So, after giving it some thought, i think you’re probably right, in the sense that the idea of a “civilization” is an inherently assimilationist one. It’s just a fact that countries like Russia (as well as the USSR before it) and China, although they are a composite of different nations/ethnic groups, do tend to assimilate these groups into a larger supra-national culture. The USSR did this with the attempt to create the “Homo Sovieticus”, a “Soviet identity” to supersede (but not replace) national identities.

I don’t think this is inherently something bad or wrong, nor does it have to clash with national self-determination, it just depends how you do it. And there is perhaps some validity to the argument that if you don’t create a kind of over-arching culture which binds a country like this together that you risk it breaking apart along national lines, to the benefit of imperialist powers which are always going to seek to drive wedges between peoples, to “divide and conquer”.

Far more problematic imo is when this impulse is turned outwards as in the case of the US. The US are arguably the only state in the West that would qualify as “civilizational” rather than a European-style nation state (there’s no “US nation”). Unfortunately it’s one that suffers from a collective messianic delusion. It views itself as essentially a crusader state (my impression is that this is intrinsically linked to its settler legacy), a unique chosen people with a holy mission of making sure they are the only such state in the world, eradicating all other civilizations and remaking the world in their image.

They cannot and will never be able to tolerate other “civilizational states” existing and will always seek to break them up in order to create a civilizational vaccum into which they can insert their own - their own culture, their own values, and eventually even their own language. Like they did in Europe and many other parts of the world (Japan, occupied Korea, Philippines, etc.).

I know this isn’t exactly a Marxist analysis but it was the best i could do trying to give this concept of the “civilization state” the benefit of the doubt. I thought i may as well try to see if i can get some value out of it, maybe to provide a different perspective from which to view things. I’m still not convinced it’s all that useful. It still has major, glaring gaps as an analytic framework compared to a proper dialectical materialist analysis, in particular on the class front.

I don’t know what they believe, and i don’t think they know for sure either. I think they’re a little confused.

Afghanistan is very much not an ethno-state though. It is actually quite ethnically diverse.