The powerful Byzantine Empire has sought to bring the Slavs into her sphere of influence since the Dark Ages. For a long time it played the part of OTL Golden Horde in determining the politics of the Balkan and East European tribes. The Varyag influence was thus limited to the northern lands of Novgorod and the surrounding lands, which still did not escape orthodoxization due to the Norse tribes being non-Christian. Later on, Novgorod consolidated as a trade republic and invited princes from both Slavia and Scandinavia to serve as military commanders. The expansion of Novgorod was successful enough to force Sweden and Norway to consolidation. Even after, pirate wars were quite common along the coast of Scandinavia, the aim of Novgorod being to secure trade routes to Europe.
Meanwhile the easternmost tribes of the Slavs did the best to get rid of the steppes peoples with Byzantine aid. The nomads, including Bulgars, Khazars, Pechenegs and Polovtsians, were potential targets for the Islamic Caliphate's religious propaganda, and Byzantium needed a strong ally to confront it. Still, they never meant to make it strong enough, driving the very center of it closer to their borders. The princes of Astrakhan, a city conquered from the caliphate, were the most supported by Byzanthium. Islam, though, still remained prominent in the conquered territories.
Thus, the historical center of the Volgan state (I propose this ethnonym, "Russian" being limited to Novgorod) was the Volga basin and later Urals. The western parts remained largely autonomous and for the most part were engaged into continuous wars with European powers. Volga, meanwhile, was rapidly colonizing (and colonizing means colonizing, not integrating to the empire - they never got the idea) the lands to the East and South-East. After the caliphate split up, this advance continued, culminating in colonizing Alaska and New Guinea in the 19th century.
By this time, though, the Volgan Empire was experiencing more and more social problems. The socialist ideas were quite popular in the Ural industrial region, while Alaska, Siberia, Central Asia and the West had strong separatist movements. The inevitable happened in 1910 when Alaska revolted and cried out for aid to several American states, as well as Japan. This overseas war exhausted the Volgans quite quickly, and after its bitter end (1918 peace of Alexandrovsk granting independence to Alaska, or Volgan America) the revolution broke out. The Imperial armies, cut off by Siberian separatist quasi-states from the center and its supplies, mostly deserted or escaped to New Guinea which managed to secure order. In 1922 the socialists were mostly expelled from the central and western parts of Volga and dug in in the old proletarian states of Urals, forming the Ural Proletarian Republic. By this time the Crimeans, unwilling to send more and more soldiers to fight for the lost cause of Volga, revolted and welcomed Anatolian troops, remaining their satellite ever since. 1924 was the year of first clashes between the Ural Soviets and Mongolian troops, led by a fugitive general Ungern and claiming all Siberia and Far East. In the following year the Urals managed to hold their territory and signed an armistice. The end of Volga as a major power came in 1927 with the consolidation of western separatists and the army-backed Duma deposing the Tsar. Several minor wars were fought between these states in the 20th century, all being indecisive.
Meanwhile the easternmost tribes of the Slavs did the best to get rid of the steppes peoples with Byzantine aid. The nomads, including Bulgars, Khazars, Pechenegs and Polovtsians, were potential targets for the Islamic Caliphate's religious propaganda, and Byzantium needed a strong ally to confront it. Still, they never meant to make it strong enough, driving the very center of it closer to their borders. The princes of Astrakhan, a city conquered from the caliphate, were the most supported by Byzanthium. Islam, though, still remained prominent in the conquered territories.
Thus, the historical center of the Volgan state (I propose this ethnonym, "Russian" being limited to Novgorod) was the Volga basin and later Urals. The western parts remained largely autonomous and for the most part were engaged into continuous wars with European powers. Volga, meanwhile, was rapidly colonizing (and colonizing means colonizing, not integrating to the empire - they never got the idea) the lands to the East and South-East. After the caliphate split up, this advance continued, culminating in colonizing Alaska and New Guinea in the 19th century.
By this time, though, the Volgan Empire was experiencing more and more social problems. The socialist ideas were quite popular in the Ural industrial region, while Alaska, Siberia, Central Asia and the West had strong separatist movements. The inevitable happened in 1910 when Alaska revolted and cried out for aid to several American states, as well as Japan. This overseas war exhausted the Volgans quite quickly, and after its bitter end (1918 peace of Alexandrovsk granting independence to Alaska, or Volgan America) the revolution broke out. The Imperial armies, cut off by Siberian separatist quasi-states from the center and its supplies, mostly deserted or escaped to New Guinea which managed to secure order. In 1922 the socialists were mostly expelled from the central and western parts of Volga and dug in in the old proletarian states of Urals, forming the Ural Proletarian Republic. By this time the Crimeans, unwilling to send more and more soldiers to fight for the lost cause of Volga, revolted and welcomed Anatolian troops, remaining their satellite ever since. 1924 was the year of first clashes between the Ural Soviets and Mongolian troops, led by a fugitive general Ungern and claiming all Siberia and Far East. In the following year the Urals managed to hold their territory and signed an armistice. The end of Volga as a major power came in 1927 with the consolidation of western separatists and the army-backed Duma deposing the Tsar. Several minor wars were fought between these states in the 20th century, all being indecisive.
