Cemetery in Buryatia. Screenshot from Sky News YouTube channel. After Russia launched its full-scale attack on Ukraine on February 24, 2022, a disproportionate number of soldiers from ethnic minorities were sent by Moscow to fight on the frontline, and the vast majority of them have died. One of those groups are the Buryats, a Mongolic nation living in southern Siberia around Lake Baikal. Despite claims by the Kremlin that it is fighting colonialism, any attempt to build an independent identity and to point the finger at long-lasting Russian and Soviet imperialism is severely crushed and censored in Putin's Russia. Global Voices talked to Maria Vyushkova from the Free Buryatia Foundation to address the issue of enduring colonial views among many Russians, including those opposing Putin or living outside of Russia. Vyushkova is a researcher and heads the analytical branch of the foundation. She is currently based in the Bay Area in California. Maria Vyushkova. Photo by Herve Philippe, used with permission. MV: Unfortunately, this is still very difficult. This is not surprising: look at the difficulty, resistance and uproar that come along in the US as part of conversations around the teaching of the history of Black Americans and systemic racism. Despite the fact that, in the US, work has been carried out for several decades to overcome this difficult legacy! In Russia, the topic of domestic colonialism has never really been covered. Since Soviet times, the only correct narrative has been about the “voluntary and peaceful entry” of nations into the Russian Empire. For example, prominent opposition leader Vladimir Ryzhkov stated in a 2016 televised debate that “the Russian Empire has never oppressed a single Buryat” despite the fact that he is a historian, PhD, and professor at Moscow's Higher School of Economics. What can we say about people without a higher education? At the same time, Russian society's awareness of the colonial nature of Russian history and its own colonial thinking is extremely important both for the future of Russia and for world security. Why? Because military aggression against Ukraine is a 100 percent product of such thinking that frames the events not as an aggressive war with a neighboring state, but as the pacification of a rebellious province. And until this mindset changes, Russia will pose a threat to both its neighbors (which it also considers as “rebellious provinces”) and the world as a whole. It seems to me that the deep and sincere dissatisfaction with the demolition of monuments to the Russian poet Pushkin in Ukraine, which was expressed by many opponents of Putin (and opponents of the war) is just a relic of colonial thinking, where Russia is the mother country, and Ukraine, a “province,” if not in a political, then in a cultural sense. This shows that we often do not even realize how deeply rooted this way of thinking is in our minds. FN: Buryats, but also Chechens and others are demonized by certain Ukrainians, and the Vatican, and instrumentalized by Russian propaganda as ‘natural killers’. Are those narratives changing? MV: I am not at all surprised by the reaction of the Ukrainians, since it is more than natural to “demonize” the soldiers of the enemy army that attacked your country. Yes, we can say that they are demonized to a greater extent than Russians. Ukrainian journalist Vitaliy Portnikov noted on this occasion that it is easier to hate the Other, a person of a different appearance, a different race and/or religion, than one who is outwardly indistinguishable from you. There is indeed such a thing as racial perception of crime: the perception of the number of crimes committed by people of a different race tends to be inflated. In the US, for example, studies have shown that the white majority tends to grossly overestimate the number of crimes committed by African-Americans. Similarly, in Russia in the 2000s, there was a widespread opinion that all crimes were committed by migrants from Central Asia and the Caucasus. But for those Russians opposing Putin yet picking up the narrative that “the Buryats are to blame for everything,” I do have questions. It is clear that the roots of the Russian army's cruelty go deep into history: two wars in Chechnya, the war in Syria, the Afghan war in Afghanistan, where at least half a million Afghan civilians were killed. This cruelty is mirrored in the psychology of Russian society (and not only of its pro-Putin part), and looking into such a mirror is not very pleasant. That is why some seized on a simple solution: to declare that exotic savages like the Buryats and Chechens are to blame for everything, and the “holy Russian soldier” and Russian society itself have nothing to do with it.