Belarus: Lukashenko worked to maintain nation's relative independence. Now. totally absorbed into Russian Federation.

Sure, there was a general alliance with the Russian Federation, but Lukashenko worked very hard to thwart full assimilation back into a 'union state' and kept dragging it out. He was performing a balancing act between the EU and the RF all these years and that has now come to an end. These nations - Belarus, Poland. Ukraine, and the Baltics have historically been radically indepdendent in population type and both East and West have been fighting to control and manage them for centuries.

Belarus is now, effecively, assimiliated back to Russia.