I thought this was interesting. Putin is walking a fine line between using Russian ethnic nationalism which plays to a significant but not all-inclusive audience and using a more cosmopolitan Russian nationalism which plays to all Russian citizens. As he tries to build the broader cosmopolitan nationalism to ensure passification of non-Russian ethnicities he threatens to lose his own base.

Staunton, April 5

Russian nationalists in Crimea and in Russia are expressing their outrage at and opposition to what they see as Vladimir Putin’s “Tatarization” of Crimea, a policy that they argue does not reflect the ethnic balance on the peninsula and that calls into question Moscow’s portrayal of itself as a defender of ethnic Russians.


The appointment to key positions of Crimean Tatars and efforts by leaders of that nation to take control of various facilities have infuriated ethnic Russian leaders there who thought that it was they, rather than the Crimean Tatars, who were exercising their right to self-determination.


After all, they point out, Russian President Vladimir Putin justified his moves in Crimea by talking about the repression of ethnic Russians, and the ethnic Russians, who form the majority of the peninsula’s population, were the most enthusiastic backers of joining Crimea to the Russian Federation.
http://www.interpretermag.com/russia...ion-of-crimea/

Of course, all this depends on the source. Has anyone heard of the "Institute of Modern Russia"?