"Conceived as a sequel to The Struggle for the Eurasian Borderlands, this book radically shifts the focus away from a comparison of the centuries' old competition among multi-cultural conquest empires for hegemony in Eurasia to the Soviet Union, the central player in the renewal of that contest in the first half of the twentieth century. Many of the issues remain the same, but the cast of characters has changed. The Soviet Union was heir to much of the territory of the Russian Empire and many of its problems both foreign and domestic flowed from that hard won inheritance. But its response was radically different. Its new leaders were engaged in transforming its foreign policy as part of re-building of a multi-national state. From the outset they were obliged to enter into complex and often contradictory relations with a ring of smaller and weaker successor states, constituting the new borderlands, which had replaced the rival empires all along their frontiers. In many cases these borderland states were allies or clients of the major powers and perceived by the Soviet government as hostile or threatening"--Provided by publisher.