Ukraine is Russian. Even more so than Muscovy aka Russia. Not that they should be part of Muscovy/Russia like Austria and Germany there's centuries old political reasons they aren't together.
They only aren't Russian until it's time to do a stunt like cancelling Moscows charter, a city THEY founded. Then they're the OG Russians. Having a seperate identity because they were seperate for centuries and centuries doesn't mean they aren't Russian.
These areas being taken are largely pro Russian. That will change if they go much further West but if Ukraine was going to leave Russia's orbits and give the finger to Russia's attempts to make the country geopoltiically neutral why would Ukraine just let the whole country leave their orbit when the whole country didn't make that decision? Both the US and Russia have installed puppets but the reality is it was a near 50-50 split along strictly regional lines who won by 4-5 percent when adding up everything is largely irelevant to the dynamic.
Here's the 04 and 09 election results. Basically the Donbass and Lyviv areas(the far west of Ukraine which is the furthest removed from Russia historically and culturally) were 90-10 for the Russia and West backed candidates with most other regions only being slightly less polarized in the 70-90 percent range some 60 percents but not a lot less than that. Only the very center of the country was in the 50-60 range.
To put this in context the US is often cited as polarized(both parties are right wing but most left leaning people are trapped voting Dem) in 2020 there wasn't ONE state that gave 70 percent to one party and only a minority where one party got 70%. And there usually is either 1 or 2 small states tops. In 1984 when Reagan won 49 states he got 70 in 4 and 2 barely. "Blue or Red" state means a consistantly safe 50%. This is a different animal altogether.
Most of the territory Russia has taken or is threatening to take was in the 70-90 percent range. Does a mandate for a Russian puppet include supporting a Russian invasion? No, especially outside the Donbass where the war hasn't been ongoing since 2014. But there were extreme regional differences here.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Ukrainian_presidential_election#/media/File:Вибори_2004.png
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Ukrainian_presidential_election#/media/File:Другий_тур_2010_по_округах-en.png
