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History of Ukraine: from the beginning of the twentieth century
At the beginning of the 20th (twentieth) century, Ukraine was a part of the tsar's Russia. Russian was the main language in the Eastern Ukraine. But the Ukrainian nationalistic movement in the country kept the Ukrainian language alive.
At the beginning of the World War One, the Russian army defeated the German army, and in 1915 occupied Galicia (the western part of Ukraine). Tsar Nicholas wanted the Western Ukraine to become a part of Russia and wanted the population to speak Russian. But the nationalistic movements in the Ukraine resisted the task.
In December, Germans pushed Russians back to the Eastern Ukraine and recaptured Galicia.
In October of 1917, the Russian Revolution brought the Bolsheviks to power in the country and Russia became the Socialist Republic.
In January 1918, Sichovy striltsi, the soldiers in the Ukrainian Independent Army, fought for the Ukraine's independence from Soviet Russia on the outskirts of Kiev. However, the Ukrainian army lost the battle.
Ukraine lost its temporary independence and became the Socialist Republic. The population in the country divided into Reds and Whites and the country emerged into the Civil War.
World War One, Russian revolution and Civil War brought poverty, disorder and hunger throughout the country. The communist government allowed the peasants to own plots of land, taken from the land that was confiscated from the rich family estates.
However, the drought in 1921 caused famine in the Ukraine. Many people died.
New Economic Policies introduced in 1922, allowed peasants to sell their produce on the market for prices that represented their true value. Many people became prosperous.
In 1922, Lenin died and Josef Stalin came to power.
In 1923, the Ukraine along with Russia and other Soviet Republics became part of the Soviet Union.
In 1929, Stalin introduced collectivization of the land and cancelled the private ownership of the land. Many people refused to join collective farms. The government forced people to accept the collectivization. Many prosperous peasants were exiled to Siberia. The government heavily taxed the produce of those who refused to join the collective farms.
Drought in 1932 did not allow peasants to fulfill the government quota of wheat. The wheat grown and kept for personal use was taken by force from Ukrainian households. People were left without food. Those who worked in the collective farm did not have food either.
Heavy famine (holodomor) struck the Ukraine. Many people and entire villages died from hunger. There was no help from the government, which did not want to admit that the Ukraine was struck with a deadly famine.
In 1934, the government gave small amounts of seeds to collective farms, and started to feed those people who came to work at the farm. Some people in order to survive the famine left the familiar countryside for the unknown life in the city, where they could find some food.
After the famine, the peasants returned to the countryside and resumed their work at the collective farms. Many Russians occupied the empty houses in the villages of the Ukraine.
World War Two brought disaster and hunger to the Ukraine as well.
In June 1941, during a Germen invasion in the Western Ukraine, Ukrainian nationalists declared the Ukraine independent, but Germans did not allow that, and arrested the leader of the movement Stepan Bandera.
The Germans sent young people to Germany to work as free labor. Many did not come back.
In 1943, the Red Army liberated the Ukraine from the Germans; however, the Germans burnt down the houses in villages as they were passing through, going back to west. The Ukraine started rebuilding the country with even more determination.
In 1947, another drought struck in the Eastern Ukraine that caused famine, and again there was no help from the government. Some people went work in the cities, some died from hunger.
In 1985, a young communist Mikhail Gorbachev came to power in the Soviet Union and a new wave of “Glasnost” and “Perestroika” swept the country.
In 1991, Ukraine declared independence from the Soviet Union and on August 24, it became an independent country.
Peasants now can own the land in Ukraine.
The wretched land was tamed, at last.
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