- Introduce a feature gate `DisableCloudProviders` allowing to disable cloud-provider initialization in KAPI, KCM and kubelet.

- Bug fix for AWS NLB service when nodePort for existing servicePort changed manually. ([#89562](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/89562), [@M00nF1sh](https://github.com/M00nF1sh)) [SIG Cloud Provider]
- CSINode initialization does not crash kubelet on startup when APIServer is not reachable or kubelet has not the right credentials yet. ([#89589](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/89589), [@jsafrane](https://github.com/jsafrane)) [SIG Storage]

   ([#122704](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/122704), [@carlory](https://github.com/carlory))

- Renamed `apiserver_watch_cache_watch_cache_initializations_total` to `apiserver_watch_cache_initializations_total` ([#109579](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/109579), [@logicalhan](https://github.com/logicalhan))

* Fixed a bug in the API server watch cache, which could cause a missing watch event immediately after cache initialization. ([#49992](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/49992), [@liggitt](https://github.com/liggitt))



# v1.6.8

      `pods.beta.kubernetes.io/init-container-statuses` to
      `pods.beta.kubernetes.io/init-container-statuses`.
    * Any code that inspects this annotation should be changed to use the new key.
      State of Initialization will continue to be reported in both pods.alpha.kubernetes.io/initialized
      and in `podStatus.conditions.{status: "True", type: Initialized}`

### Other notable changes

* federation: fix dns provider initialization issues ([#27252](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/27252), [@mfanjie](https://github.com/mfanjie))

* Prevent kubelet from getting wedged if initialization of modules returns an error. ([#59020](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/59020), [@brendandburns](https://github.com/brendandburns))