[Destro]

To take you analysis to task, while all empires are harsh - I am sure the Judeans and Gauls did not see the benefits of Roman civilization as we now do - the Czarist Russians while expansionist - did not destroy indigenous natives, say the way Americans did to the Indians. While the Muslims the Russians conquered may not have had it so well and many Muslims may have voted with their feet many Christians found the Russians as liberators (From Armenians to Bulgarians to Greeks) from the Muslim yoke of tyranny. Many Christians also found the Russians to be liberators against the oppressive rule of the Lithuanian-Polish empires as well.

[GSlob]

Tsarist Russia somehow provoked repeated Polish uprisings, while neither Prussia nor Austria (both expansionist empires as well) managed to accomplish anything comparable, although they, too, took parts of Poland. Even now, Polish/Russian antipathy is much stronger than any residual ill feelings towards other Partition empires. Same result [from different history] in the Baltics. So, what was so special about "Russian sector"?
Those who came to like Russian civilizational model are either already there or are to be cordially encouraged to move there. Speaking from personal experience (I was born, grew up and lived there for a while), I would wish it only on my worst enemies.