Black Dragon River: A Journey Down the Amur River at the Borderlands of Empires

Black Dragon River is a personal journey down Asia’s great Amur River that reveals the region’s essential history and culture. The Amur serves as a major border between Russia and China. As a crossroads for the great empires of Asia, this area offers journalist Dominic Ziegler a lens with which to examine the societies at Europe’s only borderland with East Asia. He follows a journey from the river’s source to its mouth, weaving the history, ecology, and peoples to illuminate a region obsessed with the past—and to show how this region shapes the contemporary relationship between Russia and China. The Amur is a mighty and elusive river. The terrain it traverses is notoriously difficult. Near the river’s source, Ziegler travels on horseback from the Mongolian steppe into the taiga, and later he travels the Trans-Siberian Railway through inland valleys where the water becomes impassable. As he journeys deeper into Amur country, Ziegler also explores the histories of the peoples and cultures the river’s path has transformed. The known history of the area begins with Genghis Khan and the rise of the Mongol Empire, and the region’s story has long involved conflict and conquest. The modern history is the story of Russia’s eastward push toward China. For China, the Amur symbolizes national humiliation and Western encroachment; for Russia, it has symbolized renewal, expansion, and eastward prospects. The struggle for the Amur was tied to Russia’s route to greatness, a shift in identity toward the Pacific. In 1854 Russia expanded into territory large enough to rival France and Germany combined. The region later witnessed upheaval during the Russian Civil War and under Stalin. The shared history of the Amur has shaped China–Russia relations—and their interactions with the wider world. To understand Putin’s imperial vision, one must understand Russia’s relationship to its far east and how it continues to influence the national mindset. The Amur is central to Putinism and is entwined in an ongoing clash of empires with the West.