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| Ukrainian Insurgent Army soldiers. |
The
Ukrainian Insurgent Army (Ukrainian: Українська повстанська армія, УПА,
Ukrayins’ka Povstans’ka Armiya, UPA) was a Ukrainian nationalist paramilitary
and later partisan formation. During World War II, it was engaged in guerrilla
warfare against the Soviet Union, the Polish Underground State, Communist
Poland and Nazi Germany. It was established by the Organization of Ukrainian
Nationalists. The insurgent army arose out of separate militant formations of
the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists—Bandera faction (the OUN-B), other
militant national-patriotic formations, some former defectors of the Ukrainian
Auxiliary Police, mobilization of local populations and others. The political
leadership of the army belonged to the Organization of Ukrainian
Nationalists—Bandera. It was the primary perpetrator of the ethnic cleansing of
Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia.
Its
official date of creation is 14 October 1942, day of the Intercession of the
Theotokos feast. The Ukrainian People’s Revolutionary Army at the period from
December 1941 till July 1943 has the same name (Ukrainian Insurgent Army or
UPA).
The
OUN’s stated immediate goal at the time of the German invasion of the Soviet
Union was the re-establishment of a united, independent Nazi-aligned,
mono-ethnic national state on the territory that would include parts of
modern-day Russia, Poland, and Belarus. Violence was accepted as a political
tool against foreign as well as domestic enemies of their cause, which was to
be achieved by a national revolution led by a dictatorship that would drive out
what they considered to be occupying powers and set up a government
representing all regions and social groups. The organization began as a
resistance group and developed into a guerrilla army. In 1943, the UPA was
controlled by the OUN(B) and included people of various political and
ideological convictions. Furthermore, it needed the support of the broad masses
against both the Germans and the Soviets. Much of the nationalist ideology,
including the concept of dictatorship, did not appeal to former Soviet citizens
who had experienced the dictatorship of the Communist Party. Hence, a revision
of the OUN(B) ideology and political program was imperative. At its Third
Extraordinary Grand Assembly on 21–25 August 1943, the OUN(B) condemned
“internationalist and fascist national-socialist programs and political
concepts” as well as “Russian-Bolshevik communism” and proposed a “system of
free peoples and independent states [as] the single best solution to the
problem of world order.” Its social program did not differ essentially from
earlier ones, but it emphasized a wide range of social services, worker
participation in management, a mixed economy, choice of profession and
workplace, and free trade unions. The OUN(B) affirmed that it was fighting for
freedom of the press, speech, and thought. Its earlier nationality policy, encapsulated
in the slogan “Ukraine for Ukrainians”; in 1943, the most extreme elements of
it were officially abandoned, although the actual policy of the OUN(B) hadn’t
changed significantly, and the UPA undertook ethnic cleansing in 1943.
During
its existence, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army fought against the Poles and the
Soviets as their primary opponents, although the organization also fought
against the Germans starting from February 1943 – with many cases of
collaboration with the German forces in the fight against Soviet partisan
units. From late spring 1944, the UPA and Organization of Ukrainian
Nationalists-B (OUN-B)—faced with Soviet advances—also cooperated with German
forces against the Soviets and Poles in the hope of creating an independent
Ukrainian state. The OUN also played a substantial role in the ethnic cleansing
of the Polish population of Volhynia and East Galicia, and later preventing the
deportation of the Ukrainians in southeastern Poland.
After
the end of World War II, the Polish communist army—the People’s Army of
Poland—fought extensively against the UPA. The UPA remained active and fought
against the People’s Republic of Poland until 1947, and against the Soviet
Union until 1949. It was particularly strong in the Carpathian Mountains, the entirety
of Galicia and in Volhynia—in modern Western Ukraine. By the late 1940s, the
mortality rate for Soviet troops fighting Ukrainian insurgents in Western
Ukraine was higher than the mortality rate for Soviet troops during the Soviet
occupation of Afghanistan. Between February 1943 and May 1945, unlike most
resistance movements, it had no significant foreign support. Its growth and
strength were a reflection of the popularity it enjoyed among the people of
Western Ukraine. Outside of Western Ukraine, support was not significant, and
the majority of the Soviet (Eastern) Ukrainian population considered, and at
times still viewed, the OUN/UPA to have been primarily collaborators with the
Germans.
Organization
The
UPA’s command structure overlapped with that of the underground nationalist
political party, the OUN, in a sophisticated centralized network. The UPA was
responsible for military operations while the OUN was in charge of
administrative duties; each had its own chain of command. The six main departments
were military, political, security service, mobilization, supply, and the
Ukrainian Red Cross. Despite the division between the UPA and the OUN, there
was overlap between their posts and the local OUN and UPA leaders were
frequently the same person. Organizational methods were borrowed and adapted
from the German, Polish and Soviet military, while UPA units based their
training on a modified Red Army field unit manual.
The
General Staff, formed at the end of 1943 consisted of operations, intelligence,
training, logistics, personnel and political education departments. UPA’s
largest units, Kurins, consisting of 500-700 soldiers, were equivalent to
battalions in a regular army, and its smallest units, Riys (literally bee
swarm), with eight to ten soldiers, were equivalent to squads. Occasionally,
and particularly in Volyn, during some operations three or more Kurins would
unite and form a Zahin or Brigade.
UPA’s
leaders were: Vasyl Ivakhiv (Spring – 13 of May 1943), Dmytro Klyachkivsky,
Roman Shukhevych (January 1944 until 1950) and finally Vasyl Kuk.
In
November 1943, the UPA adopted a new structure, creating a Main Military
Headquarters and three areas (group) commands: UPA-West, UPA-North and
UPA-South. Three military schools for low-level command staff were also
established.
Former
policemen constituted a large proportion of the UPA leadership, and they
comprised about half of the UPA membership in 1943. In terms of UPA soldiers’
social background, 60 percent were peasants of low to moderate means, 20 to 25
percent were from the working class (primarily from the rural lumber and food
industries), and 15 percent members of the intelligentsia (students, urban
professionals). The latter group provided a large portion of the UPA’s military
trainers and officer corps. With respect to the origins of UPA’s members, 60
percent were from Galicia and 30 percent from Volhynia and Polesia.
The
number of UPA fighters varied. A German Abwehr report from November 1943
estimated that the UPA had 20,000 soldiers; other estimates at that time placed
the number at 40,000. By the summer of 1944, estimates of UPA membership varied
from 25,000 to 30,000 fighters up to 100,000 or even 200,000 soldiers.
Structure
The
Ukrainian Insurgent Army was structured into four units:
UPA-North
Regions:
Volhynia, Polissia.
Military District “Turiv”
Commander – Maj. Rudyj.
Squads: “Bohun”, “Pomsta
Polissja”, “Nalyvajko”.
Military District “Zahrava”
Commander – Ptashka (Sylvester
Zatovkanjuk).
Squads: “Konovaletsj”, “Enej”,
“Dubovyj”, “Oleh”.
Military District “
Volhynia-South”
Commander – Bereza.
Squads: “Kruk”, “H.”.
UPA-West
Regions:
Halychyna, Bukovyna, Zakarpattia, Zakerzonia.
Military District “Lysonja”
Commander – Maj. Hrim, V.
Kurins: “Holodnojarci”,
“Burlaky”, “Lisovyky”, “Rubachi”, “Bujni”, “Holky”.
Military District “Hoverlja”
Commander – Maj. Stepovyj (from
1945 – Major Hmara).
Kurins: “Bukovynsjkyj”,
“Peremoha”, “Hajdamaky”, “Huculjskyj”, “Karpatsjkyj”.
Military District “Black Forest”
Commander – Col. Rizun-Hrehit
(Mykola Andrusjak).
Kurins: “Smertonosci”,
“Pidkarpatsjkyj”, “Dzvony”, “Syvulja”, “Dovbush”, “Beskyd”, “Menyky”.
Military District “Makivka”
Commander – Maj. Kozak.
Kurins: “Ljvy”, “Bulava”,
“Zubry”, “Letuny”, “Zhuravli”, “Bojky of Chmelnytsjkyj”, “Basejn”.
Military District “Buh”
Commander – Col. Voronnyj
Kurins: “Druzhynnyky”, “Halajda”,
“Kochovyky”, “Perejaslavy”, “Tyhry”, “Perebyjnis”
Military District “Sjan”
Commander – Orest
Kurins: “Vovky”, “Menyky”, Kurin
of Ren, Kurin of Eugene.
UPA-South
Regions:
Khmelnytskyi Oblast, Zhytomyr Oblast, southern region of Kyiv Oblast, southern
regions of Ukraine, and especially in cities Odessa, Kryvyi Rih,
Dnipropetrovsk, Mariupol, Donetsk.
Military District “Cholodnyj Jar”
Commander – Kost’.
Kurins: Kurin of Sabljuk, Kurin of
Dovbush.
Military District “Umanj”
Commander – Ostap.
Kurins: Kurin of Dovbenko, Kurin
of Buvalyj, Kurin of Andrij-Shum.
Military District “Vinnytsja”
Commander – Jasen.
Kurins: Kurin of Storchan, Kurin
of Mamaj, Kurin of Burevij.
UPA-East
Regions: northern strip of
Zhytomyr Oblast, northern region of Kyiv Oblast, and Chernihiv Oblast.
Greeting
The
greeting “Glory to Ukraine! Glory to the heroes!” (Slava Ukrayini! Heroyam
slava!) appeared in the 1930s among members of the Organization of Ukrainian
Nationalists (OUN) and Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) who started using this
slogan. Since October 2018 Glory to Ukraine is an official greeting of the
Ukrainian Armed Forces and the Ukrainian National Police.
Anthem
The
anthem of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army was called the March of the Ukrainian
Nationalists, also known as We were born in a great hour (Ukrainian: Зродились
ми великої години). The song, written by Oles Babiy, was officially adopted by
the leadership of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists in 1932.
The organization was a successor
of the Ukrainian Sich Riflemen, whose anthem was “Chervona Kalyna”. Leaders of
the Ukrainian Sich Riflemen Yevhen Konovalets and Andriy Melnyk were founding
members of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists. For this reason,
“Chervona Kalyna” was frequently used by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army.
Flag
The
battle flag of the UPA was a red-and-black banner. The flag continues to be a
symbol of the Ukrainian nationalist movement. The colors of the flag symbolize
‘red Ukrainian blood spilled on the black Ukrainian earth. Use of the flag is
also a “sign of the stubborn endurance of the Ukrainian national idea even
under the grimmest conditions.”
Awards
Cross of Merit
The
Cross of Merit (Ukrainian: Хрест Заслуги) was an award of Ukrainian Insurgent
Army. It awarded for distinguished services to the state and people of the
Ukrainian army. The Order was instituted on January 27, 1944 by the Ukrainian
Supreme Liberation Council leaders, Roman Shukhevych and Dmytro Hrytsai.
The Order is awarded in five
(golden, silver and bronze) grades and had a red ribbon with a black stripe on
each edge.
Cross of Combat Merit
The
Cross of Combat Merit (Ukrainian: Хрест Заслуги) was the highest award of
Ukrainian Insurgent Army. It awarded for distinguished services to the state
and people of the Ukrainian army. The Order was instituted on January 27, 1944
by the Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council leaders, Roman Shukhevych and
Dmytro Hrytsai.
The Order is awarded in five
(golden, silver and bronze) grades and had a red ribbon with a black tripe.
Military Ranks
The
UPA made use of a dual rank-system that included functional command position
designations and traditional military ranks. The functional system was
developed due to an acute shortage of qualified and politically reliable
officers during the early stages of organization.
UPA rank structure consisted of
at least seven commissioned officer ranks, four non-commissioned officer ranks,
and two soldier ranks. The hierarchical order of known ranks and their
approximate U.S. Army equivalent is as follows:
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UPA RANKS
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US ARMY EQUIVALENTS
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Heneral-Khorunzhyj
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Brigadier General
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Polkovnyk
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Colonel
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Pidpolkovnyk
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Lieutenant Colonel
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Major
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Major
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Sotnyk
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Captain
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Poruchnyk
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First Lieutenant
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Khorunzhyj
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Second Lieutenant
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Starshyj Bulavnyj
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Master Sergeant
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Bulavnyj
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Sergeant First Class
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Starshyj Vistun
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Staff Sergeant
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Vistun
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Sergeant
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Starshyj Strilets
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Private First Class
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Strilets
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Private
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The rank scheme provided for
three more higher general officer ranks: Heneral-Poruchnyk (Major General),
Heneral-Polkovnyk (Lieutenant General), and Heneral-Pikhoty (General with Four
Stars).
Armaments
Initially, the UPA used the
weapons collected from the battlefields of 1939 and 1941. Later they bought
weapons from peasants and individual soldiers, or captured them in combat. Some
light weapons were also brought by deserting Ukrainian auxiliary policemen. For
the most part, the UPA used light infantry weapons of Soviet and, to a lesser
extent, German origin (for which ammunition was less readily obtainable). In
1944, German units armed the UPA directly with captured Soviet arms. Many
kurins were equipped with light 51 mm and 82 mm mortars. During large-scale
operations in 1943–1944, insurgent forces also used artillery (45 mm and 76.2
mm). In 1943 a light Hungarian tank was used in Volhynia.
In 1944, the Soviets captured a
Polikarpov Po-2 aircraft and one armored car and one personnel carrier from
UPA; however, it was not stated that they were in operable condition, while no
OUN/UPA documents noted the usage of such equipment. By end of World War II in
Europe the NKVD had captured 45 artillery pieces (45 and 76.2 mm calibers) and
423 mortars from the UPA. In the attacks against Polish civilians, axes and
pikes were used. However, the light infantry weapon was the basic weapon used
by the UPA.
Formation
1941
In
a memorandum from 14 August 1941, the OUN (B) proposed to the Germans, to
create a Ukrainian Army “which will join the German Army ... until the latter
will win” (preferable translation: “which will unite with the German Army ...
until [our] final victory”), in exchange for German recognition of an allied
Ukrainian independent state.
At
the beginning of October 1941, during the first OUN Conference, the OUN
formulated its future strategy. This called for transferring part of its
organizational structure underground, in order to avoid conflict with the
Germans. It also refrained from open anti-German propaganda activities.
A
captured German document of 25 November 1941 (Nuremberg Trial O14-USSR)
ordered: “It has been ascertained that the Bandera Movement is preparing a
revolt in the Reichskommissariat which has as its ultimate aim the
establishment of an independent Ukraine. All functionaries of the Bandera
Movement must be arrested at once and, after thorough interrogation, are to be
liquidated...”
1942
At
the Second Conference of the OUN(B), held in April 1942, the policies for the
“creation, build-up and development of Ukrainian political and future military
forces” and “action against partisan activity supported by Moscow” were
adopted. Although German policies were criticized, the Soviet partisans were
identified as the primary enemy of OUN (B).
The
“Military conference of OUN (B)” met in December 1942 near Lviv. The conference
resulted in the adoption of a policy for the accelerated growth for the
establishment of OUN(B)’s military forces. The conference emphasized that “all
combat capable population must support, under OUN banners, the struggle against
the Bolshevik enemy”. On 30 May 1947, the Main Ukrainian Liberation Council
(Головна Визвольна Рада) adopted the date of 14 October 1942 as the official
day for celebrating the UPA’s creation.
Germany
Despite the stated opinions of
Dmytro Klyachkivsky and Roman Shukhevych that the Germans were a secondary
threat compared to their main enemies (the communist forces of the Soviet Union
and Poland), the Third Conference of the Organization of Ukrainian
Nationalists, held near Lviv from 17 to 21 February 1943, took the decision to
begin open warfare against the Germans (OUN fighters had already attacked a
German garrison earlier that year on 7 February). Accordingly, on 20 March
1943, the OUN(B) leadership issued secret instructions ordering their members
who had joined the collaborationist Ukrainian Auxiliary Police in 1941–1942 to
desert with their weapons and join with UPA units in Volhynia. This process
often involved engaging in armed conflict with German forces as they tried to
prevent desertion. The number of trained and armed personnel who now joined the
ranks of the UPA was estimated to be between 4 and 5 thousand.
Anti-German actions were limited
to situations where the Germans attacked the Ukrainian population or UPA units.
Indeed, according to German general Ernst August Köstring, UPA fighters “fought
almost exclusively against German administrative agencies, the German police
and the SS in their quest to establish an independent Ukraine controlled by
neither Moscow nor Germany.”
During the German occupation, the
UPA conducted hundreds of raids on police stations and military convoys. In the
region of Zhytomyr insurgents were estimated by the German General-Kommissar
Leyser to be in control of 80% of the forests and 60% of the farmland.
According to the OUN/UPA, on 12
May 1943, Germans attacked the town of Kolki using several SS-Divisions (SS
units operated alongside the German Army who were responsible for intelligence,
central security, policing action, and mass extermination), where both sides
suffered heavy losses. Soviet partisans reported the reinforcement of German
auxiliary forces at Kolki for the end of April until the middle of May 1943.
In June 1943, German SS and
police forces under the command of Erich von dem Bach, the head of
Himmler-directed Bandenbekämpfung (“bandit warfare”), attempted to destroy
UPA-North in Volhynia during “Operation BB”. According to Ukrainian claims, the
initial stage of Operation “BB” (Bandenbekämpfung) against the UPA had produced
no results whatsoever. This development was the subject of several discussions
by Himmler’s staff that resulted in General von dem Bach-Zelewski being sent to
Ukraine. He failed to eliminate the UPA, which grew steadily, and the Germans,
apart from terrorizing the civilian population, were virtually limited to
defensive actions.
From July through September 1943,
as a result of an estimated 74 clashes between German forces and the UPA, the
Germans lost more than 3,000 men killed or wounded while the UPA lost 1,237
killed or wounded. According to post-war estimates, the UPA had the following
number of clashes with the Germans in mid-to-late 1943 in Volhynia: 35 in July;
24 in August; 15 in September; 47 during October–November. In the fall of 1943,
clashes between the UPA and the Germans declined, so that Erich Koch in his
November 1943 report and New Year 1944 speech could mention that “nationalistic
bands in forests do not pose any major threat” for the Germans.
In Autumn of 1943, some
detachments of the UPA attempted to find rapprochement with the Germans.
Although doing so was condemned by an OUN/UPA order from 25 November 1943,
these actions did not end. In early 1944 UPA forces in several Western regions
engaged in cooperation with the German Wehrmacht, Waffen SS, SiPo and SD.
However, in the winter and spring of 1944 it would be incorrect to say that
there was a complete cessation of armed conflict between UPA and German forces
as the UPA continued to defend Ukrainian villages against the repressive
actions of the German administration.
For example, on 20 January, 200
German soldiers on their way to the Ukrainian village of Pyrohivka were forced
to retreat after a several-hours long firefight with a group of 80 UPA soldiers
after having lost 30 killed and wounded. In March–July 1944, a senior leader of
OUN(B) in Galicia conducted negotiations with SD and SS officials resulting in
a German decision to supply the UPA with arms and ammunition. In May of that
year, the OUN issued instructions to “switch the struggle, which had been
conducted against the Germans, completely into a struggle against the Soviets.”
In a top secret memorandum,
General-Major Brigadeführer Brenner wrote in mid-1944 to SS-Obergruppenführer
General Hans-Adolf Prützmann, the highest ranking German SS officer in
Ukraine, that, “The UPA has halted all attacks on units of the German army. The
UPA systematically sends agents, mainly young women, into enemy-occupied
territory, and the results of the intelligence are communicated to Department
1c of the [German] Army Group” on the southern front. By the Autumn of 1944,
the German press was full of praise for UPA for their anti-Bolshevik successes,
referring to the UPA fighters as “Ukrainian fighters for freedom” After the
front had passed, by the end of 1944 the Germans supplied OUN/UPA by air with
arms and equipment. In the region of Ivano-Frankivsk, there even existed a
small landing strip for German transport planes. Some German personnel trained
to conduct terrorist and intelligence activities behind Soviet lines, as well
as some OUN-B leaders, were also transported through this channel.
Adopting a strategy analogous to
that of the Chetnik leader General Draža Mihailović, the UPA limited its
actions against the Germans in order to better prepare itself for and engage in
the struggle against the Communists. Because of this, although the UPA managed
to limit German activities to a certain extent, it failed to prevent the Germans
from deporting approximately 500,000 people from Western Ukrainian regions and
from economically exploiting Western Ukraine. Due to its focus on the Soviets
as the principal threat, UPA’s anti-German struggle did not contribute
significantly to the liberation of Ukrainian territories by Soviet forces.
Poland
Massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia
In
1943, the UPA adopted a policy of massacring and expelling the Polish
population. The ethnic cleansing operation against the Poles began on a large
scale in Volhynia in late February (or early Spring) of that year and lasted
until the end of 1944. 11 July 1943 was one of the deadliest days of the
massacres, with UPA units marching from village to village, killing Polish
civilians. On that day, UPA units surrounded and attacked 99 Polish villages
and settlements in three counties – Kowel, Horochów, and Włodzimierz Wołyński.
On the following day 50 additional villages were attacked. In January 1944, the
UPA campaign of ethnic cleansing spread to the neighboring province of Galicia.
Unlike in Volhynia, where Polish villages were destroyed and their inhabitants
murdered without warning, Poles in eastern Galicia were in some instances given
the choice of fleeing or being killed. Ukrainian peasants sometimes joined the
UPA in the violence, and large bands of armed marauders, unaffiliated with the
UPA, brutalized civilians. In other cases however, Ukrainian civilians took
significant steps to protect their Polish neighbors, either by hiding them
during the UPA raids or vouching that the Poles were actually Ukrainians.
The methods used by UPA to carry
out the massacres were particularly brutal and were committed indiscriminately
without any restraint. Historian Norman Davies describes the killings:
“Villages were torched. Roman Catholic priests were axed or crucified. Churches
were burned with all their parishioners. Isolated farms were attacked by gangs
carrying pitchforks and kitchen knives. Throats were cut. Pregnant women were
bayoneted. Children were cut in two. Men were ambushed in the field and led
away.” In total, the estimated numbers of Polish civilians killed by UPA in
Volhynia and Galicia is about 100,000. On 22 July 2016, the Sejm of the
Republic of Poland passed a resolution declaring the massacres committed by UPA
a genocide.
Post-War
After
Galicia had been taken over by the Red Army, many units of UPA abandoned the
anti-Polish course of action and some even began cooperating with local Polish
anti-communist resistance against the Soviets and the NKVD. Many Ukrainians,
who had nothing to do with earlier massacres against the Poles, seeking to
defend themselves against communists, joined UPA after the war on both the
Soviet and Polish sides of the border. Local agreements between the UPA and the
Polish post-AK units began to appear as early as April/May 1945 and in some
places lasted until 1947, such as in the Lublin region. One of the most notable
joint actions of UPA and the post-AK Freedom and Independence (WiN)
organization took place in May 1946, when the two partisan formations
coordinated their attack and took over of the city of Hrubieszów.
The cooperation between UPA and
the post-AK underground came about partly as a response to increasing communist
terror and the deportations of Ukrainians to the Soviet Union, and Poles into
the new socialist Poland. According to official statistics, between 1944 and
1956 around 488,000 Ukrainians and 789,000 Poles were transferred. On the
territories of present-day Poland, 8-12 thousand Ukrainians were killed and 6-8
thousand Poles, between 1943 and 1947. However, unlike in Volhynia, most of the
casualties occurred after 1944 and involved UPA soldiers and Ukrainian
civilians on one side, and members of the Polish communist security services
(UB) and border forces (WOP). Out of the 2,200 Poles who died in the fighting
between 1945 and 1948, only a few hundred were civilians, with the remainder
being functionaries or soldiers of the Communist regime in Poland.
Soviet Union
German Occupation
The
total number of local Soviet Partisans acting in Western Ukraine was never
high, due to the region enduring only two years of German rule (in some places
even less).
In 1943, the Soviet partisan
leader Sydir Kovpak was sent to the Carpathian Mountains, with help from Nikita
Khrushchev. He described his mission to the western Ukraine in his book Vid
Putivlia do Karpat (From Putivl to the Carpathian Mountains). Well-armed by
supplies delivered to secret airfields, he formed a group consisting of several
thousand men which moved deep into the Carpathians. Attacks by the German air
force and military forced Kovpak to break up his force into smaller units in
1944; these groups were attacked by UPA units on their way back. Soviet
intelligence agent Nikolai Kuznetsov was captured and executed by UPA members
after unwittingly entering their camp while wearing a Wehrmacht officer
uniform.
Fighting
As
the Red Army approached Galicia, the UPA avoided clashes with the regular units
of the Soviet military. Instead, the UPA focused its energy on NKVD units and
Soviet officials of all levels, from NKVD and military officers to the school
teachers and postal workers attempting to establish Soviet administration.
In March 1944, UPA insurgents
mortally wounded front commander Army General Nikolai Vatutin, who liberated
Kyiv when he led Soviet forces in the Second battle of Kiev. Several weeks
later an NKVD battalion was annihilated by the UPA near Rivne. This resulted in
a full-scale operation in the spring of 1944, initially involving 30,000 Soviet
troops against the UPA in Volhynia. Estimates of casualties vary depending on
the source. A letter to the state defense committee of the USSR, Lavrentiy
Beria stated that in spring 1944 clashes between Soviet forces and UPA resulted
in 2,018 killed and 1,570 captured UPA fighters and only 11 Soviet killed and
46 wounded. Soviet archives show that a captured UPA member stated that he
received reports about UPA losses of 200 fighters while the Soviet forces lost
2,000. The first significant sabotage operations against communications of the
Soviet Army before their offensive against the Germans was conducted by the UPA
in April–May 1944. Such actions were promptly stopped by the Soviet Army and
NKVD troops, after which the OUN/UPA submitted an order to temporarily cease
anti-Soviet activities and prepare for further struggle against the Soviets.
Despite heavy casualties on both
sides during the initial clashes, the struggle was inconclusive. New large
scale actions of the UPA, especially in Ternopil Oblast, were launched in
July–August 1944, when the Red Army advanced West. By the autumn of 1944, UPA
forces enjoyed virtual freedom of movement over an area of 160,000 square
kilometers in size and home to over 10 million people and had established a
shadow government.
In November 1944, Khrushchev
launched the first of several large-scale Soviet assaults on the UPA throughout
Western Ukraine, involving according to OUN/UPA estimates at least 20 NKVD
combat divisions supported by artillery and armored units. They blockaded
villages and roads and set forests on fire. Soviet archival data states that on
9 October 1944, one NKVD Division, eight NKVD brigades, and an NKVD cavalry
regiment with a total of 26,304 NKVD soldiers were stationed in Western
Ukraine. In addition, two regiments with 1,500 and 1,200 persons, one battalion
(517 persons) and three armored trains with 100 additional soldiers each, as
well as one border guard regiment and one unit were starting to relocate there
in order to reinforce them.
During late 1944 and the first
half of 1945, according to Soviet data, the UPA suffered approximately 89,000
killed, approximately 91,000 captured, and approximately 39,000 surrendered
while the Soviet forces lost approximately 12,000 killed, approximately 6,000
wounded and 2,600 MIA. In addition, during this time, according to Soviet data
UPA actions resulted in the killing of 3,919 civilians and the disappearance of
427 others. Despite the heavy losses, as late as summer 1945, many
battalion-size UPA units still continued to control and administer large areas
of territory in Western Ukraine. In February 1945 the UPA issued an order to liquidate
kurins (battalions) and sotnya’s (companies) and to act predominantly by chotys
(platoons).
Spring 1945–Late 1946
After
Germany surrendered in May 1945, the Soviet authorities turned their attention
to insurgencies taking place in Ukraine and the Baltics. Combat units were
reorganized and special forces were sent in. One of the major complications
that arose was the local support the UPA had from the population.
Areas of UPA activity were
depopulated. The estimates on numbers deported vary; officially Soviet archives
state that between 1944 and 1952 a total of 182,543 people were deported while
other sources indicate the number may have been as high as to 500,000.
Mass arrests of suspected UPA
informants or family members were conducted; between February 1944 and May 1946
over 250,000 people were arrested in Western Ukraine. Those arrested typically
experienced beatings or other violence. Those suspected of being UPA members
underwent torture; (reports exist of some prisoners being burned alive). The many
arrested women believed to be affiliating with the UPA were subjected to
torture, deprivation, and rape at the hands of Soviet security in order to
“break” them and get them to reveal UPA members’ identities and locations or to
turn them into Soviet double-agents. Mutilated corpses of captured rebels were
put on public display. Ultimately, between 1944 and 1952 alone as many as
600,000 people may have been arrested in Western Ukraine, with about one third
executed and the rest imprisoned or exiled.
The UPA responded to the Soviet
methods by unleashing their own terror against Soviet activists, suspected
collaborators and their families. This work was particularly attributed to the
Sluzhba Bezbeky (SB), the anti-espionage wing of the UPA. In a typical incident
in Lviv region, in front of horrified villagers, UPA troops gouged out the eyes
of two entire families suspected of reporting on insurgent movements to Soviet
authorities, before hacking their bodies to pieces. Due to public outrage
concerning these violent punitive acts, the UPA stopped the practice of killing
the families of collaborators by mid-1945. Other victims of the UPA included
Soviet activists sent to Galicia from other parts of the Soviet Union; heads of
village Soviets, those sheltering or feeding Red Army personnel, and even
people turning food in to collective farms. The effect of such terrorist acts
was such that people refused to take posts as village heads, and until the late
1940s villages chose single men with no dependents as their leaders.
The UPA also proved to be
especially adept at assassinating key Soviet administrative officials.
According to NKVD data, between February 1944 and December 1946 11,725 Soviet
officers, agents and collaborators were assassinated and 2,401 were “missing”,
presumed kidnapped, in Western Ukraine. In one county in Lviv region alone,
from August 1944 until January 1945 Ukrainian rebels killed 10 members of the
Soviet active and a secretary of the county Communist party, and also kidnapped
four other officials. The UPA travelled at will throughout the area. In this
county, there were no courts, no prosecutor’s office, and the local NKVD only
had three staff members.
According to a 1946 report by
Khrushchenv’s deputy for West Ukrainian affairs A.A. Stoiantsev, out of 42,175
operations and ambushes against the UPA by Destruction battalions in Western
Ukraine, only 10 percent had positive results – in the vast majority there was
either no contact or the individual unit was disarmed and pro-Soviet leaders
murdered or kidnapped. Morale amongst the NKVD in Western Ukraine was
particularly low. Even within the dangerous context of Soviet state service in
the late-Stalin era, West Ukraine was considered to be a “hardship post”, and
personnel files reveal higher rates of transfer requests, alcoholism, nervous
breakdowns, and refusal to serve among NKVD field agents there at that time.
The first success of the Soviet
authorities came in early 1946 in the Carpathians, which were blockaded from 11
January until 10 April. The UPA operating there ceased to exist as a combat
unit. The continuous heavy casualties elsewhere forced the UPA to split into
small units consisting of 100 soldiers. Many of the troops demobilized and
returned home, when the Soviet Union offered three amnesties during 1947–1948.
By 1946, the UPA was reduced to a
core group of 5-10 thousand fighters, and large-scale UPA activity shifted to
the Soviet-Polish border. Here, in 1947, they killed the Polish Communist
deputy defence minister General Karol Świerczewski. In spring 1946, the OUN/UPA
established contacts with the Intelligence services of France, Great Britain
and the USA.
End of UPA Resistance
The
turning point in the struggle against the UPA came in 1947, when the Soviets
established an intelligence gathering network within the UPA and shifted the
focus of their actions from mass terror to infiltration and espionage. After
1947 the UPA’s activity began to subside. On May 30, 1947, Shukhevych issued
instructions joining the OUN and UPA in underground warfare. In 1947–1948 UPA
resistance was weakened enough to allow the Soviets to begin implementation of
large-scale collectivization throughout Western Ukraine.
In 1948, the Soviet central
authorities purged local officials who had mistreated peasants and engaged in
“vicious methods”. At the same time, Soviet agents planted within the UPA had
taken their toll on morale and on the UPA’s effectiveness. According to the
writing of one slain Ukrainian rebel, “the Bolsheviks tried to take us from
within...you can never know exactly in whose hands you will find yourself. From
such a network of spies, the work of whole teams is often penetrated...”. In
November 1948, the work of Soviet agents led to two important victories against
the UPA: the defeat and deaths of the heads of the most active UPA network in
Western Ukraine, and the removal of “Myron”, the head of the UPA’s
counter-intelligence SB unit.
The Soviet authorities tried to
win over the local population by making significant economic investment in
Western Ukraine, and by setting up rapid reaction groups in many regions to
combat the UPA. According to one retired MVD major, “By 1948 ideologically we
had the support of most of the population.”
The UPA’s leader, Roman
Shukhevych, was killed during an ambush near Lviv on 5 March 1950. Although
sporadic UPA activity continued until the mid-1950s, after Shukhevich’s death
the UPA rapidly lost its fighting capability. An assessment of UPA manpower by
Soviet authorities on 17 April 1952 claimed that UPA/OUN had only 84 fighting
units consisting of 252 persons. The UPA’s last commander, Vasyl Kuk, was
captured on 24 May 1954. Despite the existence of some insurgent groups, according
to a report by the MGB of the Ukrainian SSR, the “liquidation of armed units
and OUN underground was accomplished by the beginning of 1956”.
NKVD units dressed as UPA
fighters are known to have committed atrocities against the civilian population
in order to discredit the UPA. Among these NKVD units were those composed of
former UPA fighters working for the NKVD. The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU)
recently published information that about 150 such special groups consisting of
1,800 people operated until 1954.
Prominent people killed by UPA
insurgents during the anti-Soviet struggle included Metropolitan Oleksiy
(Hromadsky) of the Ukrainian Autonomous Orthodox Church, killed while
travelling in a German convoy, and pro-Soviet writer Yaroslav Halan.
In 1951 CIA covert operations
chief Frank Wisner estimated that some 35,000 Soviet police troops and
Communist party cadres had been eliminated by guerrillas affiliated with the
Ukrainian Insurgent Army in the period after the end of World War II. Official
Soviet figures for the losses inflicted by all types of Ukrainian nationalists
during the period 1944–1953 referred to 30,676 persons; amongst them were 687
NKGB-MGB personnel, 1,864 NKVD-MVD personnel, 3,199 Soviet Army, Border Guards,
and NKVD-MVD troops, 241 communist party leaders, 205 komsomol leaders and
2,590 members of self-defense units. According to Soviet data the remaining
losses were among civilians, including 15,355 peasants and kolkhozniks. Soviet
archives state that between February 1944 and January 1946 the Soviet forces
conducted 39,778 operations against the UPA, during which they killed a total
of 103,313, captured a total of 8,370 OUN members and captured a total of
15,959 active insurgents.
Many UPA members were imprisoned
in the Gulag, they actively participated in Gulag uprisings (Kengir uprising,
Norilsk uprising, Vorkuta uprising).
Soviet Infiltration
In
1944–1945 the NKVD carried out 26,693 operations against the Ukrainian
underground. These resulted in the deaths of 22,474 Ukrainian soldiers and the
capture of 62,142 prisoners. During this time the NKVD formed special groups
known as spetshrupy made up of former Soviet partisans. The goal of these
groups was to discredit and disorganize the OUN and UPA. In August 1944, Sydir
Kovpak was placed under NKVD authority. Posing as Ukrainian insurgents, these
special formations used violence against the civilian population of Western
Ukraine. In June 1945 there were 156 such special groups with 1783 members.
From December 1945 to 1946, 15,562
operations were carried out in which 4,200 were killed and more than 9,400 were
arrested. From 1944 to 1953, the Soviets killed 153,000 and arrested 134,000
members of the UPA. 66,000 families (204,000 people) were forcibly deported to
Siberia, and half a million people were subject to repressions. In the same
period Polish communist authorities deported 450,000 people.
Soviet infiltration of British
intelligence also meant that MI6 assisted in training some of the guerrillas in
parachuting, and unmarked planes used to drop them into Ukraine from bases in
Cyprus and Malta, was counter-acted by the fact that one MI6 agent with
knowledge of the operation was the traitor Kim Philby. Working with Anthony
Blunt, he alerted Soviet security forces about planned drops. Ukrainian
guerrillas were intercepted and most were executed.
Holocaust
The OUN pursued a policy of
infiltrating the German police to obtain weapons and training for fighters. In
that role, it helped the Germans to carry out the Holocaust. Although most Jews
were actually killed by Germans, the OUN police, working for the Germans,
played a crucial supporting role in the liquidation of 200,000 Jews in Volhynia
in the second half of 1942 although in isolated cases Ukrainian policemen also
helped Jews to escape. Most of the police deserted in the following spring and
joined UPA.
Numerous accounts ascribe to the
UPA a role in the killing of Ukrainian Jews under the German occupation.
According to Ray Brandon, co-editor of The Shoah in Ukraine, “Jews in hiding in
Volhynia saw the UPA as a threat.”
While anti-Semitism did not play
a significant role in Ukrainian politics, with the first anti-Semitic ideology
and acts traced back to the Russian Civil War, by 1940-41 the publications of
Ukrainian terrorist organizations became explicitly anti-Semitic. German
documents of the period give the impression that Ukrainian ultranationalists
were indifferent to the plight of the Jews and would either kill them or help
them, whichever was more appropriate for their political goals. According to
John Paul Himka, OUN militias were responsible for a wave of pogroms in Lviv
and western Ukraine in 1941 that claimed thousands of Jewish lives. The OUN had
repudiated pogroms but changed its stand when the Germans, with whom the OUN
sought an alliance, demanded participation in them. According to Unian.net,
recently declassified documents have shown that the OUN (Organization of
Ukrainian Nationalists) was most likely not strongly involved in anti-Jewish
activities in 1941.
Jews played an important role in
the Soviet partisan movement in Volhynia and participated in its actions.
According to Timothy D. Snyder, the Soviet partisans were known for their
brutality by retaliating against entire villages suspected of working with the Germans,
killing individuals deemed to be collaborators, and provoking the Germans to
attack villages. UPA would later attempt to match that brutality. By early
1943, the OUN had entered into open armed conflict with Nazi Germany. According
to Ukrainian historian and former UPA soldier Lew Shankowsky, immediately upon
assuming the position of commander of the UPA in August 1943, Roman Shukhevych
issued an order banning participation in anti-Jewish activities. No written
record of this order, however, has been found. In 1944, the OUN formally
“rejected racial and ethnic exclusivity”. Nevertheless, Jews hiding from the
Germans with Poles in Polish villages were often killed by UPA along with their
Polish saviors, although in at least one case, they were spared as the Poles
were murdered.
Despite the earlier anti-Jewish
statements by the OUN, and its involvement in the killing of some Jews, there
were cases of Jewish participation within the ranks of the UPA, some of whom
held high positions. According to journalist and former fighter Leo Heiman,
some Jews fought for the UPA, and others included medical personal. These
included Dr. Margosh, who headed UPA-West’s medical service, Dr. Marksymovich,
who was the Chief Physician of the UPA’s officer school, and Dr. Abraham Kum,
the director of an underground hospital in the Carpathians. The latter
individual was the recipient of the UPA’s Golden Cross of Merit. Some Jews who
fled the ghettos for the forests were killed by members of the UPA.
According to Phillip Friedman,
many Jews, particularly those whose skills were useful to UPA, were sheltered
by them. It has been claimed that the UPA sometimes executed its Jewish
personnel, but Friedman evaluated such claims as either uncorroborated or
mistaken. However, it has been said by the historian Daniel Romanovsky that in
late 1943, the commander of the UPA, Shukhevych, announced a verbal order to
destroy the Poles, Jews and Gypsies with the exception to medical personnel,
and later fighters executed personnel at the approach of the Soviet Army.
According to Herbert Romerstein,
Soviet propaganda complained about Zionist membership in the UPA, and during
the persecution of Jews in the early 1950s, they described the alleged
connection between Jewish and Ukrainian nationalists.
One well-known claimed example of
Jewish participation in the UPA was most likely a hoax, according to sources
such as Friedman. According to the report, Stella Krenzbach, the daughter of a
rabbi and a Zionist, joined the UPA as a nurse and intelligence agent. She is
alleged to have written, “I attribute the fact that I am alive today and
devoting all the strength of my thirty-eight years to a free Israel only to God
and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army. I became a member of the heroic UPA on 7
November 1943. In our group I counted twelve Jews, eight of whom were doctors”.
Later, Friedman concluded that Krenzbach was a fictional character, as the only
evidence for her existence was in an OUN paper. No one knew of such an employee
at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where she supposedly worked after the war.
A Jew, Leiba Dubrovskii, pretended to be Ukrainian.
Reconciliation
During
the following years the UPA was officially taboo in the Soviet Union, mentioned
only as a terrorist organization. Since Ukraine’s independence in 1991, there
have been heated debates about the possible award of official recognition to
former UPA members as legitimate combatants, with the accompanying pensions and
benefits due to war veterans. UPA veterans have also striven to hold parades
and commemorations of their own, especially in Western Ukraine. This, in turn,
led to opposition from Soviet Army veterans and some Ukrainian politicians,
particularly from the south and east of the country.
Recently, attempts to reconcile
former Armia Krajowa and UPA soldiers have been made by both the Ukrainian and
Polish sides. Individual former UPA members have expressed their readiness for
mutual apology. Some of the past soldiers of both organizations have met and
asked for forgiveness for the past misdeeds. Restorations of graves and
cemeteries in Poland where fallen UPA soldiers were buried have been agreed to
by the Polish side.
2019 Official Veteran Status
Late
March 2019 former members of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (and other living
former members of Ukrainian irregular nationalist armed groups that were active
during World War II and the first decade after the war) were officially granted
the status of veterans. This meant that for the first time they could receive
veteran benefits, including free public transport, subsidized medical services,
annual monetary aid, and public utilities discounts (and will enjoy the same
social benefits as former Ukrainian soldiers who served in the Red Army of the
Soviet Union).
There had been several previous attempts
to provide former Ukrainian nationalist fighters with official veteran status,
especially during the 2005–2009 administration of President Viktor Yushenko,
but all failed.
Prior to December 2018 legally
only former UPA members who “participated in hostilities against Nazi invaders
in occupied Ukraine in 1941-1944, who did not commit crimes against humanity
and were rehabilitated” were recognized as war veterans.
Monuments for Combatants
Without waiting for official notice
from Kyiv, many regional authorities have already decided to approach the UPA’s
history on their own. In many western cities and villages monuments, memorials
and plaques to the leaders and troops of the UPA have been erected, including a
monument to Stepan Bandera himself which opened in October 2007. In eastern
Ukraine’s city of Kharkiv, a memorial to the soldiers of the UPA was erected in
1992. In late 2006, the Lviv city administration announced the future
transference of the tombs of Stepan Bandera, Yevhen Konovalets, Andriy Melnyk
and other key leaders of the OUN/UPA to a new area of Lychakiv Cemetery
specifically dedicated to Ukrainian nationalists.
In
response, many southern and eastern provinces, although the UPA had not
operated in those regions, have responded by opening memorials of their own
dedicated the UPA’s victims. The first one, “The Shot in the Back”, was
unveiled by the Communist Party of Ukraine in Simferopol, Crimea in September
2007. In 2008, one was erected in Svatove, Luhansk oblast, and another in
Luhansk on 8 May 2010 by the city deputy, Arsen Klinchaev, and the Party of
Regions. The unveiling ceremony was attended by Vice Prime Minister Viktor
Tykhonov, the leader of the parliamentary faction of the Pro-Russian Party of
Regions Oleksandr Yefremov, Russian State Duma deputy Konstantin Zatulin,
Luhansk Regional Governor Valerii Holenko, and Luhansk Mayor Serhii Kravchenko.
Monuments Commemorating Polish
Victims
Polish survivors from Wołyn and
Galicia who lived through the massacres, constructed monuments and memorial
tables in the places where they settled after the war, such as Warsaw, Wrocław,
Sanok and Kłodzko.
Commemoration in Ukraine
According to John Armstrong, “If
one takes into account the duration, geographical extent, and intensity of
activity, the UPA very probably is the most important example of forceful
resistance to an established Communist regime prior to the decade of fierce
Afghan resistance beginning in 1979... the Hungarian revolution of 1956 was, of
course, far more important, involving to some degree a population of nine
million... however it lasted only a few weeks. In contrast, the more-or-less
effective anti-Communist activity of the Ukrainian resistance forces lasted
from mid-1944 until 1950”.
On 10 January 2008, Ukrainian
President Viktor Yushchenko submitted a draft law “on the official Status of
Fighters for Ukraine’s Independence from the 1920s to the 1990s”. Under the
draft, persons who took part in political, guerrilla, underground and combat
activities for the freedom and independence of Ukraine from 1920 to 1990 as
part of or assisting the following:
Ukrainian
Military Organization (UVO)
Karpatska
Sich
OUN
UPA
Ukrainian
Main Liberation Army
They will be recognized as war
veterans.
In 2007, the Security Service of
Ukraine (SBU) set up a special working group to study archive documents of the
activity of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) and the Ukrainian
Insurgent Army (UPA) to make public original sources.
Since 2006, the SBU has been actively
involved in declassifying documents relating to the operations of Soviet
security services and the history of liberation movement in Ukraine. The SBU
Information Centre provides an opportunity for scholars to get acquainted with
electronic copies of archive documents. The documents are arranged by topics
(1932–1933 Holodomor, OUN/UPA Activities, Repression in Ukraine, Movement of
Dissident).
Since September 2009, Ukrainian
schoolchildren take a more extensive course of the history of the Holodomor and
the fighters of the OUN and the UPA fighters.
Yushchenko took part in the
celebration of the 67th anniversary of the UPA and the 65th anniversary of
Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council on 14 October 2009.
To commemorate National Unity Day
on 22 January 2010, Yushchenko awarded Bandera the Hero of Ukraine honor
posthumously. A district administrative court in Donetsk cancelled the
presidential decree granting the honor to Bandera on 2 April 2010. The lawyer
Vladimir Olentsevych argued in a lawsuit that the honor is the highest state
award that is granted exclusively to citizens of Ukraine. Bandera was not a
Ukrainian citizen, as he was killed in exile in 1959 before the 1991
Declaration of Independence of Ukraine.
On 16 January 2012, the Higher
Administrative Court of Ukraine upheld the presidential decree of 28 January
2010 “About recognition of OUN members and soldiers of the Ukrainian Insurgent
Army as participants in struggle for independence of Ukraine” after it was
challenged by the leader of the Progressive Socialist Party of Ukraine,
Nataliya Vitrenko, recognizing the UPA as war combatants.
On 15 May 2015, Ukrainian
President Petro Poroshenko signed a bill into law that provides “public
recognition to anyone who fought for Ukrainian independence in the 20th
century”, including Ukrainian Insurgent Army combatants.
In Kyiv, Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk
and Zhytomyr, the UPA flag may be displayed on government buildings “on certain
holidays”.
In December 2018, Poroshenko
confirmed the status of veterans and combatants for independence of Ukraine for
UPA fighters.
In late 2018, the Lviv Oblast
Council decided to declare the year of 2019 to be the year of Bandera.
Popular Culture
The Ukrainian black metal band
Drudkh recorded a song entitled Ukrainian Insurgent Army on its 2006 release,
Кров у Наших Криницях (Blood in our wells), dedicated to Stepan Bandera.
Ukrainian Neo-Nazi black metal band Nokturnal Mortum have a song titled “Hailed
Be the Heroes” (Слава героям) on the Weltanschauung/Мировоззрение album which
contains lyrics pertaining to World War II and Western Ukraine (Galicia), and
its title, Slava Heroyam, is a traditional UPA salute.
Two Czech films by František
Vláčil, Shadows of the Hot Summer (Stíny horkého léta, 1977) and The Little
Shepherd Boy from the Valley (Pasáček z doliny, 1983) are set in 1947, and
feature UPA guerrillas in significant supporting roles. The first film
resembles Sam Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs (1971), in that it is about a farmer whose
family is taken hostage by five UPA guerrillas, and he has to resort to his own
ingenuity, plus reserves of violence that he never knew he possessed, to defeat
them. In the second, the shepherd boy (actually a cowherd) imagines that a
group of UPA guerrillas is made up of fairytale characters of his grandfather’s
stories, and that their leader is the Goblin King.
Also films such as Neskorenyi
(“The Undefeated”), Zalizna Sotnia (“The Company of Heroes”) and Atentat
(“Assassination. An Autumn Murder in Munich”) feature more description about
the role of UPA on their terrain. The Undefeated is about the life of Roman
Shuhevych and the hunt for him by both German and Soviet forces, The Company of
Heroes shows how UPA soldiers had everyday life as they fight against Armia
Krajowa, Assassination is about the life of Stepan Bandera and how KGB agents
murdered him.
Films
1951
– Akce B (Czechoslovakia)
1961
– Ogniomistrz Kaleń (Polish People’s Republic)
1962
– Zerwany most (Polish People’s Republic)
1968
– Annychka (USSR)
1970
– The White Bird Marked with Black (USSR)
1976
– The Troubled Month of Veresen (USSR)
1977
– Shadows of the Hot Summer (Czechoslovakia)
1983
– The Little Shepherd Boy from the Valley (Czechoslovakia)
1991
– The Last Bunker (Ukraine)
1991
– Carpathian Gold (Ukraine)
1992
– Cherry Nights (Ukraine)
1993
– Memories about UPA (Ukraine)
1994
– Goodbye, Girl (Ukraine)
1995
– Assassination. An Autumn Murder in Munich (Ukraine)
1995
– Executed Dawns (Ukraine)
2000
– The Undefeated (Ukraine)
2004
– One – the soldier in the field (Ukraine)
2004
– The Company of Heroes (Ukraine)
2004
– Between Hitler and Stalin (Canada)
2006
– Sobor on the Blood (Ukraine)
2006
– OUN – UPA war on two fronts (Ukraine)
2006
– Freedom or death! (Ukraine)
2007
– UPA. Third Force (Ukraine)
2010
– We are from the Future 2 (Russia)
2010
– Banderovci (Czech Republic)
2012
– Security Service of OUN. “Closed Doors” (Ukraine)
2016
– Wołyń (Poland)
Fiction
Fire
Poles (Вогненні стовпи) by Roman Ivanchuk, 2006.
Songs
The most obvious characteristic
of the insurgent songs genre is the theme of rising up against occupying
powers, enslavement and tyranny. Insurgent songs express an open call to battle
and to revenge against the enemies of Ukraine, as well as love for the motherland
and devotion to her revolutionary leaders (Bandera, Chuprynka and others). UPA
actions, heroic deeds of individual soldiers, the hard underground life,
longing for one’s girl, family or boy are also important subject of this genre.
Taras
Zhytynsky “To sons of UPA”
Tartak
“Not saying to anybody”
Folk
song “To the source of Dniester”
Drudkh
– “Ukrainian Insurgent Army”
References
English
Subtelny,
Orest (1988). Ukraine: A History. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Davies,
Norman (2005). God’s playground: a history of Poland: in two volumes, Vol. 2,
Chapter 19. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press.
Jeffrey
Burds (1997). “Agentura: Soviet Informants’ Networks & the Ukrainian
Underground in Galicia, 1944-48”, East European Politics and Societies v.11
Volodymyr
Viatrovych, Roman Hrytskiv, Ihor Derevianyj, Ruslan Zabilyj, Andrij Sova, Petro
Sodol’. The Ukrainian Insurgent Army: A History of Ukraine’s Unvanquished
Freedom Fighters (exhibition brochure). Lviv 2009.
Ukrainian
Антонюк
Ярослав Діяльність СБ ОУН на Волині. –Луцьк : “Волинська книга”, 2007. – 176 с.
Антонюк
Ярослав Діяльність СБ ОУН(б) на Волині та Західному Поліссі (1946–1951 рр.) :
Монографія. – Луцьк:”Надстир’я-Ключі”, 2013. – 228 с.
УПА
розпочинає активні протинімецькі дії (UIA Start the Active anti-German actions)
(За матеріалами звіту робочої групи істориків Інституту історії НАН України під
керівництвом проф. Станіслава Кульчицького)
Володимир
В’ятрович, Ігор Дерев’яний, Руслан Забілий, Петро Солодь. Українська
Повстанська Армія. Історія Нескорених. Третє видання. Львів (2011).
Петро
Мірчук. Українська Повстанська Армія 1942–1952. Львів 1991.
Юрій
Киричук. Історія УПА. Тернопіль 1991.
С.Ф.
Хмель. Українська партизанка. Львів 1993.
Іван
Йовик. Нескорена армія. Київ 1995.
Анатоль
Бедрій. ОУН і УПА. New York – London – Munich – Toronto. 1983.
Litopys
Online. The website of the chronicles of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army. Various
works.
В´ятрович
В. М. Друга польсько-українська війна. 1942–1947. - Вид. 2-е, доп. - К.: Вид.
дім “Києво-Могилянська академія”, 2012. - 368 с.
Polish
Wołodymyr
Wiatrowycz, Druga wojna polsko-ukraińska 1942–1947, Warszawa 2013
Za
to że jesteś Ukraińcem ... : wspomnienia z lat 1944–1947 / wybór, oprac., wstęp
i posłowie Bogdan Huk. Koszalin [etc.] : Stowarzyszenie Ukraińców Więźniów
Politycznych i Represjonowanych w Polsce, 2012. 400 s. : il. ; 23 cm.
Sowa,
Andrzej (1998). Stosunki polsko-ukraińskie 1939–1947. Kraków.
Motyka,
Grzegorz (2006). Ukraińska partyzantka 1942–1960. Warszawa: ISP PAN / RYTM.
Motyka,
Grzegorz; Wnuk, Rafał (1997). Pany i rezuny: współpraca AK-WiN i UPA 1945–1947
(in Polish). Warszawa: Oficyna Wydawnicza Volumen.
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| Cross of Merit. |
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| Cross of Combat Merit. |
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| Military Ranks. |
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| Military Ranks. |
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| The black and red flag of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) and OUN-B. |
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| UPA insurgents with captured German soldiers. |
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| UPA insurgents from Turka area, Lviv region, 1944. |
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| UPA insurgents from the Rivne region. |
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| UPA insurgents from the Stanyslaviv region. |
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| UPA insurgents from the Hutsulshchyna tactical sector. |
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| UPA insurgents from the Kosiv region. |
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| UPA propaganda poster. OUN/UPAs formal greeting is written in Ukrainian on two of the horizontal lines Glory to Ukraine - Glory to (her) Heroes. The soldier is standing on the banners of the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. |
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| 2nd company of the 115th Ukrainian Schutzmannschaft Battalion at the consecration ceremony of the Ukrainian national yellow-blue flag. Dereczyn, Belorussia. October 31, 1943. |
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| Polish civilian victims of March 26, 1943 massacre committed by Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) assisted by ordinary Ukrainian peasantry (so called “chern”, pol. czerń) in the village of Lipniki (Kostopol County), Reichskommissariat Ukraine. |
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| Christmas card made and distributed by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, 1945. |
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| Roman Shukhevych, Dmytro Hrytsai and Catherine Miéchko-Lagouch (uk) in Buchach in November 1943, shortly before the penultimate phase of massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia in Rivne, Lutsk, Volodymyr and Kovel. |
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| Shukhevych, October 1943. |
