After the October Revolution in Petrograd, the district came under jurisdiction of the Ukrainian People's Republic and existed until the early February 1918 advance of the Petrograd-Moscow Russian Red Guards forces of the Antonov's Task Force that was charged by Vladimir Lenin to "fight counter-revolution in the Southern Russia", but was in fact invading Ukraine in what would become known as the Ukrainian–Soviet War.

[4][5] Air-defence forces within the District included the 36th Fighter Aviation Division of the PVO located at Vasylkiv.

The district now included the oblasts (provinces) of Kiev, Cherkasy, Uman, Voroshilovgrad (historically and now Luhansk), Dnipropetrovsk (now Dnipro), Poltava, Stalino (now Donetsk), Sumy, Kharkiv and Chernihiv.

The 43rd Rocket Army's last commander was Colonel-General Vladimir Alekseevich Mikhtyuk, who served from 10 January 1991 to 8 May 1996,[9] when it was finally disbanded.

Also in the district in 1988 was the 72nd Central Artillery Weapons Base (Центральная артиллерийская база вооружения (средств управления)) at Krasnograd.

Then-Colonel Nikolay Antoshkin was chief of staff of the VVS KVO at the time of the Chernobyl disaster, and led helicopter operations to respond to the accident, dropping tonnes of sand and lead onto the exposed reactor core.

[12] In 1991, Colonel General Viktor S. Chechevatov was dismissed as District commander for refusing to take an oath of loyalty to Ukraine.

[13] The District was disbanded after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, by 1 November 1992,[14] and its structure utilized as the basis for the new Ukrainian Ministry of Defense and General Staff.