Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic

The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic or in short, the Ukrainian SSR or Soviet Ukraine was in the southwestern part of the Soviet Union. It had the second largest population of the fifteen constituent republics of the Soviet Union. This lasted from 1922 to 1991.

The Ukrainian SSR was a founding member of the United Nations. It did not really have much power because it was tightly controlled by central all-Soviet Union authorities. When the Soviet Union broke apart, the Ukrainian SSR became Ukraine.

During its 72-year history, the republic's borders changed many times. The eastern city of Kharkiv was the republic's first capital. However, in 1934, it was moved to the city of Kyiv. Kyiv is still the capital of Ukraine. Among other largest cities there were Odesa, Dnipro, Donetsk (named Stalino before 1961), Lviv, Zaporizhia.

History

Ukrainian SSR was one of 4 first republics of USSR.

In 1939 some lands of Western Ukraine was incorporated in Ukrainian SSR. It was occupied by Poland in 1921 and had cities Lviv, Ternopil, Stanislav (now Ivano-Frankivsk), Rivne.

In 1940 was taken from Romania Nortern Bukovina (Chernivtsy oblast) and part of Bessarabia.

During the WWIV all of its territory was occupied. There was large partisan movements. 
Kyiv and Odesa became hero cities.

In 1953 former head of Communist party of Ukraine Nikita Khrushchev became the General Secretary of the CPSU. In 1964 he was removed by Ukrainian Leonid Brezhnev who was in office before his death in 1982.

In 1954 Crimea was incorporated in Ukrainian SSR.

In 1986 there was Chernobyl atomic station catastrophe.

 Demographic 
In the republic there were about 29 mln people in 1926, 47.1 mln in 1970, 49.6 mln in 1979, 51.7 mln in 1989.

In 1989 5 cities had more than 1 million people. It was Kyiv (2.6 mln), Kharkiv (1.6 mln), Dnipro (1.2 mln), Odesa (1.1 mln) and Donetsk (1.1 mln).

The larger nation was Ukrainians, 2nd nation was Russians during all the history. Among the other nations were Jews, Belarusians, Moldovans and Romanians, Poles, Greeks.

References

Category:Holodomor
Category:1919 establishments
Category:20th century in Ukraine
Category:Republics of the Soviet Union
Category:1910s establishments in Russia
Category:1991 disestablishments in the Soviet Union