[Mikeb85]

To be fair, more often than not, Russia was on the receiving end of invasions. Even when they invaded others, it was often in response to being invaded first.

Look at how the Russian empire formed: it was Moscow re-taking all the Kyivan Rus lands that were conquered by Muslim invaders. Or all the European countries that attacked/invaded Russian lands: Great Britain, France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Poland-Lithuania and I'm probably forgetting some.

So yes, it's fairly apt to say that, more often than not, Russia was defending its own lands.

The fact that Russia is wrong today doesn't mean that it hasn't been wronged many, many times before. A parallel is that many abusers were once abused themselves (and yes the cycle needs to end).

Also, Ukraine's unfortunate history: they were the part of Rus/Russian lands that almost always were passed back and forth. The name "Ukraine" itself suggests that...

[AnimalMuppet]

I'm pretty sure that Russia didn't make it all the way to Vladivostok by "defending its own lands" or "re-taking all the Kyivan Rus lands".

What you say may be true in the west. It's not true of Russia's expansion east of the Urals.