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For some reason, many historians do not like using the term empire for the Soviet Union. But Lenin and Trotsky managed to piece together much of the Tsarist Empire during the Russian Civil War and the lost pieces were required during World War II, except Finland. The Soviets thus inherited all the major problems of the Tsarist Empire. An among them were the nationalizes question. This destroyed the Ottoman and Austrian Empire and weakened the Tsarist Empire. Lenin and Stalin saw the dangers involved. Solzhenitsyn details the actions that Stalin took against the various nationalities. 【Solzhenitsyn】 Some like the Ukrainian Famine approach genocide, (1931). Lenin and Stalin saw it as the Soviet Achilles' heel. One of the many things that could get you in real trouble was any expression of nationalist sentiment,although we detect a degree of Russian nationalism. . The various Soviet republics were largely ethic based, but nationalist sediment was not allowed. National languages were allowed, but Russian had to be learned in the schools. After Word War II, Soviet authorities began to to limit national languages in he schools (1950s). Showy national expression like national folk dress and dancing was permitted, but that was it. Nationalist sentiment was severely suppressed. General Secretary Gorbachev faced with issues described as stagnation attempted to reform the Communist system, by liberal reforms--Glasnost and Perestroika, What he naively didn't anticipate, that one result was allowing open expression of nationalist sentiment. In national broadcast he warned the Soviet people that this was destroying the reform program (1989). 【Burg】 It would be at the center of the eventual implosion of the Soviet Union (1992).
Burg, Stephen L. "The Soviet Union's nationalities question," Vol. 88, No. 540, The Soviet Union (Ocober 1989), pp. 341-344, 359-362.
Solzhenitsyn, Alexsanddr I. Trans, Thomas P. Whitney. The Gulag Archipelago, 1918-56: An Experiment in Literary Investigation (Harper & Row: New York, 1973), 660p.
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