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Notes -
They are afraid of the same things that all conquered nations of Russian empire were afraid of. That they will become second class citizens only to be exploited by Russian elite centers around Moscow and Saint Petersburg. An actually realistic proposition is that Putin will press them into military service and send them to war against Baltic states. You know - the same thing that Putin did to "liberated" and annexed Luhansk and Donetsk republics.
This is how Russia treats its second class citizens, yes, but eastern Ukraine doesn't actually have young people left. Western Ukraine has demographics that up until recently were at least not worse than average for Eastern Europe(that is, still quite bad). Eastern Ukraine has demographics that are Manchuria-tier. Russia's not raising a big slave army out of it, no matter how brutal their conscription laws. That's why the Russian army is increasingly muslim- same reason.
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Yeah, it wouldn't just be that the Ukrainians would now be Russians - they'd be (considered to be) stupid hick Russians, traitorous hohols who almost sold out their birthright for a song, idiots with a dumb accent with the best of them aspiring to move to the central cities to lose their accent and identity to be accepted in the in crowd and the rest being proles and cannon fodder. Why wouldn't they aspire to prevent this?
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