Russia and the Middle East

Russia has relations with all of the countries of the Middle East. Historically it has been involved in numerous wars there, especially with Turkey and the Ottoman Empire, with Afghanistan, and recently in support of Syria. Today, when the Russian political establishment deals with Middle Eastern countries it seems to act a lot like it did in imperial times – often giving them broad diplomatic and even military support.

See also

• Afghanistan–Russia relations
  • Soviet–Afghan War
• Armenia–Russia relations
• Bahrain–Russia relations
• Caucasian War
  • Russian conquest of the Caucasus
• Cold War in Asia (the regional aspect of the Cold War)
  • Soviet Middle Eastern foreign policy during the Cold War
• Crimean War
  • Crimean Khanate
  • Russo-Crimean Wars
• Eastern Question, on the decline of the Ottoman Empire
  • History of the Russo-Turkish wars
    • Russo-Turkish War (1806–1812)
    • Russo-Turkish War (1828–1829)
    • Caucasus campaign
• Egypt–Russia relations
• Georgia–Russia relations
• Great Game, the rivalry between Britain and Russia over Central Asia in the 19th century
• Iran–Russia relations
  • Russia and the Iran–Israel proxy conflict
• Israel–Russia relations
• Iraq–Russia relations
• Jordan–Russia relations
• Kuwait–Russia relations
• Lebanon–Russia relations
• Libya–Russia relations
• Oman–Russia relations
• Qatar–Russia relations
• Palestine–Russia relations
• Russo-Persian Wars
  • Russo-Persian War (1722–1723)
  • Persian expedition of 1796
  • Russo-Persian War (1826–1828)
• Russia–Saudi Arabia relations
  • 2020 Russia–Saudi Arabia oil price war
• Russia–Syria relations
  • Russian intervention in the Syrian Civil War
• Russia–Turkey relations
  • Russians in Turkey
  • Turks in Russia
• Russia–United Arab Emirates relations
• Russia–Yemen relations
• List of modern conflicts in the Middle East
• Foreign policy of the Russian Empire

Further reading

• Amos, Philip. “Recent Work on the Great Game in Asia.” International History Review 2#2 1980, pp. 308–320. online

• Bechev, Dimitar, et al. eds. Russia Rising: Putin's Foreign Policy in the Middle East and North Africa (I.B. Tauris, 2021) excerpt
• Fay, Sidney B. "Russia and the Middle East" Current History 10.57 (1946): 385-392 online.

• Feifer, Gregory. The Great Gamble: The Soviet War in Afghanistan (Harper Collins, 2009)
• Issaev, Leonid, and Andrey Korotayev. "Russia’s policy towards the Middle East: The case of Yemen." International Spectator 55.3 (2020): 132–147.
• Kagan, Frederick, and Robin Higham, eds. The Military History of Tsarist Russia (2008) online

• Kauppi, Mark V. and R. Craig Nation, eds. The Soviet Union and the Middle East in the 1980s (Lexington Books, 1983).
• Klieman, Aaron S. Soviet Russia and the Middle East (1970) online
• Kreutz, Andrej. Russia in the Middle East: Friend or Foe? (Praeger, 2007). online review
• Kuniholm, Bruce R. The Origins of the Cold War in the Near East: Great Power Conflict and Diplomacy in Iran, Turkey, and Greece (Princeton UP, 1980) online
• Lovotti, Chiara, ed. Russia in the Middle East and North Africa (Routledge, 2020) excerpt
• Lund, Aron. "From cold war to civil war: 75 years of Russian-Syrian relations." (Swedish Institute of International Affairs, 2019) online.
• Lund, Aron. "Russia in the Middle East" (UI Paper 2/2019, Swedish Institute of International Affairs, 2019) online
• Nizameddin, Talal. Russia and the Middle East: Towards a New Foreign Policy (St Martin's Press, 1999). online
• Nizameddin, Talal. “Squaring the Middle East Triangle in Lebanon: Russia and the Iran-Syria-Hezbollah Nexus.” Slavonic and East European Review 86#3, (2008), pp. 475–500, online.

• Primakov, Yevgeny. Russia and the Arabs: Behind the Scenes in the Middle East from the Cold War to the Present (Basic Books, 2009).
• Rezvani, Babak. "Russian foreign policy and geopolitics in the Post-Soviet space and the Middle East: Tajikistan, Georgia, Ukraine and Syria." Middle Eastern Studies 56.6 (2020): 878-899 online.
• Smolansky, O. M. "The United States and the Soviet Union in the Middle East". Proceedings of the Academy of Political Science (1978). 33#1: 99–109. doi:10.2307/1173976.

• Stone, David. A Military History of Russia: From Ivan the Terrible to the War in Chechnya (2006) excerpts
• Vasiliev, Alexey. Russia’s Middle East Policy: From Lenin to Putin (Routledge, 2018). excerpt
• Vucinich, Wayne S. "Russia and the Near and Middle East.” Current History 28#162, (1955), pp. 80–88, online
• Wehling, Fred. “Three Scenarios for Russia’s Middle East Policy.” Communist and Post-Communist Studies 26#2 (1993), pp. 182–204, online.