This is a case of irredentism borne of the very real discrimination and violence the Kiev government engaged in against Ukraine’s ethnic Russian minority. There had been no problem and the Russians had not invaded for a generation after the fall of the Soviet Union.
By the way, the Donbase is not only populated mostly by Russian speaking ethnic Russians, it was historically a part of Russia. It was the Commies in the 20th century who gave it to the Ukrainian SSR. Just like it was the Commies who gave another historically Russian area - the Crimea - to Ukraine in 1954.
When you have a much bigger neighbor right next door and you have a minority of those people in a region within your own country....maybe it would be smarter not to be brutal toward that minority. Just a thought.
“not to be brutal towards your minority”
Super majority of ethnic Russians in Ukraine oppose Russia. And all that bullshit about “brutalizing Russians” is just that: made up bullshit.
First time we ever heard of “8 years of bombing Donbass!” was after 8 years of documenting bombing by Russia on Ukraine, which used the cease fire for the past 8 years to use Ukrainians as target practice, while lying about having 30,000 troops and heavy weapons there, even while third party observers more or less saw Russians operating openly.
How many times do we have to catch these retarded Russians lying about everything until you stop believing everything they say?