ABSTRACT
As this book was being planned, we had just completed a fiscal policy case study based on research undertaken during our Fulbright assignments in the Baltic region. While serving as guest lecturers, we studied the role of citizens and noncitizens (Russian and other Soviet-era colonists remaining in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania) in the shaping of national security policy in the aftermath of the 2008 Russian invasion of Georgia and the 2014 armed absorption of Ukrainian Crimea. We found widespread belief that Russia’s pretext of defending Russian citizens in two Georgian provinces was really a military offensive and an internationally dangerous excuse for the rebirth of Russia’s expansionist policies. As the twentieth anniversary of Russia’s
1993 intervention in the Abkhazian dispute with Georgia attests, history shows us that we were right in our assessment of Russia’s intentions with its former territories.
