>The 'much weaker neighbour' in question and other satellites did most of the work

Aside from Ukraine and Belarus these "other satellites" had nothing resembling modern civilization at the beginning of the USSR times.

>Korolev was Ukrainian...

... who finished Bauman's University in Moscow. What does his ethnicity has to do with this? And why him and not Tsiolkovsky?

>they launched from Kazakhstan

And who designed and build Baikonur? Locals?

>most famous USSR planes, i.e. Antonov

"most famous" how? As far as Antonov goes it's mostly famous for An225 and An124.

An225 was a joint affort by at least 8 different entities. Only two of which where in Ukraine.

An124 had a similar story.

Should I even begin to state the obvious and say that not Antonov was not only manned by ukrainians?