By ' absurd logic ' do you mean that it was agreed that all at that point independent republics were allowed to break away while internal SSR republics would remain and at the same time there was an agreement that the postsoviet states would respect each others territorial integrity and sovereigntythese were the agreements back then of course ? A clear distinction was in fact made , before you call anything arbitrary you should first research the topic at hand . Stability was a major bulletpoint in the agreements , letting everyone try to secede was considered dangerous and destabilizing . Also Russia itself was a breakaway state , they payed themselves blue to become the legal successor of the USSRand thus keep nuclear weapons , so they were not the remnant of the ' empire ' rather they made a conscious decision to take up the mantle , again largely because of a need for stability since having nuclear weapons divided at random across the postsoviet states would have been a nightmare . That this didn ' t happen was also a reason why Gorbachev got the Nobel Peace Price . I ' m sorry but I had to point that out to you before you compare this to decolonisation . The Chechens claimed they fitted the bill for secesion , but they didn ' t since the agreement did NOT apply to republics internal to SSRs . There is no fair comparison to be made with decolonisation as in this situation there was an agreement in place concerning the issue that also was recognized . EDIT words