Invasion as a Practice: Understanding State Behavior in Putin’s Russia
Journal: Asian international studies review
Year: 2016

Throughout 2014 and 2015 Russia annexed Crimea and helped secessionist forces in Eastern Ukraine. However, interventions are nothing new to modern Russia. In 2008 Russia invaded Abkhazia and South Ossetia unilaterally after the Russo-Georgian War. The question arises: what drives Russia’s leaders, namely President Putin, to acquire new territories? Normative theories have proven inadequate at predicting Putin’s decisionmaking in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), and thus, this paper