I do not see any a priori reason why non-European examples should be treated differently than European examples.

I didn't say they should, I just chose to give European examples because (a) the diary was about Europe, (b) as I said, I know there were serious conflicts in Central Asian countries too, but I know much less about their background.

it makes me wonder whether the Soviet Union would have come apart less violently had he left the peoples of that country alone.

I thought about how to answer that when reading your previous comment, but I just can't. For me, the question is too academic. That is, would the Soviet Union even survived Stalin if he didn't do those things? What's more, would it even have been born? To what extent are Stalin's policies the industrialised versions of earlier policies both by Tsarist Russia and by Central Asian Khanates? Is the Russian Federation itself not a multi-ethnic state whose integrity should be considered?

Is this your own analysis, or a standard one among in history and/or political science?

Only my own :-) But based on knowing many examples near-by, I don't view it as a particularly deep analysis.

I hastily assumed that conditions had changed, people had changed

I submit this is true to some extent, but I would point to another angle: the results of the separations 80, 65 years ago still reverberate, they gave birth to long-lasting hates on people level and troublesome relations on state level, and can seed new conflicts over sparatist issues. (For example, in Romania in the nineties, there was serious fear of Transsylvania going the Yugoslav way.)

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}