No, I'm pointing out the limits of Russia being able to use that capacity.
It does no good for Russia to raise the second most men of any WWI belligerent (losing to Germany by a nose) if it can't supply them, as it found out the hard way with considerably easier logistics than it would face defending Alaska.
And America is not likely to go to war with Russia without greatly increasing the size of its forces ,which are far beneath the level the US can support without difficulty if need be (as the Germans found out in 1918).
The US in OTL didn't see a need to maintain a large army, but it most definitely had the capacity.
There's a rather unsustainable contradiction there, in that you are refusing to acknowledge that Russia, as a large, populous and rapidly industrializing nation with wealth and full access to European technology, could build a logistical capacity as easily as the United States could expand its military.
I don't see how you can argue that the United States can expand one capacity, but the Russians couldn't expand another.
And you're assuming that in the thirty or forty years of rule, the Russians would make no investment or negligible investment? That doesn't seem sustainable.
How are they putting them back on those ships?
"Stop, or we'll arrest you! Nevermind that you outnumber us hundreds to one and aren't concerned with listening to us!"
When did that stop people in incidents like this?
Easily enough, I suppose. Alaskan ports, in the early 19th century, don't have unlimited landing capacity. You're not going to see a hundred ships come in to port at once, there are not that many berths. Which means that ships coming in, will come in at the rate that Russian officials allow. And Russian officials can and will deny landing privileges.
Between 1867 and 1900, the territory is remaining under Russian control. In OTL, in 1870 through the 1880's, American prospectors did a lot of the groundwork in terms of searching for gold and establishing routes, they were operating under governance and Administration, and with media and shipping to and from the United States. All of that is potentially butterflied, American prospectors may not be welcome in Russian territory, they're certainly going to be subject to Russian governance and Russian officials, news will go back to Russia as much as and as early as, possibly earlier.
The Gold Rush of 1896-99 may be butterflied entirely, or the timing of it may be substantially altered or delayed. The degree and character of the Gold Rush may be quite different. One of the reasons for the intensity of the Alaskan Gold rush were the recent American recessions and bank failures. Change the timing, change the economy, change the way news gets out, and who it gets out to or is allowed to go to - then everything changes. Would the Gold Rush have had the same impact?
You talk a lot about logistics, but you are ignoring the logistical bottlenecks faced by the unorganized Gold Rush adventurers. In the period 1896 through 1899, a hundred thousand of them set out. Maybe 30,000 of them got there. That's ten or fifteen thousand a year. A lot of them came poorly prepared, and slowly or rapidly lost their shirts, or died or went home. They certainly weren't showing up in any organized movement. Only a few thousand of those came away with anything. It's not easy.
How are they getting there, at the rate of 10,000 a year? Well, they're travelling across the United States to get to San Francisco, or San Diego or Portland. All of whom are trying to drum up port business. Then there's a pacific ocean route to the Port of St. Michael. Or a coastal route. There's overland routes through Canada and through mountain passes. There's little in the way of roads. People died by the hundreds on the way.
Again, this is not Texas. The Russian government has substantially more ability to control people, than those people, on an individual basis have the ability to move through.
I really don't see why you think that somehow they have the full weight of the Russian government at their disposal at the docks.
They will. Not instantly. But within weeks or months. The Russian government has vast resources, armies of bureaucrats, thousands or hundreds of thousands of soldiers, and the organization and willingness to go there.
From where? Russia doesn't have large cadres of (idle/spare/reserve) bureaucrats,
Don't they? We can assume that Russian Bureaucracy in the late 19th century was corrupt, nepotistic, backwards, infested by nobility, overly labyrinthine, but I've never heard the suggestion that they lacked for bureaucrats. And for what it's worth, the Russian state was organized enough to maintain a far flung empire.
and sending troops is going to take some time - even if the Trans-Siberian railroad gets them to the Pacific coast in something like a timely fashion, then there's crossing the Pacific (the relevant part of the ocean) - which would take a fair amount of shipping to do anything except leisurely. Shipping that doesn't magically appear when the tsar snaps his fingers either.
Nope. We can assume periods of weeks or months, depending on the priority allocated. Even a year. But those resources would likely be allocated.
Not to mention that I'd bet you good money that the army regiments would react like the US army regiments in the California gold fields did - go gold hunting.
That being the case, its game over for the Gold Rush, and the prospectors. Out on the gold fields, they'll be stripped, robbed and murdered, and organized Russian squads and soldiers will take over.
And officials are easily bribed.
I'm sure that corrupt Russian officials will certainly make a killing, relieving the Gold Rush prospectors of any money they have, coming or going.
As I keep saying, it's not the early 19th century, and it's not Texas.
See above. If it was that easy, Russia would not have had the concerns it did OTL:
http://www.akhistorycourse.org/articles/article.php?artID=202
But Russia in 1890 or 1900 or 1910 or 1920 would have significantly greater ability.
Admittedly thirty years passing might make things easier in some ways, but railroads do not move infinite troops in no appreciable amount of time.
Admittedly?

In some ways? Maybe in every single way?
The Russo-Japanese war does not fill me with confidence in Russia's ability to do so without a great deal of difficulty. This sounds like a headache for those assigned to actually organize the movement, whatever the tsar thinks.
Would the Russo-Japanese War have taken place on that schedule? Would it have turned out the same way? Hell, the Russo-Japanese war came close to not turning out
Why not? It went for it in 1846.
The late 19th century was a pretty different world. And as I keep saying - Russia's not Mexico.
It practically did so in 1898.
Failed to do so successfully in 1898. Naked Territorial ambitions were frustrated by the Teller Amendment which guaranteed Cuban independence. The occupations in Haiti and the Dominican Republic went nowhere.
The US has shown little problem with waging wars that it sees as suiting national interests whether there's any serious moral foundation or not.
Cynical, but I'll grant you that. But you'll note that from the Civil War on, the American polity meant that those wars had to be justified on moral foundations, and those wars were subject to bitter criticism. The Spanish American War may have been a nakedly opportunistic and acquisitive venture, but the American government was forced by its own constituencies to give up Cuba, the big prize. The War, and the later Phillipine campaign was bitterly criticized.
Tell that to the people who, after the US bought took Philippines, refused to accept American rule.
The Philippine insurrection began in 1899 and was officially over by 1902. Fighting and scattered rebellions continued at least for another decade. Meanwhile, Philippino home rule was an ongoing issue from the beginning. The Jones Act of 1916 was promising Philippine independence. The Tydings-McDuffie Act of 1934 promised independence in a decade. By 1946, American rule was over.
So what's the outcome of the Spanish American war? A ginned up war of Imperialism, except that the big prize, Cuba, slipped away immediately, the Philippines was a bloody long term headache where peace was only bought with self rule and promises of eventual independence.
If the Spanish American War taught us anything, it was that the age of Filibusters and opportunistic expansion was dead as a doornail.
And in a situation of Red Russia, as opposed to backing up American stampeders, it would be extremely easy to sell it at least as well as the Spanish-American war was sold.
Thanks for the admission that American stampeders were going to be a non-issue, going nowhere and amounting to nothing.
As for selling a war of acquisition upon Red Russia in the 1920's, I'm pretty doubtful. Woodrow Wilson had a hard enough time getting America involved in WWI and he shot his bolt there as America returned to intense isolationism.
I can't help but noting that following the Russian Revolution, many of the Western powers, including the United States and Japan, invaded Russia and attempted to help turn the tide against the Reds. Their efforts went precisely nowhere. No one, not even the United States, was prepared to commit to a major war against the Russians, nor even to bite off chunks of Russian territory. Japan could have tried for the rest of Sakhalin, or the United States might have gone for the rest of the Aleutians - that that didn't happen. No one had the stomach for it, even where it was hypothetically defensible.
So we have an Isolationist US, dragged quacking and screaming into WWI three years late, we have a US returning to isolation so forcefully it won't even enter the League of Nations, we have Russian ventures that are abandoned, a Spanish flu that devastates everyone, a post WWI recession... Where is the incentive?
Why on Earth would an American administration decide to jump into Alaska at that point? It's all costs, all headaches, and no appreciable gain. Why would anyone think that there would be the will or inclination to just annex Russian territory, when a war to acquire Spain's colonies went so badly astray that Cuba received immediate independence and the Phillipines were only kept quiet with ongoing promises of independence. Why would any American government think that Russia would simply accept a seizure as a fait accompli and cash a check, rather than keeping the issue live for a decade or decades or however long it took. Why would any American government think that Russia is no different from Mexico or Spain?
Butterflies are butterflies. But it's hard to see a post-war America throwing over isolationism to indulge in a bit of opportunistic expansion, an expansion which would be costly, provocative and dubious.
Red Alaska is far more of a threat than Alaska in the hands of a friendly power.
Well, except that this 'Friendly Power' has demonstrated it is still in the business of gobbling up its neighbors property. Maybe friendly, definitely not trustworthy. Certainly it amounts to a sea change on the pacific coast, and not a good one.
The US taking over Alaska in 1867 was seen by the British North American colonies as a serious security threat, and was a significant motivation for both the formation of Canada, and British Colombia's subsequent entry into Confederation.
I can't imagine a circumstance where the US suddenly engaging in a war of territorial aggression in North America on Canada's northern pacific border is going to be viewed positively.
If Tsarist Russia can send tends of thousands of troops to Alaska in the late 19th century, the USSR can do the same - and has a great interest in Alaska allowing it to be within range of the US and Canada.
Except that in that case, the threat from Tsarist or Red Russia is balanced by America to the south. There's an arguable case that American interests will not allow Russian expansion.
What balances or protects Canadian territory from Americans to the north and south? What's the deterrant? Where's the further interest that stops American expansion.
And that most certainly is a lot more worrisome than someone that Canada and Britain have economic links to taking it from their hands.
Disagree.
Why? Because despite the evidence of American imperialism through out the 19th century and wars against anyone who might even be sympathetic to communism the US is suddenly going to regard the possibility of the USSR potentially having a major base in North America as not worth fighting over?
Apples and oranges. The era of manifest destiny involved purchases, filibusters and wars, but that was basically over by 1867. The Spanish American war in its actual conduct and outcomes supports my case more than it does yours.
And while the US was pretty aggressive in opposing communism abroad, that was in the cold war era, after 1945. Mexico had arguably gone 'red' in its revolution, but except for a few efforts against Pancho Villa, and border skirmishes, it stayed out of that conflict. It didn't take the opportunity to grab Baja or snack on a few more Mexican provinces on its borders. So its unlikely that during the same period, the response to civil war or turmoil or an unpleasant government in Russia is going to be to steal a handy Russian province.
Calling it American Exceptionalism to point out the US is in a stronger position in this regard than Russia is dilutes the term.
Not that much stronger a position. Alaska is a west coast territory, far from American centers of population and industry, and located high in the Arctic. The United States has its own logistical challenges to deal with, though admittedly not as severe as the Russian ones. I think you frankly overestimate the American position, and severely misread the American sentiment of the era.
I also assert that you dramatically underestimate and completely misread Russian ability and sentiment.
But so be it. I'm certainly not persuaded by your arguments, and I doubt that you'll accept mine. So I'm willing to call it a day and leave it up to any audience that is interested in reading.