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| Anthem | "Zhyvy, Malarusiya!" | |||||
| Capital (and largest city) |
Kharkiv | |||||
| Language | Malarusian; Russian; Ukrainian | |||||
| Government | All-Malorussian Congress of Soviets | |||||
| Head of State | Petro Symonenko | |||||
| Head of Government | Yuriy Boyko | |||||
| Established | March 10, 1919 | |||||
| Currency | Ruble | |||||
| Time Zone | (UTC+2) | |||||
| Abbreviations | MlSSR | |||||
The Malorussian Soviet Socialist Republic (Malarusian: Малaруськa Радя́нськa Сaціалісти́чнa Респу́блікa Malaruska Radyánska Satsialistýchna Respúblika), and commonly referred to as the Malorussian SSR, is a sovereign Soviet socialist state and one of seventeen constituent republics of the Soviet Union.
Geographically the Malorussian SSR is a landlocked state in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by the Ukrainian SSR on the east, the Byelorussian SSR on the north, the Russian SFSR on the west, and the Novorussian SSR on the south. As with the Byelorussian SSR, the Malorussian SSR is a founding member of the United Nations, although it is legally represented by the All-Union state in its affairs with countries outside of the Soviet Union. Its capital and most populous city is Kharkiv.
The name Malorussia (Russian: Малоруссия; Malarusian: Малaрусия) is derived from the term "Malaya Rus'", which meant "Little Russia". This asserted that in the case of the Malorussians, they are viewed as variants of the Russian people. Similar case can also be applied with the regions of the Krivian Rus' which can be referred as Byelorussia (Russian: Белороссия; Belarusian: Беларусия, "White Russia") and of the Prichernomorian Rus' as Novorussia (Russian: Новорoссия; Novorussian: Новaро́сія, "New Russia").
Politics and government[]
History[]
Ukrainian-Soviet War[]
After the October Revolution, many governments were formed in the Ukrainian lands. The two most important of them were Lviv-based in west and Kharkiv-based in east. These two sides were in permanent conflict with each other, which resulted in many casualties among the Ukrainians fighting in opposition in civil war as part of the wider Ukrainian-Soviet War.
Following the Peace of Lviv in 1921, the boundaries between the Ukrainian People's Republic and the Ukrainian People's Republic of Soviets were established along the river Dnieper. To the west of Dnieper (Заднепровье Zadneprovie), the Ukrainian People's Republic was recognized as an internationally-recognized sovereign government of Zadneprovian Ukraine although was immediately subjugated by Poland within a military and semi-political union called "Międzymorze". On other hand, the Bolsheviks would extend control to the east of Dnieper (Приднепровье Pridneprovie) what would ultimately become the Malorussian Soviet Socialist Republic which became a founding member of the Soviet Union in 1922.
Pridneprovian Ukraine[]
World War II[]
At the start of World War II, the Ukrainian People's Republic was invaded by the Red Army following the German invasion of Poland. For a year, the Soviets maintained military occupation in the west of the Dnieper while oversaw the Sovietization process. In 1940, a parliamentary election was conducted in Zadneprovian Ukraine with the Soviet initiatives in order to legitimize the annexation of the Ukrainian People's Republic into its Pridneprovian counterpart, with a suspicion the result was rigged for the Soviet purposes. The pro-Soviet Ukrainian People's Council then voted for Zadneprovia to join already-existing Malorussian SSR, thus united both sides of the Dnieper under the Soviet Union.
At the onset of German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, the government of the Ukrainian People's Republic was briefly reinstated by the Germans which claimed control over all Ukrainian lands despite only nominally controlled Lviv and surrounding areas. The UPR government also formally entered the Axis powers by signing the Tripartite Pact in 1942. After the Red Army entered Vinnytsia, the provisional seat of the republic following the fall of Kiev, in 1944, the Ukrainian People's Republic was formally dissolved again as both sides of the Dnieper were now under control of internationally-recognized Malorussian Soviet Socialist Republic which was already part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
Post-war development[]
The 1970s saw a backlash of the anti-nationalist campaigns by the All-Union government in the 1950s and 1960s. Ethnic tensions developed between the Ukrainians in the west, who supported the Ukrainian cultural revival and the Priedneprovians in the east, who were strongly influenced by the Russian culture. Kandid Charkviani's Policy on Nationalities in 1979 proposed the creation of new Soviet Socialist Republics and other ethnic autonomous oblasts based on latest social realities at its time.
In 1980, seventeen oblasts in the western sides of the Dnieper were separated to form the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Five years later the Crimean ASSR, Sevastopol, Zaporizhzhia Oblast, Kherson Oblast and Mykolaiv Oblast in the south also seceded and became the Novorussian Soviet Socialist Republic. The secession left the rump republic with its five eastern-most oblasts (Sumy, Kharkiv, Luhansk, Donetsk and Dnipropetrovsk) stays intact until recently.
