Sorry, but this joke is stupid.
Poles are Slavs, and they colonized EE before Russians took over.
It's just a pointless subdivision within a pointless hierarchy.
Races as defined by Americans don't match skin color nor DNA proximity.
Skin color doesn't match DNA proximity.
And none of these map cleanly into "bully vs victim" subdivisions. Mostly because groups of people move from bullies to victims and back over time. People who systematically have the chance to bully others will eventually do that.
Though I'm sure Russian jingoists over 60 today too prefer to see Soviet-allied states as "their empire". It's no more true than saying Argentina was a US colony - which means yes, you could say it, but we'd all be dumber for thinking of it like that.