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Comment by pydry | Hacker News Reader

As a thought experiment I'd encourage you to imagine what would happen if America were a weak and powerless (but feared) mess and Russia were the world's superpower.

Suppose then that Alaska, now a nominally independent state, was on the verge of voting to rejoin Russia.

I imagine the Moscow liberals would think much like you do about the "American" uprising that would inevitably follow. It wouldn't even be visible to them - they would only "see" a war of aggression being waged against a foreign state, directed entitely from DC.

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Alaska is by far a "nominally" independent state. They rely on massive federal spending. It's besides the point that a secessionist movement is very possible in the near future in the United States - I just fail to see how it is at all relevant to this conversation. At least my scenario is confined to the region.

With the key difference being that Alaska is a part of the US, and Ukraine is not a part of Russia.

I am not sure why you thought that is key. I thought Alaska breaking away from the US as a newly independent country fed up with the lower 48 stripmining it and giving nothing back is the most plausible part of that scenario.

Similar to how Ukraine broke away from the USSR.

That isn't exactly how Ukraine broke away from the USSR. Ukraine broke away by the USSR dissolving.

So if the US dissolves into, say, Alaska and Hawaii and Puerto Rico and the "other 48", and then Alaska votes to rejoin Russia, then the 48 would be unhappy, sure. But they wouldn't have any say, because in this scenario Alaska wouldn't be part of the US any longer. In the same way, Russia has no (legitimate) say, because Ukraine isn't part of the USSR any longer.

It's kind of like how the UK didn't have any say over the US after that 1776 thing, and when they tried to act like they did, it turned into the War of 1812.

Whom has a "say" is an interesting although altogether different question to whether the English speaking Alaskan Americans would repudiate rule from Moscow and revolt without taking orders from DC.

Historic landmarks are not relevant at all. If a people wants to join a different nation - while shouldn't they? Nations are the nautilus shells of the hermit crabs that are people.

In Recognition of the soon the posted argument of the: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kievan_Rus%27

Russia failed to attract its potential citizens, to offer a cooler, more vital society other people wanted to join

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