The pro-Western government of Ukraine is trying to wipe out the Soviet period of its history by pursuing a policy of “decommunization”. However, Ukraine as an independent state in its present borders could only be possible thanks to the Soviet rulers who expanded the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic at the expense of the neighboring states, including Russia. In fact, the Soviet power continued Imperial Russia’s policy of uniting Ukrainians within one state: the bulk of the present-day Ukraine’s territory was taken by the Imperial Russia from Poland and Turkey. Meanwhile, today’s Ukraine is the direct successor of the first internationally recognized Ukrainian state, the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, which was proclaimed in 1919, became one of the founding states of the Soviet Union in 1922 and a founding member of the United Nations in 1945.

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