Oleksandr Kucheruk
Ph.D. in History
DOI https://doi.org/10.37837/2707-7683-2019-5
Abstract. The article deals with the establishment of national states and formation of the state border between the Ukrainian National Republic and the Republic of Lithuania. In late 1917, a need to end the war and conclude a peace treaty was obvious, which resulted in the first negotiations between representatives of the Bolshevik government and Germany, joined by Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria and Turkey. The Ukrainian National Republic also got a chance to become an actor of European politics and participated in the peace negotiations in Brest-Lytovsk.
The system of the Brest-Lytovsk peace treaties legalized the separation between Russia and its national entities, recognized the independence of the Ukrainian National Republic as well as Lithuania and Latvia. The details of the negotiations remain unknown, but in the context of the establishment of relations with great powers and new nation-states, the Ukrainian-Lithuanian contacts were not in the foreground, although remained relevant.
In the summer of 1918, Lithuania was preparing to become a full-fledged monarchy and the final establishment of state borders was postponed. In October 1918, the Ministry of Military Affairs of the Ukrainian State established a commission dealing with the issue of the border line between Ukraine and Lithuania.
However, the plans were not meant to be realized due to the revolution in Germany, the anti-Hetman uprising in Ukraine, the restoration of the republic, the next wave of the Russian aggression against the newly formed states and the Polish invasion against Ukraine and Lithuania. Consequently, the western territories of the Ukrainian National Republic as well as the Lithuanian capital Vilnius with the Vilnius Region came under the control of Poland. Thus, the delineated Ukrainian-Lithuanian border remained on paper and on new maps of Europe.
Keywords: Ukrainian-Lithuanian border, monarchy, revolution, peace negotiations in Brest-Lytovsk.
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