The history of the area is that Ukrainians are a separate branch of East slavs - distinct from Muscowites.
They were under the dominion of Muscowy from the late 1700s onwards, but loosely. That changed from the 1870s to 1914 but then loosened when there was a de jure (but not de facto) independent Ukrainian soviet republic.
You keep talking about “Russian ethnicity” yet ignore the fact that there are plenty of people who speak Russian as their first language but consider themselves Ukrainian. And plenty of people whose parents came from what is now the Russian federation and yet consider themselves Ukrainian.
the Kremlin invading Ukraine twice was just wrong and is wrong
I don’t have the time to list the thousands of “just wrong” things in the world. I will call your attention to one “just wrong” thing though, the Obama/Soros gang turning Ukraine into a corrupt Western woke satrapy. Of course, you’re cool with that. You’re also cool with those Western woke globalists starting WWIII to protect their puppet regime. Talk about “just wrong”.
“The Kremlin invading Ukraine twice was just wrong and is wrong.”
Amen.
That is why the nations united for Ukraine: “De Oppresso Liber.”
This meaning is “To free the oppressed,” or “Free from having been oppressed.”