But it was insufficient: the spread of national consciousness, foreign recognition and even the Brest-Litovsk treaty were not enough to build the Ukrainian state. The Central Rada’s proposed reforms – especially its plans to take land from estate owners without compensation – brought about confusion and chaos in the countryside. The public parades, the flags and the freedom that Hrushevsky and his followers greeted with so much optimism in the spring of 1917 did not lead to the creation of a functioning bureaucracy, a public administration to enforce its reforms or an army effective enough to
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