this post was submitted on 20 Aug 2026
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I think you're running into a conflict of definitions. Usually that's what these sorts of disagreements boil down to. In order to answer whether Russia counts as "imperialist", you first have to know what counts as "imperialism".
From Meriam-Webster:
By this definition, it's difficult to say Russia is doing capital "I" imperialism, since they're not occupying and controlling a majority of Ukraine. If you count any amount of land occupied, then they are.
When you're talking to tankies, you also have to realise that Imperialism is a jargon term with a specific definition. That's explained by Lenin here, if you're interested.
Your, rather pointlessly pedantic, argument makes sense only if you ignore the places russia has already taken over (and I'm talking about areas colonized by imperial russia, soviet union and current russian federation, that are still occupied by said russian federation) and also ignore their goals with Ukraine.
But if you don't ignore those things, your argument falls apart.
I think you're confusing the "extending the power and dominion of a nation" bit and are treating that line as if it refers to two entities, as it it read "extending the power and dominating a nation".
"The dominion of a nation" is basically its possessions.
The passage is really saying that Imperialism is "the policy, practice, or advocacy of extending the power and territory or resources of a nation especially ...", though personally I'd replace "nation" with "entity", since I do think the capitalistic use is also appropriate. It's really about an entity wanting to expand (or consolidate) its control.
Anyways, with that clarification, I don't think whether or not Russia is doing an imperialism is under question.