[Hithredin]

I guess the distance is also proportional to the strenght of the remote part and the brutality of a vengeance from the capital.

England, Fance, Spain, Portugal keeping colonies for a while until they technologically matched and that enlightened europe would be less tolerant of a bloody revenge.

Russia, China still controlling their colonies because there is no local comparable strenght in those moutain/toundra/desert parts.