Maybe. But Brezhnev didn’t colonize Afghanistan with Russian civilians.
Putin is almost certain to colonize Ukrainian areas with Russian loyalists.
It’s a historical tradition.
True but all those folks are evacuating back to the mother land
It was a tradition all through the Old Testament.
stalin colonized ukraine with russians.
while I agree that much of the Donbas is populated by ethnic Russians, the population is increasingly nationalistic Ukrainian with every kilometer you move West. Most of the Ukrainians I know do not think of themselves as “Junior Russians” but are proudly, patriotically Ukrainian.