Ukraine

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===Pre-War===
Modern Ukraine emerged at the beginning of the 20th century from a series of tumultuous conflicts of national identity, autonomy, and shifting borders. Ukrainians participated on the frontlines of World War I under the Russian Empire, and were participants of the Russian Civil War in 1917 as well. The war left the country devastated, with over 1.5 million dead, thousands homeless, and the country overall under the control of the Soviet Union. Further hardship came with the 1930s. The country experienced intense industrialization that saw its industrial output quadruple, while collectivist policies and unrealistic quotas enforced by the Soviet Union saw dramatic reductions in agriculture that lead to massive famine, resulting in the deaths of 3.9 million Ukrainians die as a direct result. Mass killings in the late 1930s intended to keep the population in line saw thousands more deported or executed.
In 1941, the Soviet Union was invaded by Germany. The Battle of Kyiv that year saw the Germans encircle the city, occupying it after a month of fighting that saw more than 600000 Soviet soldiers die or be captured. Throughout the war, most Ukrainians fought alongside the Russians, but some aligned themselves with the Germans. However, the Germans brutal rule and inaction in reversing the policies put in place by the Soviets saw many Ukrainian collaborators turn against them. Overall, most of the fighting of World War II took place on the Eastern Front, of which Ukraine made up approximately 1/3 of, with a total loss of approximately 6 million Ukrainians, 700 Ukrainian cities and 28000 Ukrainian villages. The loss of so much infrastructure caused another famine in 1946 which killed yet tens of thousands more.
Between 1946-1950, nearly 20% of the Soviet Union’s budget was invested in redeveloping Ukraine. The country soon became a leader of industrial production in Europe and an important part of the Soviet arms industry and high-tech research.
In 1991, Ukraine declared independence from the Soviet Union. Later that year, the Soviet Union itself was dissolved, ending the Cold War. Initially, Ukraine was expected to emerge as a strong member of the Commonwealth of Independent States, but experienced substantial economic recession instead, losing 60% of its GDP from 1991 to 1999, causing extreme hardship and unrest. After 2000, the economy began to stabilize and slowly recover.
The first decade of the 2000s saw multiple political scandals. In 2013, the Ukrainian president, after years of stalling integration into the European Union, announced intent to establish further ties with Russia. This led to protests, which were in turn countered by protesters from Ukraine’s Russian-speaking eastern population. Signs of strife that had begun in November of 2013 erupted into violent revolution in late February 2014. Following the revolution, the ousted president of Ukraine petitioned the Russian Federation for aid against what he considered an illegal coup. The Russian president came to the decision that the Crimean Peninsula would be annexed from Ukraine back to Russia. Russian troops operating without insignia captured the parliament of Crimea and key locations around the peninsula. A pro-Russian government was installed and a referendum was held resulting in the declaration of Crimea's independence in mid March. Two days later, Russia would then formally incorporate Crimea as a federal subject. Following the annexation, concurrent pro-Russian protests across southern and eastern Ukraine escalated into war between the Ukrainian government and separatist forces of the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk Republics in April.
===Human-Vannai War===
Ukraine served as an important source of information for ACC on what had happened during the Two Week War, leading to the launch of Operation Blowout to explore the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone in search of information on the Vannai in September 2014. This information revealed that the SSAU had collected some data on the Vannai Killsat Network and possibly the Mothership as well, in addition to the fact that development work on a man-made artificial intelligence and power armor had been going on in either Russia or Ukraine shortly after the invasion, though 2014-era ACC personnel demonstrated difficulty determining the difference between the two nations.
Ukraine itself did not share Western Europe’s good fortune of going through the war mostly intact, having already been embroiled in a war with Russian-backed separatist forces in its eastern region. The alien attack did not prompt any ceasefires, and after the nuclear exchange between Moscow and Washington, both governments were left paralyzed. The Russians initially abandoned the separatist forces to deal with their own problems, but with no indication of anything of their government having survived the Two-Week War, military units stationed in and near Crimea felt more inclined to resume aiding the rebels. Ukraine, alone, struggled and failed to hold its territory, resulting in a bitter defeat and the ceding of the Donets Basin to non-state actors, along with it a substantial portion of its domestic coal mining and heavy industry, and a region that produced about 30% of its gross exports. In the backdrop of a global struggle for survival in which international aid was scarce, this was absolutely crippling for Ukraine and a humiliating loss for the Ukrainian government after the annexation of Crimea. Territory losses continued until 2016, by which point Ukraine had lost access to the Black Sea completely.
===Post-War===
====The European Federation====
In 2019, the European Federation was formed. Ukraine, languishing in economic squalor following the end of the war against what was now calling itself Novorossiya, had hopes that the EuF would accept it into the Federation as well. Prior to the invasion, the intent to join the European Union proved to be a flashpoint for the nation that factored into the civil war coming to pass. However, EuF diplomats never approached Ukraine with the offer.
====The Intermarium League====
In late 2020, various heads of state in Eastern Europe had concluded that the new state of affairs had dramatically altered the power balance and geopolitical landscape to the detriment of these nations, more than half of which had been members of NATO and the EU, but now found themselves isolated with the dissolution of both. The formation of the European Federation proved to be the tipping point for these doubts and fears, which had begun with the balkanization of Russia thanks to the actions of the Red Initiative. Having lost large swathes of its territory to rogue nuclear states, the Russian Federation was eager to look for ways to claw back power, and looked west to the nations of Eastern Europe that lacked formidable armies, nuclear weapons, and could no longer count on the safety umbrella provided by NATO or Western Europe. Ukraine, having already suffered the ignominy of losing territory to “insurgents”, was keen to become a part of any military alliance that would safeguard it from further losses - or better yet, allow it to regain the land it had lost. Thus, when the League was proposed, Ukraine immediately became one of its strongest supporters. However, this attitude changed when the League was actually formed and economic reformations were planned. Despite possessing all the resources that indicate a potential to be a highly successful economic power on par with those of Western Europe, Ukraine's economic performance remained historically hamstrung due to, among other reasons, very high amounts of corruption. The League’s economic commission, aware of this, recommended the installation of anti-corruption legislature and program advisors from the Baltics and Slovenia. This resulted in significant pushback within the Ukrainian government, which many fear may be the signs of another governmental crisis in the making.
Category:TE Nations
Category:Eastern Europe