I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what happened in Ukraine. Unlike some oUher wars this was not easy as it was too crazy to be believed. It is hard to even distinguish  a Ukrainian from a Russian.
I have anecdotes on how Kiev post USSR blamed the Russians for keeping them down. They taught this in schools after USSR.

Some guy was a native Ukr speaker and grew up in Kiev and went to university there. He later moved to US.
He showed a chart comparing Ukr SSR to 4 industrial European Countries. It compared this group of 5 in 13 production categories.

The 1990 pop was Ukr 51M, DE 79; GB 57, FR 56; IT 56

https://youtu.be/Msf8HuIWlQA?t=162

elec 3; oil/gas 2; nat gas 2; coal 1; iron ore 1; steel 1; concrete 4; grain 2; potatoes 1; meat 3; milk 2; sugar 1; butter 2.

Ukr SSR was number 1 or 2 compared to EU countries. How did they piss this away? I recall they ended up amongst the poorest country in Europe. In per capital terms they looked even better in 1990 as they had the smallest pop of the group.

USSR collapsed in 1991 and the civil war started in 2014 and the SMO in 2022. So they had 13 or 21 years before things got messed up. People in Crimea said nothing was built after USSR until they rejoined Russia. some Ukr POWs were en route to a POW exchange. They commented on freshly paved roads. something new.

IMO corruption had a lot to do with it. Also IMO the post coup Ukr govt focused on returning to a Ukr that never existed. It is said 30 years ago you did not hear Ukrainian spoken in Kiev. Ukrainian was a rural agrarian language and nowhere on earth is such a language taking over. Russian was a big city language and an empire language.

The Russian and Ottoman empires lasted because they mostly did not interfere with language, religion, or culture. That was bad for business. So the kiev govt messes with all 3. All pain for negative gain.

The Kiev govt is interfering with Russian language usage and even changing Russian loanwords in Ukrainian to new words. Places are renamed, statues pulled down, they even propose changing a coin because it is called a Kopek same as in Russia.  They rewrite the history school books sometimes yearly. 

Some Kiev source said they had disposed of 10M Russian language books by 2023 with a goal of 100M. The Kiev govt created a new orthodox sect in 2019, with US help I believe. Some lawyer for the Ukrainian Orthodox church said the govt has seized 1500 churches so far. They are often given to the new sect. The reasons given are past or current affiliation with the Moscow Patriarchy. This is very upsetting especially to old people.

Grok said that for every 1 Ukrainian language book published there are 24 in Russian, 40 in Mandarin, and 80 in English. The Kiev govt response is to pulp Russian language books (book burning makes them look like NAZIs) and turn them into egg cartons.

My conclusion is that the ultra nationalist infused Kiev govt is crazy. Romans, Ottomans, WWII Germans and WWII Japanese reasons for war were not insane. The Donbass region of Ukraine was the most productive of Ukraine so the Kiev faction decided to wage war on them and drive those people out of the country out of hatred and spite.

That about sums it up nicely.