The Ukrainian–Soviet War was an armed conflict from 1917 to 1921 between the Ukrainian People's Republic and the Bolsheviks (Soviet Ukraine and Soviet Russia). The war was part of the Russian Civil War and ensued soon after the October Revolution when Lenin dispatched Antonov's expeditionary group to Ukraine and Southern Russia. Ultimately, Ukraine's forces would suffer devastating losses due to the spread of typhus in October 1919, paving the way for the formation of the Soviet Union in 1922.Soviet historiography viewed the Bolshevik victory as the salvation of Ukraine from the armies of Western and Central Europe (including that of Poland). Conversely, modern Ukrainian historians consider it a failed war of independence by the Ukrainian People's Republic against the Bolsheviks and former Russian Empire.