Historical memory as a way of conceptualizing foreign policy problems during the reign of Catherine II

Appeals to "historical memory" are repeatedly encountered in the history of Russian history. Historical memory can serve as a motive for making government decisions or be a justification for such a decision. An example of the use of historical memory was the decision to include Crimea into the Russian Empire. The objective of the article is to show how historical memory helped to justify the turn of Russian policy in the Black Sea region from "defensive" to "offensive". Sources and methods. The key source is the document by P.A. Levashov "Picture or a brief news about Russian wars with the Tatars and affairs that began in the middle of the tenth century and continued almost continuously for eight hundred years." An additional source is the text of the letter of G.A. Potemkin to Catherine II in 1782. The study of these documents was carried out using the methods of systemic, textual, documentary and semantic analysis. Analysis. The need for an appeal to historical memory for the leaders of Russian foreign policy arose after the successes of Russians advancement in the Black Sea region in the first half of the 1770s. Conclusions. The study showed that an appeal to historical memory made it possible to substantiate the decision to annex Crimea. This led to the emergence of two interrelated concepts: "restoration of historical justice" by P.A. Levashov and "rational", in the spirit of the modern theory of "offensive realism" – G.A. Potemkin.