How Did Russia Get So Big?

instead of stealing it from us we'll hire you to protect it from your fellow raiders and the rules said okay and with their power eventually became the actual rulers of these local people establishing the rurik dynasty size russia is the biggest country in the world with a size of over 17 million square kilometers a federation made up of 85 federal subjects republics provinces and territories etc although it looks far bigger than it actually is and if we use this tool to see a country's true size we can see how the distance from the equator distorts a country's size on a typical map but still even in its true size depiction it's big far ahead of anyone else in the top five of biggest countries in the world and in fact almost double the size of each of the three runner-ups canada usa or china a lot of times i used to look at a map and think how did russia get this big so in this video we're going to find out how there are two questions we need to answer one how is it possible for them to expand as much and 2 when and how did they expand into each part of the territory answering the first question the answer has very much to do with geography there are three factors that explain the ease with which the russian state expanded low population the fact that the few people who existed were nomads and the fact that most of the territory is flat save a few obvious exceptions low population meant that a nation could just claim a large plot of land back then if there was no one to challenge that claim then it became theirs vast tracts of what russia is today were unpopulated or barely populated at the time that they were annexed by the russians so all the russians had to do was show up and say hey this is ours now there weren't big settlements with fortified walls and kings with large armies that the russians had to defeat with great effort in order to conquer now don't get me wrong the russians did have enemies especially to the south and even in some cases to the east not to mention their endless wars with europe in the west but their vast expansion into siberia was mostly simple in military terms and to further help the expansionist cause a flat territory makes for easier and faster traveling allowing for an even easier annexation so that's question one answer now let's move to the main second question by briefly going over russian history and understanding when and how they annexed each part of what is now russia the roots of russia lie in the invasion of northern raiders from scandinavia called the rules probably where the country's name comes from these raiders arrived in towns mostly populated by slavic people who among other things traded their goods the rules raided these people stealing their goods and selling them for themselves at one point the locals had enough and said okay instead of stealing it from us we'll hire you to protect it from your fellow raiders and the ruse said okay and with their power eventually became the actual rulers of these local people establishing the rurik dynasty they formed a state known as the kievan rus where a rurik grand prince of kiev ruled over a sort of federation of other rurik princes each with their principality across the then smaller russian lands eventually after many other political and military events a major one took place the mongol invasion and this is where moscow or muscovy becomes the new center of power in russia paving the way for its and then russia's expansion the mongol invasion led to the subjugation of all russian states to the mongols themselves out of luck or political and diplomatic skill muskovy gained the privilege of collecting the tribute from other russian states in the north to give to the mongols in the south acting as sort of a middleman this situation allowed them to gain some economic power also attracting people to live there since it was less likely to be raided by the mongols after strengthening and taking advantage of the collapse and separation of the mongol empire muskovy rallied a few russian states against the mongols and defeated them conquering part of their lands and most importantly ending the subjugation of the rurik princes towards the mongols there were many battles and even many wars until the mongols were fully defeated but ivan iii's 1480 victory over the great horde is cited as the restoration of russian independence 240 years after the mongols had invaded and conquered kiev a once again independent russian state composed of many principalities existed with moscow's grand prince at the head and from here on out they expanded the first great expansion of moscow's territory was led by this grand prince ivan iii also known as ivan the great who was crowned in 1502 ivan brought many russian duchies directly under the rule of moscow taking away the titles from the nobles who had them after that he went to war with the republic of novgorod who controlled much of northern russia he won and so novgorod ceded a lot of its land to moscow about four-fifths of its total territory after ivan died his son vasily iii continued his policy of expansion annexing the last autonomous provinces within the grand principality also capturing smolensk from poland lithuania in 1514 as well as expanding russian influence along the volga river a fun fact is that he was the first grand duke of moscow who adopted the title of tsar and the usage of the byzantine double-headed eagle after vasily came another ivan but this one wasn't known as great he was known as terrible he was declared emperor of all rules in 1547 and established the zordom of russia with moscow as the predominant state with a capital if you will during his youth russia conquered the cannot of kazan and the canada of astrakhan with the latter being important to further control the volga river trade route he also lost some land livonia and ingria in a war against the livonian confederation poland lithuania denmark and sweden but the most important expansion during ivan the terrible's reign was the one towards siberia at this time in the second half of the 16th century russia started a large-scale exploration and colonization of siberia a process which would take a long time to complete yvonne the terrible son feldor took little interest in ruling and it was his brother-in-law boris who had the real power feldor died without any children leading to the extinction of the rurik dynasty who had directly led the russian people since the 13th century after their arrival from the north and his regent boris became tsar himself in 1598 the first one that wasn't from the rurik dynasty boris's policy was generally pacific and the only relevant expansion in the west seems to be the recovery of some towns from sweden in 1595 but he did have an important role in expanding russia's population and territory in the east he built towns and fortresses along the eastern and southern borders to keep the tatar and finnic tribes in order and he colonized siberia with many new settlements as well as conquering the local canaanites of seabird his son and heir feldor ii only ruled for a few months from april to june of 1605 and didn't really have time to write his name in the history of russia's expansion however he did create a map of russia still preserved today and re-edited throughout that century he may not have contributed to expanding the russian territory but he did contribute to depicting it allowing us today to see how it was back then and as we can see here russian control was already vast at this point but did not yet stretch too far into the east with feldor ii's death a period known as the time of troubles began in russian history lasting from 1605 to 1613 although arguably it had become with the end of the rurik dynasty in 1598 and this is a particularly odd thing about that period when the last ruxar feldor the first died his heir would have been his younger brother dmitry but dmitry died before that leading to the regent boris becoming nazar and then to this gigantic crisis and so during the time of the troubles a number of fake dmitri's showed up pretending to be the rightful heir who they pretended had miraculously survived therefore having the rights to the throne who would restore the rurik dynasty and end the troubles and what's crazier is that it worked whether out of convenience or actual belief local nobles supported not one not two not three but four false dimitris the first even became tsar for a year but let's not get lost in these historical details the time of the troubles was an incredibly serious crisis for russia and so understandably there was no territorial expansion during this time in fact the only changes were losses of territory as a result of a war against poland lithuania who conquered severia and reconquered smolensk this period finally ended in 1613 with the election of michael romanov azar by a council of nobles establishing the romanov dynasty which ruled russia until the revolution of 1917. michael romanov ruled from 1613 to 1645 alongside his father until 1633 and through his reign the project of colonizing siberia begun by ivan the terrible was finally completed russia conquered most of siberia a feat largely accomplished by the armies of the cossacks and largely financed by the merchant stroganoff family reaching the pacific ocean by the end of michael's reign this was in terms of size the period of largest territorial expansion in all russian history another task he faced territorially was to put an end to the conflicts with sweden and poland which had begun during the time of the troubles through the peace deals of stopover with sweden and deleno with poland with sweden russia gained novgorod and other land it had lost during the war but also renounced all claims to estonia and livonia also losing part of corellia and ingria to the swedes with poland the previous conquest of smolensk was accepted by the russians oh and another term of the peace was the return of michael's father who had been taken prisoner the one we just saw ruled alongside him for a while alexei succeeded michael and in his reign new wars against sweden and poland took place the peace treaty with sweden did not see any territorial changes as far as i could find out all that happened was russia giving out on territorial gains it had made during the war however the peace with poland lithuania in 1667 saw great territorial gains for russia in this map we can see those in dark green noticeably smolensk once again changed hands being recovered by the zardom parts of ukraine especially including the city of kiev was taken as well supposed to be a two-year temporary transfer it was made permanent 20 years later when russia bought the city for 146 000 rubles and so the original seat of power of the rurik dynasty in russia was recovered but this time for the control of the new romanov czars alexei's son another feldor the third only contributed with a small expansion conquering the kazim kanat in 1681 and he was succeeded by his two sons ivan v and especially peter the first known as peter the great the two brothers ruled russia together from 1682 to 1696 and then when even died peter began ruling alone until 1725. a real administrative mess they were cozars and even was the senior czar but for the first seven years it was their sister who ruled as a regent anyway during this reign mostly attributed to peter the great some important expansions took place peter wanted to modernize and industrialize russia and he knew a key necessity was improving russia's naval power and so he went to war with the ottomans to acquire access to the black sea in 1698 he conquered the ottoman fortress of azov gaining access to the sea and establishing russian influence in the area however he lost these a few years later after having established a foothold in the black sea in the south he now wanted a foothold in the baltic sea in the north at the time controlled by sweden although this time he counted with the help of denmark and poland lithuania it's weird how these nations were constantly at war with each other and constantly switching sides and allies in this great northern war the russians conquered and annexed ingria estonia livonia and a substantial part of corellia allowing the founding of the city of saint petersburg in 1703 which then became the capital of the zardom of russia rebranded by peter as the russian empire in 1721 in his final years peter the great took the additional title emperor of all russia's reinforcing the multinational character of the empire during peter's reign the expansion into central asia also began although initially with little success in 1717 a military expedition attempted to conquer the cannot of kiva but was completely defeated and destroyed but they did successfully expand into the south although only temporarily the persian safavid empire to the south was in decline because of this peter launched the russia persian war in 1722 which began russian influence in the caucasus and caspian sea region the safavids were forced to hand over a few territories to russia but 12 years later they were returned to the persians peter was succeeded by his wife catering the first who did not expand russia's territory that much she was however the first woman to rule imperial russia opening up the path for other female rulers in the future such as catherine the great other successors followed after catherine the first's death peter ii anna who returned more territories to the persians in the caucus but recovered azo from the ottomans ivan the six elizabeth who conquered southwest corellia from the swedes and then peter iii but these focused more on internal development and participating in europe's political and military life instead of continuing russian expansion which is somewhat understandable such a big amount of land had already been taken that it was important to stabilize it and deal with other issues before going off on further conquests the next period of significant changes came in 1762 with katerine ii known as catherine the great a period of gigantic territorial expansion during her reign she extended the borders of the russian empire by around 520 000 square kilometers absorbing south ukraine crimea the north caucus right bank ukraine belarus lithuania and carland after wars and subsequent victories against the ottoman empire persia and the polish lithuanian commonwealth fallen lithuania collapsed during her reign and so the entire territory of the commonwealth was divided between russia austria and prussia as we can see on this map here with russia taking the eastern and largest part of the territory in the far east russians also became active in fur trapping in kamshatka and the cordial islands allowing for the expansion into this land and a rivalry with china also began over both empires wanting to expand into central asia catherine the great's commitment towards expansion seem to be extremely strong having once said i shall not die until i have ejected the turks from europe suppressed the pride of china and established trade with india a set of goals which she did not fulfill despite her other great achievements her son paul the first however opposed catherine's policies and instead preferred to pursue a more peaceful diplomatic path the only expansion russia saw during his reign was when persia officially seated border of georgia to them in 1813 and the early start of the colonization of alaska before russia sold it to the us paul awarded a monopoly a fur trading to a local company and in exchange expected it to establish new settlements in alaska and to carry out an expanded colonization program this was in 1799 the colonization took place but was stopped with the alaska purchased by the us in 1867 paul's son and heir alexander the first could not however run away from territorial issues because during his reign napoleon invaded russia and half of europe as well other than fighting off napoleon's invasion several additional territories were annexed during alexander's way between 1801 and 1825 eastern georgia the grand duchy of finland western georgia besarabia molova the duchy of warsaw georgia dagestan northern azerbaijan and northern armenia his successor nicholas the first conquered the remaining parts of azerbaijan and armenia in 1828. these and previous games were results of new wars against persia finland and the ottomans during the reign of alexander ii several other territory expansions were achieved china seated lands north of the amu river and east of the usuri river as consequence of their defeat in the second opium war in 1860 and this established russian control over part of manchuria the conquest of kazakhstan which had started in 1730 was finally finished in 1863 and in 1866 they conquered uzbekistan confirming this reign as a period of great expansion into central asia north turkmenistan was also taken defeating the kanat of kiva and avenging the other defeat they had previously suffered as well as kyrgyzstan and west tajikistan with the annexation of the kanat of kokhand in 1876. in the far east sakhalin was taken in a border agreement with japan and another war against the turks in 1878 resulted in the annexation of the cars and batum oblasts his son alexander iii wrapped up the conquest of central asia defeating the turkmens in 1885 and conquering south turkmenistan exploring the premier plateau which was sparsely populated and equivalent to current day east tajikistan finally the last major territorial change in the russian empire took place with the last russian tsar nicholas ii who lost south sakhalin to japan in the wrestle japanese war in 1905. during his reign the 1917 revolution took place the romanov dynasty followed the same fate as the ruliks did before them although through different means and became extinct the russian empire was no more the end of the empire caused several territorial losses as well after the revolution poland and finland became independent russia's area of effective direct control varied greatly during the russian internal conflict from 1917 to 1922 and various territories gained temporary independence until 1920 before being re-annexed by the soviets eventually the revolutionary government regained control of most of the former eurasian lands of the russian empire and in 1922 we joined with belarus transcaucasia and ukraine as the four constituent republics of a new state the soviet union by the end of world war ii the union had additionally annexed a number of other territories the dissolution of the ussr led to the creation of independent post-soviet state with the russians declaring their own independence in december of 1991 and changing their name to the russian federation being reduced to the territory they have today in the 21st century a few other conflicts have led to an increase of russian territorial control in the caucasus and in crimea so that was a very brief overview of how russia got so big going over the history of russia since its creation with the arrival of the rurik princes from scandinavia all the way to modern times passing through the kievan rus federation of principalities to the mongol invasions the return of russian sovereignty through the grand duchy of moscow the endless wars with sweden poland lithuania and the ottomans the colonization of siberia the conquest of central asia cannots and even the temporary colony in alaska the loss of land that took place with the 1917 revolution and its recovering and even expanding with the soviet union and the further loss after the ussr was dissolved until today and what i think we can understand is that russian land expansion was a slow process of many centuries while we can associate final conquests to specific dates and specific rulers many of these were the culmination of centuries-long processes of annexation and conquest through many attempts and wars especially in the caucasus central asia and siberia or the many territories they constantly disputed with poland sweden persia or the ottomans did i miss any important part of russia's territorial expansion or any other important information about this let me know in the comments thanks so much for watching this video don't forget to subscribe to catch future ones and support me on patreon if you want access to extra content and a behind the scenes look i will see you next time for more general knowledge [Music] you

Channel: General Knowledge

Views: 465,037

Keywords: generalknowledge, funwithflags, countriesthatdon'texist

Id: JVV-Y8vHgNc

Length: 21min 14sec (1274 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 02 2021