First Mongols came and receded, leaving Tartars then Poland-Lithuania moved in, leaving their own imprint.īeyond the areas of foreign control lay the wild realm of the Ukrainian Cossacks. The tides of history carved out divides in Ukraine that still persist today. Ukraine is marked by a diversity of historical memories and orientations, and in that sense, it’s like a microcosm of larger Eastern European patterns. One question that arises is what sort of a Russia comes into being if it chooses an imperial identity with an appetite for expansion, or if, on the contrary, Russia chooses a self-sufficient identity that meshes with modern Europe.įor Ukrainians, their identities are both linked to those of a past shared with Russia, but also with historic ties and affinities with the West. Scholars have noted that Russia without Ukraine is a country, but Russia with Ukraine is an empire. Rather, the background is a slow-motion identity crisis involving both Ukraine and Russia, and extending back over centuries. The tinder for the Ukraine conflict didn’t spontaneously come into being in 2014. Vejas Gabriel Liulevicius explains the extraordinary lead-up to the violent events of 2014. In his video series A History of Eastern Europe, Dr.
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