukraine is today.
Ichkeria and Dagestan
Republic of Ichkeria has a long history of upprisings against the Russian rule, the first dating back to the XIX century. During the last 150 years there was no single generation of Chechens who would not attempt to liberate their Homeland. The most recent Second Chechen War of 1999-2000 was only won by the russian army terrorists under the command of Vladimir Putin by using the genocide against Chechen civilians. During the war and the following decade of Chechen insurgency up to 80'000 of Chechen and Ingush civilians (out of the total population around 1'500'000) were killed and almost 500'000 were displaced by the russian terrorists. Many Chechen political and military leaders fled to EU, Turkey, or UAE after the war, and they still dream of liberating their homeland once Russia is weak again.
There are two scenarios how this can happen in the observable future. At the start of the Russian Civil War, russian ethnic leaders would seek for ways to neutralize non-russian Ramzan Kadyrov. A direct and simple way for that would be to give independence to the dicontent Chechen Republic and proclaim Ramzan Kadyrov its president. This would ultimately remove his from the pan-russian competition and crystallize Chechen Republic as the bandit state. The other (more probable) option is that Ramzan Kadyrov will be assassinated immediately after (or even before) Vladimir Putin as his militias and bodyguards are rather non-professional even by the russian standards. That would result into the vacant place that will soon be occupied by a different Chechen leader, potentially from a different clan; who will soon proclaim the independence.
So, one way or another, Republic of Ichkeria will quickly become independent at the start of the Russian Civil War. That would motivate many of over 500'000 Chechen expats (to EU, Turkey, Russia, and other countries) to repatriate into the newborn homeland, just like Jews repatriated into Israel when it was reborn. Many of them are ready warriors (some fighting against Russian in Ukraine in the Volunteer Legion) who will not lose a second chance to restore Ichkeria during their lifetime. Most probably, this reborn state will include current territories of ethnically close Chechen Republic and Republic of Ingushetia. From ethnic perspective Ichkeria will be dominated by two close ethnicities - Chechens (over 75%) and Ingushes (over 20%). With the capital in the city of Grozny, the total land area of the state will be over 20'000 sq km and the total population over 2'000'000, Ichkeria will be a small landlocked country, comparable to Slovenia. Still, repatriates from EU, Turkey, and UAE might succeed to build a modern and prosperous islamic society based on its oil & gas industries.
Soon after the independence of Ichkeria, the neighbouring multi-ethnic Republic of Dagestan will also seek for the independence. And that help might come from both Ichkeria and the regional powers of Iran, Azerbaijan, and Turkey, all of which would be interested in the independent buffer state between their spheres of influence and Russia. Even Kazakhstan and Georgia are interested in the formation of independent Dagestan and will support it economically; but most probably they would not be overly active during the first phase. The complex ethnic (9 ethnicities with over 3% population - Nakh-Dagestanians: 27% Avars, 16% Dargins, 5% Laks, 4% Tabasarani, 3% Chechens; Turks: 13% Cumans, 4% Azerbaijani; 9% Russians), linguistic (3 language families), and religious (90% sunni, 5% christian, 3% shia) situation in the newborn state will require to quickly find an accurate balance in internal affairs (by example of e.g. Turkey) in order to prevent internal conflicts. In fact, all Dagestan citizens should be maximally interested in a secular multi-ethnic state as no single group inside the country has dominance in almost any big geographic area. With the capital city Makhachkala, the land area of over 50'000 sq km and the population of over 3'000'000 citizens, Dagestan will be a medium state comparable to Georgia or Lithuania. Although Dagestan economy is weak at the moment, it has a chance to become as prosperous as e.g. Azerbaijan without the Russian kleptocracy syphoning funds from its oil & gas industries.
In both use cases Russia, bound by its internal struggle and having a bigger trouble at the far east, will not have enough military power to oppose these independence proclamations. More so, the northern Caucasus will not have enough economic value for the competing Russian elites compared to the problems on other fronts.
Tuva and Altai
The other two small nation-states that have all chances to appear on the world map during the initial stage of the Russia disassembly are located in the Altai mountains region at the border crossings of 4 big countries: Russia, Mongolia, China, and Kazakhstan. This ethnically complex region is home to numerous Turkic and Mongolian tribes. This region at the moment is home of two compact living ethnicities - Tuvans (Tivvans) and Altais; both having strong aspirations for the independent nation-states and having the majority in their autonomous provices.
The first of the two to declare independence will propably be the more powerful Tuva. The current head of the Russian ministry of defense - Sergey Shoigu - is of Tuvan origin; and he did not forget for his small homeland, warranting a decent amount of russian investments into it. His power on the russian political arena can be measured by a simple fact: he is the only russian politic who stayed in power since 1991 until now non-interrupted. However, after the Russian defeat in the Russo-Ukrainian War, Sergey Shoigu risks to meet the end of his career on the russian stage. Being the prominent kleptocrat he will probably seek for the refuge in his motherland, and might become the active supporter of its independence once his defeat in the competition for power in Russia will become clear. Even without support from Shoigu the Tuvan elites publicly declared their aspirations for the independence. Thus, one way or another, it will proclaim independence as soon as Russian Civil War erupts. Soon after the small country of Altai will proclaim independence too. Most probably, Russians will not even pay attention to these events being busy with more important matters; the same way they let go a much bigger Mongolia during the First Russian Civil War with little resistance.
Tuva (Tivva) has a long history of independence dating back to the Xiongu state during anticity. The Tuva Republic was only finally occupied by Russia in 1944 and there are still people alive who remember the pre-russian period in their history. With the capital in the city Kyzyl, land area of over 170'000 sq km and population of only around 300'000 citizens (82% Tuvan, 16% Russian) Tuva will be a medium sparsely populated state, comparable to Syria or Nepal by size and to smaller Iceland or tiny Barbados by population. It is one of the few places in the world where the oriental Tengrian Shamanism is still popular, which peacefully coexists with the primary religion of Tibetan Buddhism. Tuva has a huge potential for the mining industry, in particular coal, ores, gold, jewels; however, due to bad logistics with core russian provinces it was largely underdeveloped. This could change after gaining independence and integrating into Chinese and Kazakh supply lines.
The small state of Altai (Aktash) that will consist of the Altai Republic of Russia is all that is left from the once powerful medieval state Oirat Khanate spanning wast territories. Now most of its former territory is divide between Russia, Mongolia, and China; and most of its former citizens were assimilated. Mountaineous Altai Republic is the only russian provice where Altaians still hold the large community: by 2010 officially 34% were Altai (and quickly growing), 6% Kazakh, 56% Russian (but some of them only formally, while in fact they belong to Altai ethnicity); a similarly named Altai Krai is wastly russian by now. However, Altaians have a strong desire for the nation state and will declare independence most probably together with or short after Tuva. With the total land area of around 90'000 sq km and population of just 200'000 citizens it will be a medium sparsely populated state; comparable by area to Portugal or Jordan, and by population to the tiny Samoa. Still, Altai can quickly become a transit hub between Mongolia and Kazakhstan who seek for alternative transport routes to the hegemon China. Altai economy will be focused primarily on tourism as the authentic oriental mountaineous nomad culture; still mining industries for ores, gold, silver, and lithium might also bring decent value. An interesting situation might be with the Altai capital: the only city in the state - Gorno-Altaisk - would be located just 5 km away from the border with Russia; thus, the state leaders might decide to move the capital to the safer town like e.g. Kosh-Agach with population of just around 10'000 citizens. If that happens - it would be the least populated mainland capital in the world.
Both countries may become vital allies of Mongolia who is currently landlocked between two hegemons - China and Russia. With emerging small states on the north, Mongolia will seek for mutually benefitial alliances with them to counter the ever increasing Chinese influence. That could dramatically change the geopolitical position of Mongolia from the client state to the patron state. Mongolia itself is the resource rich country with limited options for the supply market. A tiny country like Altai might become a vital trade route to Kazakhstan and beyond, a much needed alternative to the current only option to sell crude ores to either China or through China (not a big choice, indeed).
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.
Yenisey
Since the start of the Russo-Ukrainian war and the world sanctions against Russia, Russian oligarchs began to look for the options how to save their businesses. Over the time they will become more and more depressed by the stupidity of the russian warmongering government increasing the rift between their expectations and government actions. However, it will be no earlier than the start of the Russian Civil War before they will be ready for the open dispute, seriously considering all options, including the fragmentation of Russia.
Most probably, the main battles of the Russian Civil War will take place to the west of Ural mountains; leaving Siberian oil & gas facilities relatively safe. Moreover, the Civil War in Syria has shown that no party is interested in destroying the oil wells. Still, with ever increasing pressure from the emerging state of Buryatia; mining and oil & gas facilities near Irkutsk would really fall under the risk of expropriation or even physical destruction. Moreover, the Chinese hegemony over the region would almost certainly lead to the major redistribution of wealth in the Siberia region leading to the permanent loss of rich natural resources of Siberia for Russian oligarchs. For them, self-made "business people" with criminal past, money are worth much more than the people or state alike. Thus, this will be the time which requires unprecedented actions from them.
The Irkutsk Oblast and Krasnoyarsk Krai would be one of the first regions to meet the new threat. These are the lands "owned" by one of the most powerful Russian oligarchs - Oleg Deripaska - who is formally the Putin's supporter, but in reality it was just an "agreement" for support in exchange for preferences. Oleg Deripaska is one of the longest living Russian oligarchs who made his "career" long before Putin seized power over Moscow. He is also a commander of one of the biggest private bodyguard armies in Russia counting (unofficially) almost 40'000 personnel. After the assassination of Putin and facing the increased threat to his primary mining provinces Oleg Deripaska will start active discussions with the so-called inner circle of the Russian government to use his power to secure the eastern borders in exchange for the higher level of autonomy. In parallel he will start to form political alliances with other rich oligarchs to prepare the so-called "plan B" with the main idea of being the secession of rich Siberian provinces from Russia.
Yenisey - a wast area formed by Krasnoyarsk Krai, parts of Irkutsk Oblast, and economically tied Republic of Khakasia - would be the first puzzle piece to put in this "plan B". As the demoralized Russian army will retreat from the push of the invading Buryat troops; the emerging army of Yenisey will start the defence of Irkutsk, Baykalsk, Ust-Kut, Kirensk, and the crossings over the Lena river. Quite soon, Yenisey will proclaim its independence with the silent support of the other Russian oligarchs putting Oleg Deripaska or one of his protege into the post of the President. Most probably, de facto this will be the dictatorship of the richest person of the newborn country. But being de jure democratic and de facto kleptocratic is the norm for the Russian society, so primarily Russian ethnic citizens of the new state will not oppose this change in the name of government buildings, especially after declaring the "heroic" victory over daemonized Buryatia. Furthermore, the Yeniseyan secession from Russia, the Buriat ransack of Irkutsk, and the declaration of democratic ideals would be enough for the EU and USA elites to sign the trade treaty with the newborn state to allow the flow of natural resource from it. In the eyes of western countries Oleg Deripaska might quickly transform from the past criminal and supporter of Putin into the savior of Irkutsk and democratic leader - something that happens quite often in the modern history.
With the capital with Krasnoyarsk, land area of over 2'800'000 sq km and population of 5'600'000 citizens (over 90% Russian), sparsely populated Yenisey will be one of the largest states in the world; at the 8th place between India and Argentina by size, with the population comparable to small states like Singapore or Slovakia. From the economy perspective it has all chances to quickly become the natural resources powerhouse: just the city of Norilsk produces 35% of worlds palladium, 25% of platinum, 20% of nickel and rhodium, 10% of cobalt; Yenisey will own a big chunk of the East Siberian oil field with the total potential of 7 bln barrels of discovered crude oil; almost unlimited amount of wood and fish. With that natural wealth and no money syphoning into Moscow, the biggest cities of Yenisey - Krasnoyarsk, Irkutsk, Bratsk, and Norilsk - will certainly see the improved infrastructure and the standards of living; potentially even the increased wealth of regular citizens.
Due to the oligarchs (an probably also FSB) plot Russia will not try to prevent the independence of Yenisey. In the eyes of Russian establishement the secession of Yenisey would look temporary, and it would probably be so if not the continued disassembly of Russia at the south of Ural mountains as described in the next section. However, having the experience of the fleet loss in Vladivostok (see Amuria section above), Russian navy would make sure to take control over the Severnaya Zemlya islands as well as a range of small islands between it and the Yenisey river estuary, that should serve two purposes: preserving the summer maritime access to the remaining far-east territories, and technically landlocking Yenisey to force it into paying the rent for transporting resources using the arctic sea route. Without the possession of navy fleet Yenisey will have no chance to oppose that.
Tatarstan and Bashkiria
This is not the story about partiotism; like the disassembly of USSR was not a story about partiotism. As a someone who lived through the independence of Ukraine I can state it loud that there were millions of patriots who struggled for freedom, sovereignty, and independence of Ukraine; still, those people who had power in Ukraine in 1991 were not among patriots. The first president of independent Ukraine, Leonid Kravchuk, as well as the first presidents of Belarus, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Kurgystan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan were in no way patriots of their countries; instead, they were the key USSR communist party functioners, who allied with the renegade president of Russia, Boris Yeltsyn, in an attempt to seize power from the USSR leader, Mykhail Gorbachov. After the breakaway of Baltic states, the most secure way to do that in their opinion was to for the former federative republics to exit USSR formally and later reunite in a new federal state. However, most of the soviet rulers either lost power in a few years (like Ukraine and Belarus), or preferred to build the self-owned autocracy (like Turkmenistan). Either way, after 30 years all of these states except Belarus moved far enough to lose the Russian Empire's reunification gravity.
With that historical intro we enter the case of Tatarstan and Bashkiria, both countries dominated by their respective non-Russian ethnicities with long history. In particular, the city of Kazan was the capital of the medieval Khanate of the same name lasting for centuries before the Russian massacre of Kazan in 1552, followed by centuries of rebellions, repressions, and displacements. Nevertheless, until now separatist tensions in both regions are quite popular. However, as with Ukraine and Belarus, the independence of Tatarstan and Bashkiria will become real not because of their patriots, that is almost impossible due to their geography: both ethnicities form enclaves inside the Russian territory surrounded by the primarily Russian provinces. Instead, it will be local bureaucracy functioners supported by Russian oligarchs, FSB agents, who will side with one of the warring parties of the Russian Civil War, and "temporary" declare the independence to preserve its territory and businesses alike during the period of instability. As usual, this temporary will become permanent over time. Both countries will have to support the border guards and army, as well as police, in order to warrant safety of their borders and internal stability. As such, they will obtain more and more real state attributes over time. Most importantly, as the Civil War extends in time, local population will form independent political parties which will have all chances to take the majority vote during the first elections. Even without elections ethnic majorities will force the government to pass laws which secure the national identity and independence, the same way that happened in e.g. Ukraine and Kazakhstan. Thus, by the time the Russian Civil War ends these breakaway states will be far enough politically to stay independent. Due to the domino effect they will no more be enclaves, and not even the periphery as other states (closer to Moscow) will become that periphery.
With the capital in Kazan, land area of around 68'000 sq km and population of almost 4'000'000 citizens, Tatarstan will be a medium state comparable to Georgia or Ireland. The newborn country with Tatar majority (approximately 55% Tatars versus 37% Russians) will start to search for ways to prosper economically, fueled by its oil & gas, machines (including trucks, planes, and helicopters), and textile industries. At first, Tatarstan will probably sign an increased autonomy agreement with Moscow, similar to how it was done in 1994, in order to be able to support its own military to protect key oil & gas and machine industries. However, as soon as the military formation is finalized, Tatarstan will declare independence, just in time to be able to protect itself from the Russian Civil War warlords approaching its borders. Over time Tatarstan will improve its ties with Bashkiria and Kazakhstan, and most importantly China who might recognize its independence in exchange for economical preferences. Facing the apparent Russian threat Tatarstan might also become the locomotive of the independences parade during the next phase of the Russian disassembly.
With the capital in Ufa, land area of around 144'000 sq km and population of over 4'000'000 citizens, Bashkiria (Bashkortostan) will be a medium state comparable to Tajikistan or Tunisia by size, but comparable to Tatarstan by population and GDP. Just like Tatarstan, the bewborn state of Bashkiria will have the non-Russian ethnic majority (30% Bashkirs and 26% Tatars versus 35% Russians), however, its ethnic situation is far from being simple. Also, like the its neighbour Bashkiria is highly industrialized with developed oil & gas and machine (including helicopters), chemical, and metallurgy industries. Being larger and closer to Kazakhstan, Bashkiria will have a favorable position from the defensive perspective than Tatarstan; still, both newborn states will most probably quickly become close political and military allies and might even sign the joint defence treaty or union. For many years, Ufa was titled as the best city to do business in Russia; thus there is no doubt Bashkiria will chose the path to prosperity over the path to world dominance.
Both Tatarstan and Bashkiria will take the lion chunk of the Volga-Urals oil & gas basin, accounting for the combined 2 bln tonn oil reserves. There is no doubt that independence will grant the citizens of these two states a better fortune in properly leveraging these resource rather than being the periphery of the Russian Empire.
Initially, Russia will be forces into compromises to allow these states to break away politically, while keeping the economic dominance of the Russia businesses in the emerging states. That will be benefitial for Russian elites themselves allowing to secure their oil dollars, and even as a way to overcome western sanctions. However, when Russia will be ready to seize control of these territories agains, it will be too late due to multiple political and military alliances of Tatarstan and Bashkiria. So, once again the non-patriotic bureaucracy will make a favor for patriotic nationals.
Chircassia and Osetia
Caucasus will become hot again during the second phase of Russian disassembly. This time the key events will happen to the west of Ichkeria which independence will motivate the political leaders of widespread Chirkassian ethnicities to break away from Russia. In total there are 7 closely tied Chirkassian ethnicities present in the region as of now, the biggest communities being Kabardins, Karachaians, and Adyges (in Russia) as well as Abkhazians (in Georgia). Notably, due to constant Russian repressions over 70% of Chirkassians are expats (over 5 mln people) living primarily in Turkey and Jordan. Once Chirkassia declares independence many of them will repatriate, just like Chechens to Ichkeria or Jews to Israel, strenthening its demography and economics. The independent Chirkassia will emerge as the union of the Kabardino-Balkarian Republic and the Karachay-Cherkess Republic.
The Republic of Adygea will have hard time joining them, not only due to the fact that it is enclave inside the primarily Russian Krasnodar Krai, but also because its territory is highly fragmented and the most important town Adygeisk is located a mere 20km away from the city Krasnodar sharing a common damm and gidro-electric power plant. Moreover, while Chirkassian ethnicities form the dominant majority in the first two republics, Adyges are a minority in Adygea. Hence, it seems most probable that Adyges might get a greater autonomy during or after the Civil War, but not the independence. Thus, for this phase we will consider Chirkassia as the union of two republics as stated above.
Immediately after the independence Chirkassia will attempt to seize control over the historically Kabardin region around Mozdok on the territory of the Republic of Osetia. It is also important for Chirkassians from the geopolitical perspective as it will grant them a land access to the allied state Ichkeria (in particular, the highway Nalchik-Groznyi). That special operation will take at most a couple of days with full support from Ichkeria and will be quickly recognized by neighbouring countries as legitimate due to the complex relations of Osetians with all their neighbours.
With the capital in Nalchik, land area of almost 28'000 sq km and population of around 1'400'000 citizens (growing due to repatriates), Chirkassia (Cherkassia) will be a small state comparable to Belgium or Armenia by size and comparable to Estonia or Timor-Leste by population. Due to a complex ethnic composition (Chirkassian: 35% Kabardins, 14% Karachais, 4% Cherkesses, 3% Abazins; Turks: 8% Balkars, 4% other; 27% Russians; 2% Osetians) and religious diversity (many Islamic and Christian schools, dominant Sunni: over 60%), it is important to build a secular state similar to Turkey in order to prevent internal conflicts. Key economy drivers of the newborn state will be agriculture and tourism with some mining facilities. The mount Elbrus (the highest Caucasus peak) is located on the territory of Chirkassia and will generate a measurable chunk of revenues for its economy. Chirkassia will desperately seek access to the Black Sea ports, however, despite Chirkassian minorities in cities like Sochi, Adler, and Tuapse it is impossible for Chirkassians to seize control of them. Thus, they might try to establish ties with the ethnically close non-recognized quasi-state Abkhazia on the Georgian sovereign territory. Such alliance would have unpredictable impact onto the regional politics.
The fate of the Republic of Osetia under the Russian Civil War would not promise anything good. Being the important Russian ally in the region Osetians gained multiple grievances from all neighbouring ethnicities (except Russians). Thus, without the military support their of their patron Osetia will be in a desperate position. Firstly, the emerging states of Ichkeria and Chirkassia will immediately seek for ways to settle some territorial claims (in particular, the town of Mozdok). Secondly, Georgia will try to restore its sovereignty over the territory of South Osetia (inhabited primarily by ethnic Osetians by now due to the Russian occupation and displacement of Katvelians). What is worse, both regions have all chance to part with Osetia. In this situation, the declaration of independence might be the only way to preserve at least a small chunk of territory - the Republic of North Osetia-Alania (except for the Mozdok district seized by Chirkassia).
With the capital in Vladikavkaz, land area of around 7'000 sq km and population of around 700'000 citizens (including refugees from South Osetia, excluding Mozdok), Osetia (Alania) will be a tiny state, comparable to Brunei or Cyprus. From ethnic perspective it will be a nation state with strong ethnic minorities (76% Osetians, 15% Russians, 4% Ingushes) and quite content from religious perspective (as both Osetians and Russians are Ortodox Christians). Osetia owns significant reserves of natural resources: oil, ores, stones; as well as developed industries, promising it the steady growth as an independent state. However, the problem number one to solve will be to reconcile relations with neighbouring states: Ichkeria, Chirkassia, and Georgia in order to get access to the trade routes. Without Russian instigations this task doesn't seem impossible given the absense of other choices for Osetia.
The Third Disassembly of Russia - Ongoing Crisis and Logistics
The third stage of the Russian disassembly will take place before the end of the Civil War and a few years after the ceasefire between 2026-2033 and will be led by the oligarchs and elites of the geographically or logistically separated regions who will prefer to not take an active participation in the Civil War.
Komi
After the successful "special operation" to declare the independence of Yenisey (and the broad autonomy of Tatarstan and Bashkiria) - which contain huge chunks of the 3rd (Nabu-Tobuoba) and 4th (north of Volga-Ural) biggest Russian oil & gas deposits - the Russian oligarchs will be ready to the next stage of their plan. The Republic of Komi is the logical next step in this big game. First, it contains the 5th biggest oil & gas deposit (Timan-Pechora). Second, it controls on the pipeline from the 2nd biggest oil & gas deposit (Yamal), and has a railway and navy access to this hardly accessible area. Third, there is only one railroad and two roads from core Russian provinces into Komi making its territory easy to defend. And third, more than one third of its citizens are of Komi and Ukrainian ethnicities, many are former political prisoners of the Soviet Union with deeply patriotic sentiments (as they were literally building most of the Komi cities), who could be quickly mobilized to into the territorial defence paramilitary troops. Together these factors make Komi an ideal candidate for the field workout before privatizing the most wanted piece of Russia - it's resource reach East Siberian provinces. This secession also helps isolating these provinces from the Russian core.
The most powerful Russian oil & gas oligarchs owning Timan-Pechora and Yamal oil & gas wells will start secretly supplying weapons to the Komi guerilla militants at the same time as Yenisey and Tatarstan start forming their armies. However, ready to act Komi activists will wait a little bit longer, until the key city of Kazan (the capital of Tatarstan) is ready to voluntarily block Russian traffic, so that potential military Russian supplies into the region become even harder. Once Tatarstan is enough strong, and the Russian Civil War reaches its critical point, the Republic of Komi will proclaim its independence after either bribing the reginal government or the quick coup d'etat. A similar overture will take place in the Nenets Autonomous Okrug to the north (there by the alliance of Komi and Nenets ethnicities), and the combined newborn state - Komi - will initially consist of these two provinces.
After securing a couple of critical transport corridors leading to the biggest city of the region - Syktyvkar - on the sout-west; Komi military troops will be ready for the next big game - seize control over the oil & gas facilities on the Yamal peninsula. A valid claim for this operation would be the unification of Nenets inhabited lands, also important for their seasonal deer herds migration. If taken at spring, this operation have all chances to be successful as the only civilized in-route into the Yamal peninsula is the railroad Seida (small town in Komi, south of the city Vorkuta) - Labytnangi (a port on Yamal peninsula at the left bank of the Ob river, across the city Salekhard), while the maritime routes through Ob river are only navigable during a couple of summer months. Still, Komi army will not be able to secure territories south of Salekhard or on the right bank of the Ob river (and more so the whole Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug) due to the apparent complexity of such move. The Russian army, busy fighting the Civil War on the south will have no capacity to intervene while Siberian army troops will have hard time reaching out into this area via summer river routes. Still the Russian White Sea fleet should be capable to take control of the northern islands of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug (in particular, the Kolguyev Island in the Barentssea and the Belyi Island in the Kara sea), secure its control of a huge Novaya Zemlia island, and protect the trade routes over the Ob river lined by its right bank. Although the Buryat invasion (described before) will be the first ever military operation of the Russian secessed state against Russia; the Komi military operation will be the first covertly planned and financed by renegade Russian oligarchs.
Although the biggest city of the newborn Komi state will be Syktyvkar, from logistic perspective a small depressed city Pechenga is a better candidate to become the state capital, as it is centralized towards the other (relatively) big cities Vorkuta, Ukhta, and Usinsk. With land area of over 740'000 sq km and population of around 940'000 citizens Komi will be a big sparsely populated country, comparable to Turkey or Chile by size, but much smaller Djibouti or Fiji by population. It will have a complex multi-ethnic composition of approximately 65% Russians, 22% Komi, 5% Nenets and Ukrainians, and others. Althought the portion of Russians is apparently overestimated and will rapidly decrease over time as its nominal holders start to reveal their true ethnicity in the new state. Rich in oil (over 15 bln tonn), gas (over 10 bln m3), coal (9 bln tonn), titan, gems, furs, and timber; with direct access to northern sea routes, Komi has all chances to quickly become prosperous, much more than under the rule of Moscowian kleptocrats.
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Sakha
On the east of Russia the sleeping leviathan lives; and its name is Sakha - a self-name of the indigenous people of the vast territory around the Lena river and its tributaries, more widely known to the world by the Russian given name Yakuts. Sakha has everything to be independent: the strong majority of population (officially 52% Yakuts versus 36% Russians, much higher ratio in reality and growing), rich natural resources (oil & gas, coal, uranus, gold, jems, timber, fish, furs, etc), strong aspirations for a nations state. However, it lacks just one thing - an extremely low sparse population of just 1 mln people not able to protect itself from the mighty Russia in case of the military conflict. However, after the independence of Amuria and Buryatia the only land road into Sakha that goes through Irkutsk (Yenisey) - Ulan-Ude - Chita (Buryatia) - Tynda (Amuria) - Yakutsk (Sakha) will be disjoint by independent states. Furthermore, After the independence of Yenisey (and to lesser intent Komi) the summer maritime route via Arctic seas will be practically cut off as well. With that and the strong desire for their own state Sakha people will not hesitate a second to proclaim independence from Russia.
At first, the newborn Sakha state will originate within the borders of the russian province Republic of Sakha with the capital in the only large city Yakutsk; still, due to the strive to obtain southern sea ports they will quickly absorb the economically tied Magadan Oblast with the rapidly shrinking population of just 140'000 people. Although Magadan Oblast is predominantly Russian (over 80%), its whole economy is built around the port-city Magadan which only value is to export rich natural resources of Sakha. Quickly, the Chukotka Autonomous Okrug with event lesser population of just 50'000 people will join as well. Chukotka has a complex ethnic composition of 52% Russians, 27% Chukchis, 6% Ukrainians, 3% Evens, and 6% small Chukchi related ethnicities; with that small population and vast territory Chukotka would be simply unable to build self-sustainable economy and political system; while a wide autonomy as the part of Sakha would seem quite appealing for them. Notably Chukchis were one of the rare nations who defeated Russians in all wars where Russians tried to occupied them between 1725-1778 (over 50 years); they only joined Russia deliberately on the conditions that Russia must protect them and they will not pay any tax.
That territory is already vast; furthermore, probably the huge Kamchatka Krai (situated on the peninsula with the same name) will join as well a little bit later, but there are options. It is not clear if the predominantly Russian territory will chose multi-national Sakha or the predominantly Russian Amuria as its new motherland; there is a small chance they could also proclaim their independence. Joining Sakha seems the most probable scenario for several reasons: first, Sakha has a land route into Kamchatka while Amuria only has maritime routes; second, Sakha will need maritime access to the Pacific ocean while Amuria will already have it via Sakhalin and northern Kuril islands; third, world powers like e.g. USA and Canada would prefer to border the state with less powerful navy. Still, neither of these factors seems decisive, so any of the two options seem probable.
As described in above sections, most probably the newborn state Buryatia will seek to expand north at its dawn, annexing primarily Irkustk Oblast territories, but also parts of Sakha until the Lena river. This will most probably happen even before Sakha declares its independence (and might be as well one of the strong factors to proclaim it). Fearing an attack of its territories the neighbouring state Amuria will probably send its troops as peacekeepers to protect the Sakha borders to the north of its territory, in order to limit the invading capacity of Buryatia. Soon after the ceasefire and a sort of the peace treaty Amuria will recall its troops; though it might ask for some economic or political preferences in return, potentially including the give up of Kamchatka as a part of the "secret" agreement with Sakha.
One way or another, if Sakha is formed as a union of all four regions it will become the 7th largest state in the world with a whopping land area of over 4'700'000 sq km (60% larger than India and the 2nd largest in Eurasia after China). With population of just around 1'500'000 citizens it will be the most sparsely populated state in the world (with just 0.32 people per square kilometer), comparable to small states like Bahrain or Estonia by population. Despite the complex ethnic composition of 51% Russians, 32% Yakuts, 5% Tungusic (Evenks, Evens), 4% Ukrainians, 3% Chukotko-Kamchatkans (Chukchis, Koryaks, etc), it will nevertheless be unlikely to suffer from any internal conflicts, as its citizens learned how to live in peace in this diverse region for decades. Without Kamchatka its territory would be only slightly smaller - over 4'200'000 sq km of land area and population of around 1'200'000 citizens, with a higher ratio of Yakuts (40%) and a lower ratio of Russians (43%), and even lower population density of just 0.28 people per square kilometer (if Greenland would be independent it would have just 0.13, the only real competitor).
Despite the small population, the new country have all chance to quickly become prosperous without the rule of Russian kleptocrats due to its rich natural resources: oil (62 mln tonn), gas (1'200 bln m3), uranus (344'000 tonn), coal, gold (over 60 tonn per year), silver (over 1300 tonn per year), gems, tin, wolfram, copper, molibden, but also timber and fisheries. Hopefully, it will be able to finish the construction of the 2'000 km long highway Yakutsk-Magadan (which Russia was not able to build for over 40 years due to insane corruption), or even extend it the other 1'500 km to Anadyr (capital of Chukotka); that would increase the export capacity of Sakha further empowering it economically. With the vast territory and small population Sakha might embrace liberal immigrant policies to attract foreign labor; also they will look for trade and military alliances with Amuria, Japan, USA, and Canada.
In the Arctic region Russia might try to keep its control over the large Wrangel and Lyakhovsky islands, but due to extended and unreliable Arctic maritime routes it will quickly abandon this idea forfeiting them to Sakha. Still, Sakha government might seriously consider the idea to sell the uninhabited Wrangel island to USA in exchange for significant investments into infrastructure projects; USA might also be interested in that agreement as it seeks for the dominance in the Arctic ocean.
Mari-El, Chuvashia, and Mordovia
On the opposite side of Russia in the dangerous proximity of its core provinces the world might witness the rise of 3 tiny nation-states: finnish Mari-El and Mordovia, and turkic Chuvashia. If that happens, the westernmost point of Mordovia will be mere 270 km away from the Moscow suburbs; and still that is a quite real possiblity. However, the future of this diverse region is far from clear yet. Below I will cover a couple of the most probable scenarios.
All three regions are dominated by Russian-speaking non-Russian ethnicities and have strong aspirations for independence. For them it looks like the unimaginable dream at the moment; hence, their latent population will not be the key actor in achieving that dream. However, if one looks closely at the region, it becomes evident that Kazan - the capital city of the emerging neighbouring state Tatarstan - will be positioned just 24 km away from the will-be western border with Russia by straight line or 40 km by the highway. Sounds scary, right? Especially, considering that the regular MRL artillery in Russian armanent BM-21 Grad has a firing range of 45 km, and the modern tank traverses that distance within 2 hours. Therefore, Tatarstan will look for ways to push its border with Russia further away from its capital. The most logical move, by a still autonomous (but not yet independent) Tatarstan will be to move its newborn military troops to the west to take control over the neighbouring territories of Mari-El and Chuvashia, possibly also to the south to control the important city Ulyanovsk. This will be described as the friendly move to protect the neighbouring areas from the attrocities of the ongoing Civil War. However, once Tatarstan declares indenendence (in sync with Bashkiria, possibly at the same day), these troops will not be recalled; instead, they might be even enforced by the allied troops of Bashkiria, still playing the peacekeepers role.
Local elites of rich industrialized regions of Mari-El and Chuvashia might leverage this fact as a chance to declare the independence from Russia at the right moment. Later on Mordovia might join their accord, although that is less probable due to the geographic complexity of defending its territory, surrounded by Russia from all sides (almost 95% of its border length). Thus, Mordovia might wait for a better time to declare independence, once the independent Volga state emerges on its south border (see below). Anyway, all 3 states will be quite vulnerable to the Russian invasion; thus they will seek for the defensive alliances with each other as well as with Tatarstan and Bashkiria, but also Komi and Perm; so much that they can even choose to become the part of the neighbouring states.
Mari-El with the capital in Yoshkar-Ola is dominated by the finnish ethnicity Mari: officially 45% Russians, 42% Mari, and 6% Tatars; but as usual the ratio of Russians is in fact much lower, making the Mari ethnicity the dominant in this newborn state. Since the beginning Maris might seek the alliance with ethnically close Komi, Mordvins, Udmurts, and Permians (all finnish); so they might wish to join the state of Perm. However, Mari-El is the only one of these finnish ethnicities who has the majority in their region. So, independence looks like the most probable outcome. With land area around 23'000 sq km and population around 670'000 citizens, Mari-El will be a small state, comparable to Djibuti or Belize. Most of its population will be Orthodox Christians, and since the majority of nominal Russians are in fact Mari, no religious or ethnic conflicts are expected. Although Mari-El has little natural resources, its industrialized economy is highly integrated into Tatarstan and this country will remain its primary trade partner.
Chuvashia with the capital in Cheboksary is by far dominated by turkic ethnicity Chuvashes: officially 68% Chuvashes, 27% Russians, 3% Tatars. Although they are ethnically close to Tatars, Chuvashes are (possibly) the only Turkic ethnicity which is predominantly Orthodox Christian; thus, it is more probable that they would prefer to proclaim the independence from Russia rather than join predominanly Muslim Tatarstan, even if that poses a greater risk. It is even more probable that Chuvashia will prefer to join Perm over Tatarstan if they are forced into any sort of subjugation by the Russian threat. With land area around 18'000 sq km and population almost 1'200'000 citizens, Chuvashia will be a small state, comparable to Fiji or Eswatini. The economy of Chuvashia (like Mari-El) is highly integrated into Tatarstan, although it also has potential for more trade freedom based on its machine and chemical industries.
Mordovia (Mordvinia) with the capital in Saransk is officially dominated by Russians, but in fact by finnish ethnicities of quite close Erzyas and Mokshas, collectively called as Mordvins: officially 53% Russians, 40% Mordvins, 5% Tatars. An interesting fact: almost 4% of the Mordovia population are prisoners from all around Russia as it hosts almost 30 penetentiary institutions. Due to large distance from other finnish-populated ethnicities, independence or allegience with Russia seems to be the most probable outcomes for Mordovia, although they might also join Perm (together with Mari-El and Chuvashia) or Volga. With land area around 26'000 sq km and population around 770'000 citizens, Mordovia will be a small state, comparable to Mari-El or Djibouti. Mordovian economy is surprisingly innovative as for Russia promising to be self-sustaining during independence; in addition it might become an important transit point between Moscowia and Volga states.
Below is a summary about the probability of each region to become independent versus stay with Russia or join other states. Mari-El: 50% independent, 20% stay with Russia, 20% join Perm, 10% join Tatarstan. Chuvashia: 60% independent, 20% stay with Russia, 10% join Perm, 10% join Tatarstan. Mordovia: 40% independent, 40% stay with Russia, 10% join Perm, 10% join Volga.
Siberia
All major inroads from core Russian provinces into Siberia go either via major cities of Kazan - Perm, Kazan - Ufa, or Samara - Ufa, and further via Ural mountain passes; or alternatively via the maritime navigation through the mighty river Ob. An alternative land route via cities Kirov - Perm is hardly traversable. Thus, after the successful "special operations" to declare independence of Yenisey and Komi, and most importantly Tatarstan and Bashkiria, the renegade Russian oligarchs will be ready to strike the final blow into the agonizing Russian Federation. At the peak of the Civil War the vast territory of Western siberia, comprizing of the Ural Federal Okrug (except the Yamal peninsula seized by Komi), Omsk Oblast, Tomsk Oblast, Novosibirsk Oblast, Kemerovo Oblast, and Altai Krai, will be almost as cut off from the Russian core provinces as Sakha, an ideal situation to declare independence.
Although the majority of Siberian population are ethnic Russians, the oligarchs will use all their power to falsificate the so-called referendum for independence. They might use television to "convince" the locals that they are Siberians unlawfully exploited by the Moscowian Horde or even directly bribe the population; that would be viewed by them as the cheap way to part with Russia and lift western sanctions for their businesses. Siberia might become the first state to extradict its citizens to Ukraine for the Tribunal against the Russian War Crimes during the First and Second Russo-Ukrainian Wars. Remember that the city of Rubtsovsk, the home to many infamous russian marauders, is situated on the far east side of Siberia. Russian oligarchs will not shy away to give up a tiny part ot its most extremist citizens to justice or free and elect a pseudo-liberal FSB agent like Oleksiy Navalnyi as the Siberian president, and ask EU to lift economic sanctions against Siberia in exchange. They are already willing to do anything to lift these sanctions.
Russian government will certainly not be willing to forfeit their primary oil & gas deposits without fight. However, with limited road and railroad supply capacity and problems on the southern front fighting Kuban, Don and Volga rebels; Moscow elites will have hard time fighting the eastern front against Siberia. However, as stupid as that might seem, Moscow regime (even after the Putin's death) will not hesitate sending regular citizens at all fronts at once, further ruining Russia from inside out and speeding up its demise. With the combined population of well over 15 mln people, the vast operational territory, and the narrow inroads via Ural mountains Siberia will be the tough nut, almost impossible for the weakened Russian army to penetrate.
From ethnic perspective Russians will form a dominant majority entire Siberia, with over 80% Russians in every province except the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug (68%) and Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug (61%) where they still hold the majority and any other ethnicity still has less then 10% of the region's population. Thus, it is highly improbable that the Siberia might further split into smaller states from ethno-religious reasons; even less so from economic or political reasons.
With the land area over 2'500'000 sq km and population around 23'000'000 citizens, Siberia will enter the top 10 largest states in the world, comparable by size and population to Kazakhstan. Ethnical composition will be dominated by former Russians who will quickly divert culturally and linguistically from their Moscowian relatives; the biggest minorities will be Tatars, Ukrainians, Bashkirs, and Kazakhs. There are several cities with population well over 1 million citizens that could serve as the capital city. Novosibirsk seems the most favorable candidate from the logistics and security standpoints, situated at the crossing of main road, railroad, and water ways of Siberia, at a secure distance from all neighbours. Still, large economic hubs Omsk, Tumen, or Yekaterinburg are viable candidates too.
Notably, during the secession Siberia will inherit the one sixth of the Russian population - something that will impact not only the economic or territorial balance of Russia (like all the previously described newborn states), but also a huge demographic impact. By cutting off Russia from the regular source for conscripts, this secession alone is capable to destroy any future imperialist aspirations of Moscowians. Furthermore, with the relatively large population and vast territory Siberia will take its most valuable resource - the largest Eurasian oil & gas deposits of the western siberian oil field. By cutting off the primary oil & gas deposits spread across the vast Tumen Oblast region, this will certainly mean an end to the endless supply of fossil fuel dollars, so much needed by the Russian imperial regimes to fund their pointless military campaigns.
Besides oil & gas, Siberia will inherit a significant amount of other netural riches: gold, silver, platinum, gems, stones, marble, ores, coal, uranus, furs, fertilizer, timber, as well as developed agriculture and industries. All that will now be owned solely by former Russian oligarchs (and now Siberian), who will no longer need to bribe and fear the Moscowian dictatorship. Obviously, they will still need to bribe the newborn corrupt bureaucracy of Siberia, build new money-laundering schemes covered by the local FSB branch, lobby its interests in EU and USA to lift sanctions against this newborn state and their businesses. But all that is a lesser evil for them compared to being a part of the isolated stagnating Russian dictatorship or risking to lose all their during the ongoing Civil War. To the world, a corrupt but peaceful state smaller than Argentina would seems a much better option than a criminal warmongering state covering one tenth of the entire planet. To Siberian citizens a replacement of Moscow kleptocrats with regional kleptocrats might also mean an improvement of their lives; as all these billionaries will have to build facilities for their fashionable life and palaces in the close Siberian cities instead of the far away Moscow or Saint-Petersburg.
Perm
Situated between the newborn independent states on the north, east, and south, and practically cut off from the core Russian provinces logistically, the 3 Russian regions - Perm Krai, Republic of Udmurtia, and Kirov Oblast - will not stay with Russia for long. Although this is the historic territory of the medieval state Velyka Perm (of finnish origin), as of now it is for long dominatied by the ethnically Russian population. Only the republic of Udmurtia still holds a significant finnish minority - ethnical Udmurts - at around 28% of its population; other two even less so. However, the logistics, the economics, the historic reasons, and the pressure of neighbouring Komi, Siberia, Bashkiria, and Tatarstan (seeking to secure its borders from the Russian invasion) will do its job. The Russian renegade oligarchs might even opt to declare the independence of Perm at the same time as independence of Siberia in order to make the life of Russian regime and military extremely hard. Due to the joint Tatarstan and Bashkiria army securing the border of (potentially independent) Mari-El, the only inroad into Perm for the Russian military will be a hardly trespassable road Nizhniy Novgorod - Kirov. Thus, chances for Perm to become independent are high.
Once independent, Perm will claim its ascendance to the medieval state with the same name, playing the role of the regional center of Uralic and Finnish cultures (despite those cultures being a minority in modern Perm). That might lead the small states of Mari-El, Chuvashia, and Mordovia to join Perm; although that scenario is less probable than 4 separate states (as described in above sections).
With the capital in Perm, land area around 320'000 sq km and population around 5'300'000 citizens (81% Russians, 9% Udmurts, 5% Tatars, 2% Komi-Permyaks) the newborn Perm will be a big state, comparable to Oman or Finland (or bigger if Mari-El, Chuvashia, or Mordovia join it). Perm will inherit a small share of the Volga-Ural oil & gas field and developed industries, enough to build a prosperous state. It will also serve as an important transit state for both Komi and Siberia, as well as an important trade partner for Tatarstan and Bashkiria. Interestingly, Perm might become an important global player of military supplies, as a big chunk of Russian military industrial plants reside in Udmurtia.
Kalmykia
A small Kalmykia on the south of Russia is enclosed between the rivers of Manych (Don tributary) and Volga. Despite the Kalmyk ethnic majority (almost 60%) it would have hard time declaring its independence due to the small population (of little over 250'000 citizens), if not the Russian Civil War. However, as the Russian revolutionary troops from Kuban and Don regions move north, Kalmykia will gain a short window of opportunity. Like the neighbouring Dagestan, this region was for long a depressive Russian province with almost no real investments from the olygarchy. Thus, seeing the success of other nation states emergency on the Russian skeleton, Kalmyks will try to go the proven way: a wide autonomy followed by an independence.
Although Kalmyks are nominally close to Mongols, historically they had close ties with surrounding Turkic ethnicities. Thus, the new state might get a high level of support from Turkic regional powers of the Kaspian region - Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan, potentially also Turkey and China. Notably, as the Russian Civil War progresses, Kazakhstan will gradually transform from the restrained Russian ally into an independent regional leader seeking to project its political agendas more aggressively. In particular, with the emergence of independent Kalmykia, a possibility to establish a land corridor into the Caucasus region will appear on the table of Kazakhstan, amplified by historic Kazakh claims for the Astrakhan province of Russia sitting between Kazakhstan and the emerging Kalmykia. Due to the stretched supply lines along the south of Volga river neither official Russian government in Moscow nor the revolutionary forces will be able to prove its authority over Astrakhan Oblast, leading to the increased discontent in it. Thus, a joint police operation of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kalmykia, Dagestan, and Azerbaijan to restore order in this province seems real. Most probably, Kazakh leader will not be interested in annexing the city of Astrakhan (with the Russian majority) that would destabilize its complex ethnic situation. For Kalmyks it would, in contrast, be highly desirable to join Astrakhan to its territory as a major trade hub. Thus, the final outcome of this operation will be a division of the Astrakhan Oblast between Kalmykia on the right bank of Volga with large chunk of ethnic Kalmyks (including the Astrakhan city), Kazakhstan on the left bank of Volga with a strong Kazakh ethnic majority (including the sanctuary site of Sarai-city ruins, the former capital of Nogai Horde), and another new state (e.g. Don, see below) holding the the northern parts of Astrakhan oblast with Russian ethnic majority (around the town Akhtiubinsk).
The acquisition of Astrakhan, the Volga river trade route, and the land border with Kazakhstan will allow Kalmykia to become an important transit state of the region fueling its economy. Although Kalmykia might lose the westernmost part of its territory behind the Manych river (which is predominantly Russian and hard to defend), that will have a minimal impact onto the newborn state.
With the capital in Elista (or Astrakhan), land area of over 95'000 sq km and population of a around 1'000'000 citizens (including Astrakhan with over 500'000 citizens), Kalmykia will be a medium sparsely populated state comparable to Portugal or Liberia by size, but much smaller Djibouti or Fiji by population. It will inherit a complex ethnic composition: 56% Russians (primarily in Astrakhan, in fact a smaller portion), 18% Kalmyks, 9% Tatars, 8% Kazakhs etc; and religious diversity (primarily Christian, Muslim, and Buddhist). Notably, it might become the first and only nominally Mongolian ethnic group state in Europe, a tiny remnant of once powerful Golden Horde. Although its economy will be mostly agricultural, it has all chances to become an important transit point and trade hub between Middle Asia and Caucasus. With the emergence of Kuban it might also become an vital puzzle in the alternative land based Silk Trade Route from China into Europe completely avoiding the Russian territory.
Kuban
For long a historically multi-cultural Kuban region consisting of the Krasnodar Krai and Stavropol Krai provinces of Russia was the permanent source of discontent led predominantly by diverse Chirkassian ethnicities and descendants of Ukrainian Cossacks, both groups known to be quite discontent anti-imperialist cultures. Together with the neighbouring Rostov-On-Don Oblast this region might ignite the Russian Civil War. However, as it usually happens the initial stage of this uppraising have little chance for success, and the Russian army will most probably take control over the Rostov-On-Don Oblast within the first year of the Civil War threating the total collapse of the revolution.
Kuban, however, will be a tough region to penetrate due to its culture and geography. Protected from the north by mighty Don and Manych rivers and Terek river on the east, the only land inroad into the region is all the way through Volgograd and Astrakhan. As the Second Russo-Ukrainian War have proved the Russian army is rather inefficient in passing through rivers, and its transport aviation is expected to be totally destroyed in this war. In addition to that, although Kuban population is nominally reported as dominantly Russian; in fact it has strong genetic and cultural roots in Chirkassian and Ukrainian ethnicities. Just one fact: in 1929 whole 47% of Krasnodar Krai population (over 1'400'000) were reported as Ukrainians, while just 10 years later in 1939 most of them were "written down" as Russians, only 4.7% remained as Ukrainians (almost 150'000). These "magic numbers" were not a mistake: the territory of artificial hunger in Ukraine implemented by the Russian oppressors included the Ukrainian provinces of Kuban too; thus after the long period of Ukrainian genocide it was just safer to declare Russian allegiance. Despite nominally Russian even now many of these people inside families tell they are Ukrainians or Cossacks, whatever makes more sense to them. Most importantly, they have a strong warrior culture which will ultimately prove benefitial when facing the threat of repeating repressions of the Russian administration. Finally, Kuban military leaders have all chances to cease the Black Sea Fleet of Russia and use its firepower to destroying the Russian army supply routes south of the Don river.
Besides geographic, cultural, and military factors; another reason to strenthen the Kuban resistance is geopolitical. The separation of this region from Russia would mean the land bridge between Caucasus and Ukraine, and together with the secession of Kalmykia also a land bridge between Middle Asia and Ukraine (note that the Crimea peninsula will be liberated by the Ukrainian Army during the first few months of the Russian Civil War). That effectively means that fossil fuel from Caucassus and Middle Asia (and also from Iran) could enter the huge Europena market by the cheapest transport - land based pipelines; and also that the purely land based Silk Road from Chine into Europe is possible, completely avoiding the Russian territory - something Chine is dreaming of for long. Because of that Kuban might receive covert or open military support from Ukraine, Turkey, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Ichkeria, and China, and even Russian oligarchs, in exchange for the declaration of independence. Teached by the failure of the First Russian Civil War to the most evil party - communist terrorists - due to the desire to liberate entire Russia off the red plague, modern revolutionaries might be wiser to accept the iterative approach of secessing small pieces off Russia chunk by chunk.
All those factors together will lead to the independence of Kuban. Further on, it will be an outpost to spread the revolutionary ideas into Don region fuelling the next stage of the ongoing Russian Civil War, while remaining an independent state. There is a high chance that Kuban and Don regions will stay united. However, due to the difference in their ethnic and cultural landscape as well as the geopolitical interests of regional powers, the independence of Kuban seems more probable.
Inside Kuban there is a small enclave of the Republic of Adygea which might want to join Chirkassia. Still, due to the complex geography of Adygea consisting of de facto 3 geographically separate territories with no direct access to the rest of Chirkassia, as well as the predominantly Russian population and the dangerously close distance from the Krasnodar city, a more probable option seems to be a wide autonomy inside Kuban.
With the capital in Krasnodar, land area of almost 150'000 sq km and population of over 8'900'000 citizens Kuban will be a medium state comparable to Tunisia or Greece. From the ethnic perspective it will be dominated by 78% Russians, with strong minorities of 5% Armenians, 2% Ukrainians, 2% Adyge, other (over 40) ethnicities. However, soon enough Kuban people will undergo the national renaissance, declaring the ethnic divorse with the Russian culture and forming a separate Slavic ethnicity (neither Russian nor Ukrainian) e.g. Kubans or Cossacks. Kuban will inherit a relatively healthy agriculture and industries (potentially the 2nd agriculture exporter in Europe after Ukraine), as well as fine tourism and transport infrastructure. Being an important transit hub for fossil fuels (from Middle Asia, Iran, and Caucassus to Europe) and the Silk Route (from China to Europe) and free from Moscowian kleptocrats; Kuban have all chances to prosper after the end of the Russian Civil War, even despite a high corruption of regional elites. Over time, it might take the course of Ukraine, following the slow yet steady path of democratic reforms. Interestingly, the Kerch Bridge between Crimea (Ukraine) and Taman (former Russia, future Kuban) peninsulas which most probably be destroyed during the Russo-Ukrainian War might obtain a new value as the transit vein between independent Kuban and Ukraine and may be rebuilt.
Prussia
The nowadays Kaliningrad Oblast of the Russian Federation, despite being small, has a long history full of controversy. The historic name of the region is Sambia, and it was populated by now extinct Baltic trides commonly known as Prussians during medieval epoch. Later on these tribes were germanized and assimilated by the crussaders of Teuton Order, vassalized and later annexed by Poland (which founded Kroliewec - the first historic name of Kaliningrad), later seized by german state Brandenburg allowing it to proclaim itself as the kingdom of Prussia (with the aim to claim its medieval Prussian heritage), and later form the German Empire. Finally, just during the WW2 the russian Red Army captured the then East Prussia province of Germany preceeded by the epic evacuation of the entire germanized Prussian population from this province Germany.
Russians immediately militarized the region, building the monstrous navy bas for its Baltic Fleet. Since then the only indigenous population of the province are small Latvian, Lithuanian, Belarusian, and Polish minorities; the majority of population are Russian (and to lesser extent Ukrainian) colonists, just enough to provide services to the military bases. As of now this is a regular depressive russian region full of military facilities and personnel and little of other (non-military) economy. Compared to the rich neighbours - Poland and Lithuania, and even more so Sweden and Germany - it is clearly home to the poor population.
During the Second Russian Civil War, the Kaliningrad Oblast will gradually orbit away from the Russian power projection and towards the EU. As the result of the Russo-Ukrainian War it risks to be subject of land and later sea blockade by the EU member states. That will quickly lead to the population discontent. As the Baltic Fleet is rebased from Baltiysk to the safer Saint-Petersburg navy base, the regional bureaucrats will probably declare the independence and pledge to either Poland or Deutschland for military protection. However, the EU members in general are not interested to allow annexation of this region by anybody, as that could dramatically shift the balance of power within EU and potentially create internal conflicts. A more balanced approach will be to support the Prussian independence and take control of its democratic and economy reforms. The local predominantly Russian population (over 85%) will gladly agree to the new ethnonym which is similar to their current name and also refers to the historic ethnic and geographic name of the region. They might even choose to rename the capital city of Kaliningrad into either Kroliewec or Kenigsberg in order to completely part with their Russian past.
With land area over 15'000 sq km and population of little over 1'000'000 citizens Prussia will be a small country, comparable to Montenegro or Timor-Leste. At the beginning Prussia will be a poor state with disbalanced economy, but its geographic position allows it to quickly follow the path of other Baltic states to prosperity. Relatively large deposits of amber will help with that too if combined with anti-corruption legislation. The EU will be highly interested in the fast economic growth of Prussia; so much that, ironically, it might be ready to join the EU even faster than Ukraine, as fast as by 2035 in the best case scenario.
The Final Disassembly of Russia - Restoration of Moscowia
The forth stage of the Russian disassembly will take place after the end of the Civil War (potentially, as the result of the Civil War Peace Treaty cementing the Russian fragmentation) and the following decade between 2028-2040 and will be led by the opposing Civil War parties and the emerging regional clans (political, economic, and criminal) in the core Russian provinces. Any quasi-state which is not able to secure its independence a decade after the Civil War ceasefire (betwen 2035-2040) most probably will be dragged back into the gravity well towards Moscow.
Pax Moscowia
The will be no such state as Pax Moscowia - it is just a convenient name for this essey to describe a part of Russian Federation left after the independence parade of its former colonies. What is left are pre-dominantly Russian ethnic regions with more or less good road and railway communication with Moscow. There is a high chance that Moscow government will be able to hold these provinces under their authority, as well as Mordovia and Perm. In the borders outlined on the above map (plus some arctic islands and archipelagos), this quasi-state would still posses land area over 2'600'000 sq km and population over 71'000'000 citizens getting almost 16% of land area and 49% of population of the Russian Federation. That would be still the largest state in Europe by land area, but only 3rd by population after Turkey and Deutschland, with strong military and access to quite big oil & gas deposits.
However, such outcome would apparently mean that the Russian threat for the civilized world is not over. If it succeeds to stay unified in these borders, its elites will certainly thrive for the yet another revenge against the world, constantly threatening to invade and annex the weak neighbours to the east and south. There is no doubt that the huge Pax Moscowia would be able to gloat the tiny Mari-El within days. One way or another, it would annex many states up to the Ural and Caucasus mountains and once again put the world in danger of a big war.
Thus, the preferred scenario is for Pax Moscowia to desintegrate even further. And very probably that without intervention of world elites to stop this process, under continued isolation and economic sanctions this process will continue as described in the following sections.
An important note is about the name of the Russian Federation after the majority of its colonies secess. For european states it is desirable to use a historically justifiable name Moscowia for this remaining state regardless of the left-name its population choses; such states as Ukraine, Kuban, and Baltics should immediately promote the restoration of the common use of the Moscowia, so that the Russian imperialism is evicted from the world at all fronts, including the cultural and mental. The thing is: the self-name Russia was stolen by the Moscowian tsarism from the latinized name Ruthenia of the medieval state Rus. The Rus with capital in Kyiv had Varangian rulers and the East Slavic population consisting of around a dozen different tribes inhabiting a vast territory between the Black Sea step and the lakes Onega and Ladoga. Notably the first mention about Ukraine and Ukrainians is available around XII century in the manuscripts of the kingdom of Galicia-Volynia and refers to the geographic region and indigenous population of the western, northern, and central parts of modern Ukraine. Moscow rulers used the self-name Moscowia and Moscowites during XIV-XVIII centuries and only adopted the name Russia (and Russians) in the late XVIII century in order to falsify its imperial claims onto the Rus heritage and later the entirety of East Slavic lands.
It is common for the world to use a different external versus internal name for the state when disputable situation like this happens. Restoring the names Moscowia and Moscowians (or Moscowites) will serve the purpose to undermine the core idea of the modern russian imperialism quite well.
Don
After the establishment of independent Kuban and Kalmykia, and securing their borders, different Russian revolutionary groups will continue to push north along the Don and Volga rivers in an attempt to take control of Moscow and install their government. In case if any group succeeds to take control of all remaining major cities in Pax Moscowia (Moscow, Saint Petersburg, Volgograd, Rostov-On-Don, Sarama, and Saratov); this new unified government will immediately foster plans to re-unite the other parts of former Russian Federation. This is something that regional powers like Poland, Ukraine, Turkey, Kazakhstan, and also Siberia, would not welcome. Thus, using the covert politics both regional powers and small emerging states will work hard to keep the shaky balance between different parties of the Russian Civil War to not allow any of them to take the decisive upper hand.
Without external support Rostov-On-Don based revolutionaries would have hard time pushing further north along the Don river than the city of Voronezh. Also, rich elites of Samara and Saratov will make sure that revolutionaries are not able to move along the Volga river beyond the city of Kamyshin, although the city of Volgograd will probably join the revolutionaries voluntarily. In the best case (for them) Don militants might seize control as far north as over Tambov, Lipetsk and Kursk Oblasts; however, that would be a deadly threat for the government in Moscow. Note that from the ethnic perspective population of the Don region is different from both Kuban region and territories further north than Voronezh, despite all of these groups speak similar dialects of the Russian language. That means that unlike Volgograd, citizens of Lipetsk and Tambov would not welcome southern rebels. Thus, a the most probable scenario is that Don rebels will take control of parts of the Voronezh Oblast (but not its capital). An important role at a later stage of this conflict may be played by another party - rich elites of Samara and Saratov (see below) which would prefer Don to control the important roads and pipelines going through the south of Voronezh Oblast rather than Moscowia.
An interesting scenario might happen in the Belgorod Oblast which was historically a part of Ukraine and is populated primarily by russified Ukrainians. Not only they are closer ethnically to Ukraine population than to Moscowians, they are also more economically tied to the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv than any Moscowian cities. Amid the assault of Don rebels onto the Voronezh Oblast and intensified warfare across the Don river, Belgorod Oblast elites might declare wide autonomy and appeal to neighbouring Ukraine to protect its territory militarily. Ukraine will be unlikely to annex Belgorod Oblast which could worsen the Ukrainian demographic situation, however, Ukrainians might be interested in yet another buffer zone between the Ukrainian and Russian borders. Thus, a probable situation is the declaration of independence of Belgorod and quick negotiations between Belgorod and Ukraine governments about a sort of the peacekeepers mission on its borders. Later on Belgorod might become a client state of Ukraine, or join Moscowia or Don. Without a strong patron it would have hard time to survive militarily and economically.
Exact borders of the new Don state as well as its chosen name are not clear. One of the foreseen scenarios is presented on the map above, where it consists of the Rostov-On-Don Oblast, the Volgograd Oblast, and parts of the Voronezh Oblast. In this composition with the capital in Rostov-On-Don, land area over 260'000 sq km and population over 7'500'000 citizens, Don will be a big state comparable to Laos or Finland. It will immediately become an important transit state for oil & gas pipelines from Ural, Siberia, and Middle Asia into Europe, the river vein between Kaspian and Black Seas, and the land route hub between all neighbouring states. Also, it will become an important agriculture exporter (potentially 3rd in Europe after Ukraine and Kuban), and will get its own significant chunk of the Volga-Don oil & gas fields deposits. Although initially rather warmongering and culturally intolerant to its neighbours, Don will not have enough military and political power to expand. Thus, over time its population will settle down and become a valuable trade partner to Ukraine, Kuban, Volga, Kazakhstan, and others.
The potential Belgorod (Bilgorod) state, with the capital in Belgorod, land area of 27'000 sq km and population over 1'500'000 citizens, will be a small city-state, comparable to North Macedonia or Equatorial Guinea. Populated by predominantly russified Ukrainians it might claim its heritage back to the once influential East Slavic tribe of Siverians equidistancing itself from Moscowia, Ukraine, and Don. Economically tied to the Kharkiv Oblast of Ukraine the new Belgorod state have all chances to be self-sustaining due to its developed agriculture, iron ore mining, and metallurgy economy sectors. It might also establish a healthy balance of power between the neighbouring states: Ukraine, Moscowia, and Don, when neither power is able to fully drag the small Belgorod state into its orbit of influence.
Volga
Surrounded from 3 directions (north, east, and south) by independent states, and under constant threat of proliferation of Don rebels from the west, regional elites of rich industrialized Russian cities situated at the middle current of the river of Volga: Ulyanovsk, Tolyatti, Samara, and Saratov - will have to make a hard decision about their allegiance to the Civil War participants. Most probably, they will choose the middle path to stay neutral for as long as possible, but closer to the culmination of the Russian Civil War they might declare their independence from Russia and help the Don rebels to seize parts of the Voronezh Oblast from Moscowia in exchange for the mutual non-aggression pact and some trade preferences. In particular, the new state (lets name it Volga based on the primary waterway) will be interested in the lucrative conditions for the oil & gas transit through the Soyuz pipelines flowing through the south of Voronezh Oblast.
Depending onto many factors parts of the Orenburg Oblast spread narrowly in between Tatarstan, Bashkiria, Siberia, and Kazakhstan, as well as small chunks of other provinces in the region, might be annexed by the mentioned countries where their title ethnicities form a strong majority. In particular, Bashkiria and Kazakhstan both have strong historic claims for the east part of Orenburg Oblast, including the city of Orsk. These territories were only cut from Bashkiria and Kazakhstan Soviet Republics during the administrative reforms of late Soviet Union when the communist party made a decision to completely assimilate ethnicities of Ural and Volga regions (specifically, Bashkirs, Tatars, and Finno-Uralic ethnicities). In one of the scenarios the city of Orenburg will be the easternmost point of the territory held by Moscowia or Volga. Still, the other equally probable scenario is that the entire Orenburg Oblast will join the new Volga state, with supply lines stretched along the "road of life" Samara - Buzuluk - Orenburg - Orsk. One more, less probable, scenario is the emergence of the separate state Ural within the borders of the Orenburg Oblast.
In the most probable scenario the new Volga state will consist of former Samara Oblast, Ulyanovsk Oblast, Penza Oblast, Saratov Oblast, and Orenburg Oblast; although in some scenarios a militarily weak Republic of Mordovia might also join. With the capital in geographically the most centralized city of Samara, land area around 360'000 sq km and population around 9'900'000 citizens, Volga will be a big state, highly urbanized (over 75%) with average population density, comparable to Norway or Japan by size, and to Portugal or Sweden by population. From the ethnic perspective it will be dominated by Russians (84%) with strong minorities of Tatars (6%), Mordva (2%), Chuvashes (2%), Kazakhs (2%), and Ukrainians (2%); religiously dominated by Orthodox Christians with the Sunni Muslim minority. Volga will inherit developed industries: machines (including cars, trucks, trains, and planes), electronics, chemicals, metallurgy, agriculture, military equipment; rich natural resources: oil & gas, iron, copper, and nickel ores, salt, timber; as well as education and entertainment services. It will also serve as an important pipelines transit hub for oil & gas from other Ural states and Siberia, as well as an important road and railroad transit hub for its many neighbours. All that plus the freedom from Moscow kleptocrats promise Volga a bright future once it adopts the modern economy pronciples and work with internaltional organizations to bring war criminals to justice in order to lift the economic sanctions from world powers.
Novgorod
Without other large cities to balance them, the largest Moscowian metropolices of Moscow and Saint Petersburg will increase their historic competition that might grow into rivalry. Even now the infamous rivalry between Moscow and Petersburg branches of FSB is rather dramatic; as well as the rivalry between predominantly Petersburgian FSB against the predominantly Moscowian general staff and GRU. Left to themselves these tensions may grow into a full-scale covert war, resulting into the restoration of historic grievances and the split of the visually united state by the historic, economic, political, and even ethnic trench through the sparsely populated territory midway between Moscow and Saint Petersburg.
This divorse will finalize the disintegration of Russia making it no more capable to take major offensives against its neighbours. The ongoing rivalry between Moscowia with the capital in Moscow and Novgorod with the capital in Saint Petersburg risks to grow into the last military conflict on the former Russian Federation core provinces. However, a more probable scenario is that it will end up with political and covert operations, or at most the hybrid war for the northern province giving access to the White Sea and Artics: Republic of Karelia, Murmansk Oblast, and Arkhangelsk Oblast. Although all 3 provinces are ethnically closer to the primarily Slavic-Finnish ethnic mix of Novgorod than the Turkic-Slavic-Uralic ethnic mix of Moscowia, Moscow military and intelligence elites will throw all their forces to secure access to the White Sea after the loss of Pacific, Black, and Baltic Fleets. Thus, the most probable border between the emerging Novgorod state and the remnant Moscowia state in the north will go somewhere in the middle of the Republic of Karelia. There is a small chance that Karelia will declare independence or will fully join the Novgorod; still in any case Moscowia will remain the most probable owner of the Kola peninsula (even if it Moscowia manages to keep only the maritime routes to it), the Arkhangelsk Oblast and its Arctic possessions. Although the historic medieval Vylykyi Novgorod republic stretched as far as the Velyko-Permian Kniazdom, it is highly unlikely that it will be reproduces in the same borders now, as the ancient Vologda and Astrakhan cities are now more economically, politically, and logistically tied to Moscow.
The emerging state of Novgorod will become the most mono-ethnic state of the remnants of the Russian Federation with over 90% of population being ethnic Russians. However, soon after Novgorodian political elites will declare their ethnic heritage of the powerful medieval state of Great Novgorod, restoring the East Slavic ethnicity of Novgorodians; completely parting with their Russian cultural past. With the capital in Saint Petersburg, land area over 260'000 sq km and population over 8'900'000 citizens, Novgorod will be a big state, comparable to Don or Laos. (Note that if Novgorod manages to acquire the full of Republic of Karelia and the Kola peninsula (Murmansk Oblast) - it would become even bigger, with land area around 520'000 sq km and population over 9'800'000 citizens, comparable to Yemen or Thailand by size, but much smaller Hungary or Portugal by population). The new state of Novgorod will acquire relatively modern industries, financial and trade hub of Saint Petersburg, as well as rich cultural heritage and natural resources: iron ore, coal, fertilizer, timber. However, it will also inherit poor depressed regions of the Novgorod and Pskov Oblasts periphery deserving high infrastructure investments. Upon its independence Novgorod will seek for the close ties with its European neighbors - Finland, Estonia, and Latvia, as well as other EU members. Over time it might even become the EU and NATO member, together with Ukraine, Kuban, and Georgia. Once that happens, Moscowia will have no more chance to threaten the European security and will be forced to take the path of peaceful coexistance.
Moscowia Minor
After the secession of secession of Don, Volga, and Novgorod, the remnant Moscowia state will be stripped off all its former colonies (except the Arctic archipelagos, Arkhangelsk, Murmansk, Vologda, Smolensk, Bryansk, Kursk, Tambov, and parts of Voronezh Oblasts, which already became its core provinces long time ago). For quite some time it will be still paralized by the worldwide isolation and economic sanctions; and after Novgorod and Ukraine join either NATO or EU, Moscowia will be left with no other option than slowly transform from the warmongering terrorist state into the modern industrialized peaceful economic powerhorse. Probably, around 2050 Moscowia will finally finish its industrial revolution, an event it should have been undertaken long time ago, but which was postponed for decades due to its false geopolitical ambitions.
With the capital in Moscow, land area around 1'700'000 sq km and population over 43'000'000 citizens, Moscowia will be still one of the top 20 largest states in the world, comparable to Iran or Sudan by size, but now it will be comparable to Ukraine or Spain by population. Together with the limited access to the rich oil & gas deposits this will make the Moscowia comparable militaryly to its neighbours. Still, Moscowia with its White Sea and Arctic Fleets will remain one of the dominant powers in Arctics, competitive to USA, Canada, and Norway. Upon finally accepting its defeat at global stage, bringing war criminals to justice, paying reparations to Ukraine and other victim states of its imperialism, and working in a good faith to lift the economic and political sanctions from the world powers, Moscowia has all chances to return back to the world economic stage. It will still hold a large piece of its natural riches: coal, iron, aluminium, nickel, copper, fertilizer, agriculture, fisheries, furs, timber, stones and gems, oil & gas of the arctic archipelagos and shelf. With proper management and no over-budgetting the military expenses, Moscowia should be capable to rapidly grow its economy, becoming the next economic tiger of the eastern Europe.
Epilog
The disintegration of Russia will have tremendous consequences for the world. They will reach further than the formal disappearance of the biggest state from the world map. This death of the gargantuan empire is capable to trigger the domino effect on other Eurasian (and other continent) empires; and will also dramatically change the global balance of power, positively for some and negatively for others.
See more of the geopolitical analysis in the Part 3 of this essey.
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2 年Re-published on Medium: https://medium.com/@vkhoroz/imminent-disintegration-of-russia-4b66badf1d71