Originally Posted by Mutt

Not by choice.

"A chaotic period of incessant warfare ensued, with internationally recognized establishment of independent Ukrainian People's Republic. Independent Ukraine emerged from its own civil war. Then Soviet aggression and the Ukrainian?Soviet War followed, which resulted in Soviet victory. Ukrainian People's Republic was occupied and a puppet state called Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic was created. On December 30, 1922 it became one of the founding republics of the Soviet Union. The Soviet government was hostile to Ukrainian language and Ukrainian culture; there were mass repressions of Ukrainian poets, historians and linguists. Then there was a genocide of Ukrainians: millions of people starved to death in 1932 and 1933 in the Holodomor. After the 1939 invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany and Soviet Union, the Ukrainian SSR's territory was enlarged westward. During World War II the Ukrainian Insurgent Army tried to reestablish Ukrainian independence and fought against both Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. But in 1941 Ukraine was occupied by Nazi Germany, being liberated in 1944. In 1945, the Ukrainian SSR became one of the founding members of the United Nations.[12] In 1954 it expanded to the south with the transfer of the Crimean Peninsula."