Albert P.

Some views in the media portray Russia’s intervention in Ukraine as an invasion by an “imperialist power.” Yet if we step outside the NATO narrative, the evidence shows the opposite: Russia is not an imperialist power but a state under siege by U.S. led imperialism. For three decades, the U.S. has expanded NATO to Russia’s borders, orchestrated regime change in Kyiv, supported nationalist militias guilty of war crimes, and ignored Russia’s calls for collective security.

When the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991, Western leaders gave verbal assurances to Moscow that NATO would not expand. Yet within a decade, NATO absorbed Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic (1999), followed by the Baltic states, Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia (2004). Later came Montenegro (2017), North Macedonia (2020), and even Finland in 2023. Each wave pushed NATO infrastructure closer to Russia’s borders.

To Russia, this was not abstract geopolitics but a military siege: NATO bases, missile defence systems, and troops encircling its western frontier. When NATO declared in 2008 that Ukraine and Georgia “will become members,” it was a direct threat to Russia’s existence.

The so-called “Euromaidan revolution” was celebrated in the West as a democratic uprising. But leaked recordings showed U.S. officials like Victoria Nuland attempting to influence the selection of Ukraine’s new leadership. Nuland earlier boasted of the billions of U.S. dollars poured into civil society groups before 2014, laying the groundwork for Yanukovych’s ouster.

The result was not democracy, but a U.S. aligned regime. Ukraine’s new leaders pushed for NATO integration, banned the Russian language in official contexts, and unleashed military force on their own citizens in Donbas who resisted the coup. For Moscow, this was proof that Washington sought to turn Ukraine into a permanent anti-Russian outpost.

From 2014 onward, Donetsk and Luhansk were subjected to shelling, blockades, and repression. Volunteer battalions like Azov, Aidar, and Right Sector carried out kidnappings, torture, and summary executions. Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and UN reports documented these abuses.

The West turned a blind eye. For eight years, Moscow demanded the Minsk agreements, which granted autonomy to Donbas, be respected. Instead, Kyiv stalled while NATO armed and trained its forces. Only later did Western leaders like Angela Merkel and François Hollande admit Minsk was never intended to be implemented, but merely to buy time to arm Ukraine. This confirmed Moscow’s suspicion that diplomacy was a trap.

By late 2021, NATO was conducting large-scale exercises on Russia’s borders, U.S. missile systems were stationed in Romania and Poland, and Ukraine was receiving billions in Western weaponry. Kyiv escalated shelling of Donbas. Moscow’s final attempts to negotiate binding security guarantees were dismissed by Washington. In February 2022, Russia launched its intervention, declaring it had “no choice.”

Why Russia Is Not an Imperialist Power

Imperialism, as Lenin defined, is not simply military action. It is a global system dominated by monopoly-finance capital, which plunders colonies and controls the world market. By this measure:

The U.S. and EU dominate global finance: The United States and the European Union exercise overwhelming control over the global financial system, which allows them to dictate economic and political outcomes across the world. U.S. banks and multinational financial institutions dominate international lending and investment, while the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank enforce structural adjustment programs and austerity measures in developing nations, ensuring that these countries remain subordinated to Western economic interests. The U.S. dollar functions as the world’s reserve currency, giving Washington enormous leverage over global trade, access to capital, and international transactions. Nations that resist these financial structures, whether by attempting to trade in alternative currencies or pursue independent economic policies, often face sanctions, credit restrictions, or financial isolation.

In contrast, Russia’s economy is largely rooted in the export of natural resources, including oil, gas, wheat, and other commodities. Its wealth is tied to tangible assets rather than global financial domination. Moscow does not control multinational banks, does not dictate IMF policy, and does not enforce economic dependence through the dollar system. While sanctions may affect certain sectors, Russia lacks the mechanisms of global financial imperialism that the U.S. and EU routinely wield. Its economic influence is regional and resource-based rather than global and financialised, meaning that Russia does not impose exploitative economic structures on other nations in the way that Western powers do. In this sense, Russia is fundamentally different from imperialist states: it survives and asserts its influence through natural resource production and trade, not through the coercive mechanisms of monopoly-finance capital.

The U.S. maintains 750+ military bases in 80 countries: One of the clearest indicators of the difference between U.S. imperial power and Russia’s regional influence is the scale and purpose of military deployment. The United States maintains over 750 military bases in approximately 80 countries, spanning every continent, from Europe and the Middle East to Africa and Asia. These bases are not primarily defensive; they are instruments of global power projection, allowing the U.S. to intervene militarily, protect its economic interests, enforce sanctions, and intimidate states that resist its policies. Key examples include the U.S. presence in Germany, Japan, South Korea, Qatar, and Djibouti, as well as temporary or semi-permanent deployments in Eastern Europe and the Middle East. Through this global network, Washington can mobilise rapid strikes, station troops near conflict zones, and maintain dominance over strategic sea lanes and airspace.

By contrast, Russia’s overseas military presence is small and highly targeted, reflecting a reactive and regional strategy rather than global domination. Russia operates roughly 20 foreign bases, mostly concentrated in former Soviet republics (Belarus, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan) or strategic allies like Syria, where it maintains air and naval facilities in Tartus and Khmeimim. These deployments serve to protect Russian national interests, support allies in conflict zones, and secure its immediate periphery rather than project power worldwide.

This contrast underscores a key point in understanding imperialism: imperialist states seek global military reach to dominate, whereas Russia’s bases are regionally defensive and strategic, aimed at countering immediate threats rather than subordinating distant nations. While the U.S. maintains thousands of troops abroad and can influence domestic politics in faraway states, Russia’s forces are primarily concentrated where they are directly relevant to its security and regional influence.

The U.S. has waged wars of conquest worldwide: A central distinction between U.S. imperialism and Russia’s military actions lies in the objectives and scope of their wars. Over the past few decades, the United States has repeatedly waged wars of conquest and regime change far from its borders, often justified under the guise of “democracy promotion” or “counterterrorism,” but in reality, serving strategic, economic, and geopolitical objectives. The 2003 invasion of Iraq, for example, was driven not only by the alleged presence of weapons of mass destruction but also by a desire to control one of the world’s largest oil reserves and to establish a compliant pro-U.S. regime in the Middle East. Similarly, the U.S.-led intervention in Afghanistan (2001–2021) extended its military presence into Central Asia, securing geopolitical influence and access to key trade routes, while maintaining control over natural resources and countering rival powers. Libya (2011) and Syria (2014 onward) demonstrate how the U.S., often working through NATO or proxy forces, sought to overthrow governments that were strategically independent, aiming to maintain dominance in North Africa and the Middle East. Across these interventions, the pattern is clear: offensive, far-reaching wars aimed at expanding U.S. global hegemony, securing economic interests, and controlling resources.

Russia’s military actions, in contrast, have been primarily reactive and regionally focused. The 2014 intervention in Crimea and the support for Donbas separatists were responses to NATO expansion, a U.S.-backed regime change in Kyiv, and threats to Russian-speaking populations. Russia’s aim was not to conquer or plunder but to secure its borders, protect strategic assets, and defend allied or ethnically Russian populations. Even in Syria, Russia’s intervention has been framed as stabilising the Assad government, preserving regional security rather than seeking to dominate or exploit the country’s resources for global economic gain. In Ukraine, Russia’s actions are similarly about geopolitical survival — ensuring that NATO and U.S. influence do not encircle its territory — rather than establishing colonies or extracting wealth.

Russia as an “Anti-Imperialist” Actor

Russia’s role in global politics can be understood not as imperialist but as conjuncturally anti-imperialist¹, resisting U.S. and Western hegemony while offering an alternative path for states seeking sovereignty and economic independence. The evidence supporting this position is strong, spanning economic, diplomatic, military, and ideological arenas.

One of the clearest demonstrations of Russia’s anti-imperialist stance is its resistance to U.S. sanctions. Following its intervention in Ukraine and its opposition to Western encroachment, Russia faced what the U.S. itself described as the largest sanctions campaign in history, targeting everything from banking, energy exports, and technology imports to individual Russian elites. Rather than collapsing under this unprecedented economic pressure, Moscow survived, adapted, and reoriented its trade toward Asia, particularly China and India. Moreover, Russia actively promoted alternatives to the U.S. dollar, including bilateral trade in rubles, yuan, and other local currencies, signalling that Washington’s economic warfare is not unassailable. This resilience has had profound symbolic effects: smaller nations under U.S. economic pressure now see that global financial coercion can be challenged and mitigated through regional alliances, alternative trade systems, and resource-based self-reliance.

Russia’s anti-imperialist stance is also evident in its support for BRICS and the broader project of multipolarity. As a founding member of BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa), Russia has sought the inclusion of new members such as Iran and Egypt, consolidating a bloc that challenges U.S. economic dominance. BRICS promotes trade in local currencies, alternative development banks, and mechanisms that reduce dependence on the dollar, providing real structural tools for countries seeking economic sovereignty. By advancing multipolarity, Russia encourages the Global South to resist unilateral U.S. and EU economic control, offering a credible counterweight to Washington’s financial hegemony.

Beyond economics, Russia has cultivated solidarity with nations in the Global South. It has strengthened ties with Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, and several African states, offering support that contrasts sharply with conditional Western “aid.” Moscow has cancelled debts, provided defensive arms, and negotiated grain deals that help nations address food and security needs without imposing austerity, privatisation, or structural adjustment conditions, which are hallmarks of IMF and World Bank interventions. By doing so, Russia positions itself not as a neo-colonial power but as a partner for states seeking economic sovereignty against U.S. encroachment.

Russia’s military interventions further illustrate its anti-imperialist role. In Syria, Moscow’s 2015 intervention prevented a U.S.-engineered regime change that could have toppled Damascus and installed a government aligned with Western interests. Russia’s intervention countered the U.S.-backed wars that have repeatedly overthrown governments across the Middle East. While Syria experienced renewed U.S. influence in 2024, weakening Palestinian resistance, the broader lesson remains: Russian military engagement has often acted as a counterbalance to unilateral U.S. interventionism.

Finally, Russia’s ideological impact reinforces its anti-imperialist orientation. Across Africa, Latin America, and Asia, Russia is increasingly perceived not as a colonial or exploitative power but as a counterweight to U.S. imperialism. Polls and surveys indicate that many in the Global South hold a more positive view of Russia than the United States, appreciating its role in promoting sovereignty, resisting Western domination, and offering alternatives to global financial and military dependence. Russia, in this sense, functions as a symbol of resistance, demonstrating that nations do not have to be subjugated to Western geopolitical priorities.

Taken together, these facts paint a picture of Russia as a reactive, conjuncturally anti-imperialist actor on the world stage. Its actions provide both practical and symbolic support for nations seeking independence from U.S. and Western domination, challenging the narrative of Russia as an imperialist power and highlighting its role as a counter-hegemonic force in global politics.

Russia today stands as an anti-imperialist actor—certainly not socialist, but objectively breaking the unipolar domination of Washington.

Notes

1. “Anti-imperialist” here just means “counter-hegemonic,” that is, that Russia is opposed to the existing U.S. led imperial arrangement. It does not mean that socialists should “support” Russia in general, however that is cashed out, or the special military operation. And it must be emphasised that this is a qualitatively different anti-imperialism than socialist anti-imperialism. As Mariategui puts it, we socialists ‘are anti-imperialists because we are Marxists, because we are revolutionaries, because we oppose capitalism with socialism as an adversarial system called to succeed it.’ (Mariategui, “Anti-Imperialist Point of View,” in An Anthology [New York: Monthly Review Press, 2011], 272.) ↩︎