705F Winter 2026 Vladimir Putin: Why Does He Want More?

A poor Ukrainian farmer once asked a reporter, “Why do the Russians want our land? They already have so much.” The same question applies to Putin. He is the firmly entrenched ruler of the largest country by area. Russia is some six million square miles, way ahead of second place Canada with three million square miles. So why does he keep trying to add more land? Fareed Zakaria commented once on the traditional Russian expansionist tendency, “Maybe during the Cold War, our problem wasn’t that they were Communist, but that they were Russian.” Indeed, when Stalin was in Germany for a conference at the end of the European War, someone asked him if it wasn’t a triumph to be in Germany. His icy reply was, “Czar Alexander got to Paris.” This class will discuss historical motivations as we probe the question of why the master of such a large country goes to war to add more territory.