Ukraine 1914–2014

Throughout World War I, the people of the Ukrainian territories were split between the Austro-Hungarian and Russian Empires. The Bolshevik Revolution in Russia allowed nationalism in the Ukraine to flourish and Socialist movements established a number of short-lived states. The Ukrainian People’s Republic and the West Ukrainian People’s Republic were both formed separately in 1918 and unified in 1919. Civil war then restarted as anarchist, Bolshevik, and Tsarist forces all vied for power. The Bolshevik factions succeeded in establishing the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, which became part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in 1922, whilst Poland gained the lands of western Ukraine. Following a period of industrial growth, Ukraine became an area of brutal fighting during World War II, after which it was ceded Polish and Romanian territory. Crimea was gifted to Ukraine by Russia in 1954 but then reoccupied by the Russian Federation in 2014, 14 years after the dissolution of the USSR.