Does Putin have plans to reclaim Alaska?

In 1867, Russia finalized the sale of Alaska to the United States. Recently, certain delegates from Moscow have voiced demands for the return of the territory. Explore the details of the original transaction and examine whether Russia holds any legitimate claim to Alaska today.

Alaska has been the 49th state in the USA since 1959; however, not so long ago, the northern state that borders Canada belonged to Russia...

According to the National Archives, in 1867, the Russian Empire sold Alaska to the United States for a cool $7.2 million.

In fact, Russia and Alaska are only separated by the Bering Strait - which is only 85 km/52.8 miles wide. At the time of sale the Russian Empire needed the money and found the rugged state hard to maintain, so selling it to the US seemed like a good idea.

However, some claim that Putin is thinking about trying to get this "lost" Russian land back. As reported by Newsweek in December 2023, Sergei Mironov, a Russian lawmaker wrote on X that the time may be coming for Russia to try to claim back Alaska.

Mironov wrote that the United States is losing power and suggested that Russia could try taking back old territories as Venezuela did with Guyana.

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This might sound outlandish but according to Newsweek, even back in 2022 posters could be seen in the Russian city of Krasnoyarsk with the words “Alaska is ours!” Perhaps, a campaign to reclaim the land has already begun.

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The reclaiming of Alaska was led primarily by Vyacheslav Volodin, a confidant of Putin and chairman of the State Duma. According to the Associated Press, in 2022, Volodin said in a meeting with Russian state officials, "When they [U.S. lawmakers] attempt to appropriate our assets abroad, they should be aware that we also have something to claim back," referring to Alaska.

However, according to the Daily Mail, Russia may not only demand the return of Alaska, but also Fort Ross in California...

According to Newsweek, in the summer of 2023, a Kremlin adviser, Oleg Matveychev, is said to have made this demand - as compensation for the US sanctions that Russia has been facing since the start of the war in Ukraine.

You may not realize that a long, long time ago, Russia had a settlement in Fort Ross, California. In 1812, Russian traders settled Fort Ross and stayed for thirty years.

While these states could easily be dismissed by the United States as mere words, an event in the summer of 2023 caused concern.

Russian and Chinese warships went on "patrol" together - near Alaska, as reported by CNN at the time.

The fact that Alaska and Fort Ross once belonged to Russia is thanks to the Danish naval officer in Russian service Vitus Bering - the namesake of the Bering Strait between Russia and Alaska.

During the "Great Nordic Expedition" between 1733 and 1743, Bering made the "second discovery" of America.

In 1799 the Russian-American Company was founded and several Russian settlements were founded in America.

Russia continued to advance and founded Fort Ross on the Pacific coast in 1812. In 1840 the Tsarist Empire lost interest in the settlement because it was unsuitable for supplying Alaska and sold it to a Swiss man.

When the sale of Alaska came about, relations between Russia and the USA were much better than they are today.

As historian Henner Kropp says according to the German publication t-online.de, the Russian rulers "never really warmed to the distant and inhospitable Alaska."

Photo: Unsplash / Rod Long

When the then US Secretary of State William H. Seward acquired Alaska for $7.2 million in 1867, he had to endure a lot of malice from his contemporaries who did not see the benefits of the freezing, seemingly inhabitable land.

Photo: Painting, after the signing of the Alaska Treaty on March 30, 1867.

However, it would later turn out that Alaska had a rich oil reserve...

In addition, according to Marc von Lüpke on t-online.de, "a Russian Alaska today would dramatically change the geopolitical situation in Russia's favor."

However, the sale back then was valid and Alaska legally belongs to the USA - whether Putin and the Kremlin like it  or not.

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