Haven’t the Russians been unkind to the Turkmen minority living in the Crimea since Russia took it over?
Russia's a brutal, imperialist power, just as China is. Putin's on record as claiming that the fall of the USSR was the greatest disaster, and has been quite obviously trying to put it back together. Anyone who cheers that is an a-hole. Putin and the rest of his gangster cadre is an atheist and fascist, and neither of those characteristics screams "religious crusader". There are people stupid enough to think that it does, or under enough of a threat to claim that he is.