Upa in World War II. Ukrainian Insurgent Army. Masters of "economic shares"
And the Ukrainian Institute of National Remembrance continues a series of special projects dedicated to Ukrainians who passed through Nazi concentration camps. The publications are based on the materials of the exhibition "The Triumph of Man", which in May --- August In 2018, she worked near the Main Post Office in Kyiv. The researchers of the Center for the Study of the Liberation Movement, in collaboration with partners, have collected unique materials about people who have gone through the most difficult trials, but have not lost their human dignity. Previous publications have presented about female prisoners, about priests Ukrainian nationalists And prisoners of war, O persecution of Jews. In this part of the cycle - a story about the fate of children who ended up in concentration camps.
Edition and history of concentration camps, information about camp life and order, story about female prisoners, about priests who were behind barbed wire, as well as what tests fell to the lot Ukrainian nationalists And prisoners of war. In this part of the cycle - a story about the persecution of the Jews.
Edition and Center for Liberation Movement Studies continue a series of special projects dedicated to Ukrainians who passed through Nazi concentration camps. The publications are based on the materials of the exhibition "The Triumph of Man", which opened on May 8, 2018, on the Day of Remembrance and Reconciliation, near the Main Post Office in Kiev and worked until August 23. The researchers of the Center for the Study of the Liberation Movement, in collaboration with partners, have collected unique materials about people who have gone through the most difficult trials, but have not lost their human dignity. Previous publications have presented history of concentration camps, information about camp life and order, story about female prisoners, about priests who were behind barbed wire, as well as what tests fell to the lot Ukrainian nationalists who ended up in concentration camps. In this part of the cycle - stories about the fate of prisoners of war.
Who are they? Heroes or traitors? They operated from the spring of 1943 in the territories: Volyn - the end of March 1943, Galicia - the end of 1943, Kholmshchyna - autumn 1943, Northern Bukovina - summer 1944, which in the period between the two world wars were parts of Poland, Czechoslovakia and Romania. In 1939-1945. most of these territories became part of the USSR. In 1941-44, the vast majority of the population of Ukraine, except for the western region, considered Ukrainian nationalists to be allies of the Nazis, which limited the region of operations of the OUN and UPA.
Despite the formation in February and the adoption in August 1943 of the strategy of "struggle on two fronts", the main "enemy" of the OUN and the UPA was the Soviet Union, and the fight against the Germans had to take place in the form of "self-defense of the people." M. Stepnyak's proposals to start mass actions against the Germans were rejected by the III Conference of the OUN in February 1943 and the Great Assembly of the OUN in August 1943. Nevertheless, by the second half of 1943, the armed groups of the OUN (b) and the UPA took control of most of the uncontrolled or weakly controlled by the German administration of the rural areas of the General Okrug Volyn - Podolia. The German administration continued to control the main supply routes for large settlements.
Propaganda publications of the OUN and the UPA “Idea and Chin”, “To zbroi”, “Visti z UPA Front”, etc., contain descriptions of numerous “UPA battles with German invaders”, starting from March 1943. In them, the enemy suffers numerous losses and, extremely rarely, retreats; the loss of the rebels in these "battles" is 1 to 16-50 "destroyed Germans." It is noteworthy that among the “battles with the Germans” there is a record of the operation in Ivanova Dolina (the Polish village of Yanova Dolina, defeated by the UPA at the end of April. Descriptions of “battles” similar in “effectiveness” and the number of “German losses” are published in the publications of the OUN and UPA up to until the summer of 1944.
Yanova Valley
Consequences…
And to many other Yans ...
According to the publication of Yuri Tys-Krokhmalyuk (one of the coordinators of the creation and later an officer of the SS division "Galicia") "Armed struggle UPA in Ukraine”, published in 1972 in New York by the Association of Veterans of the UPA (which is still considered one of the most significant sources of information about the UPA among a number of Western historians, and above all historians of the Ukrainian diaspora in Canada), in early May 1943 the UPA leads victorious battles with several SS divisions for a little-known Ukrainian town, after which he defeats the troops under the command of SS generals Platle and later Hinzler.
Further, according to the same Krokhmalyuk, Himmler personally, seeing such a catastrophic situation in the fight against the UPA and having held several meetings, sends to Ukraine "the chief partisan" in the Reich - Erich Bach-Zalewski, who also suffers defeat in the fight against the UPA, after which they recall him and impose a penalty on him. The most detailed work of Yuri Tys-Krokhmalyuk describes the battle of 3 UPA battalions with three SS divisions (according to his information, there were 30,000 people in only two divisions) at the beginning of July 1944, the latter suffer heavy losses and retreat without having achieved their goal; the loss of the rebels - a dozen people - and this was during the beginning of the Lvov-Sandomierz operation.
Lvov-Sandomierz operation - map
In actions against the Soviet partisans, the OUN and the UPA achieved significant success. They succeeded in complicating the combat activities of the partisans in many areas of Volyn-Polesye, and hindering the conduct of sabotage operations on German communications. The UPA was able to largely thwart the plans of the Soviet command to bring partisan formations into the territory of Galicia for operations on German communications in 1944.
The first mention of the activation of Ukrainian nationalists in actions against Soviet partisans dates back to the beginning of the spring of 1943, but in 1942 the nationalists tried to destroy small reconnaissance and sabotage groups dropped from aircraft into the territory of Volhynia. Since the formation of the UPA, in 1943-44, the destruction of Soviet sabotage groups by nationalist detachments has become a normal phenomenon. At the same time, attempts to conduct operations against partisan detachments and attempts to send their agents into them to destroy the command staff ended unsuccessfully.
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At the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, the armed formations of the OUN (b) were actively involved in sabotage coordinated with the German troops and disorganization of the rear of the Red Army. In late 1943 - early 1944, with the approach of Soviet troops (1st Ukrainian Front, 13th and 60th armies) to the areas of operation of the UPA, separate UPA units offered them armed resistance together with the Germans. As the UPA detachments found themselves in the rear of the Soviet troops, they either crossed the front line or continued attacks on small rear units and individual Red Army soldiers; part of the members of the UPA, following orders, cordially greeted the Red Army in order to dull the vigilance of the Soviet counterintelligence, collected information about the reserves and the movement of Soviet troops and transferred it to Department 1s of the Army Group on the Southern Front.
Red Army units
According to the Polish historian Grzegorz Motyka, the actions of the OUN-B/UPA on the territory of Volhynia in 1943 were part of the overall plan of the OUN-B to “cleanse the territory” from “an undesirable element. This information is also confirmed by sources of the UNR and OUN of a non-Bandera direction, which also became the target of the activities of the Security Service and the gendarmerie of the OUN-B / UPA. According to the orders of Klim Savur (D. Klyachkivsky), in the areas controlled by the UPA, “skhidnyaks” were destroyed - encircled and escaped prisoners of war of the Red Army who hid in remote forest farms. With the advent of Soviet power in Western Ukraine, the struggle of the OUN-B / UPA with the “sexots” intensified - which were recommended to be hanged in public with a corresponding sign. Teachers, employees of civil and financial institutions in the countryside and watchmen, railroad workers, tram drivers and others in the city.
So out of a group of 15 people sent to one of the regional centers of the Rivne region to restore the national economy, only one managed to escape - 14 others were shot and abused over the corpses - one of the men was cut off his head, and the woman's face and legs. According to the regions, losses among Soviet citizens were: (including military personnel, employees of the NKVD-MGB-MVD and fighters of fighter battalions) - Volyn - 3500, Transcarpathian - 48, Ivano-Frankivsk - 10527, Drohobych and Lvov - 7968, Rivne - 3997, Ternopil - 3557, Chernivtsi - 796, Khmelnytsky - 133, Zhytomyr? 150.
A house burned by the UPA in the town of Bukovsko (photo taken in 1946)
At the first stage of the liquidation of the nationalist underground, the main miscalculations were considered to be the underestimation of its prevalence and readiness for action by the Soviet side, the insufficient number of forces involved and their technical equipment. As you attract more forces (from the autumn of 1944) indicated the weakness of coordination between various structures, the weakness of the undercover and reconnaissance movement. After the liquidation of large and medium formations (winter-spring 1945), the liquidation of small ones was not staged properly, the forces involved in the operations were often worse armed than their opponents (rifles against machine guns and machine guns), the same poor coordination between different structures led to confusion and in many cases to shooting "at their own." After the elimination of small units. The restructuring of the NKVD in the spring of 1946 and the transfer of the main part of the functions to the MGB had a bad effect on the quality of operational work. The change in tactics of the nationalist underground reacted belatedly. Weak leadership at the grassroots level of work and lack of reasonable initiative led to stagnation as a result of operations.
In 1946, 1619 shares were registered by OUN-UPA, of which 78 were attacks on employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of State Security. 2612 families of "bandits and gang accomplices" were deported - 6350 people. 1947 became last year for the OUN and UPA on the territory of Poland - the resettlement of the Ukrainian population and the activity of the Polish law enforcement agencies forced the remnants of the UPA and the OUN underground to move to the West in the safest way - through Czechoslovakia. Of the one and a half to two thousand people of the "Zakerzonskaya" UPA, passing the route in several stages, detachments consisting of several hundred fighters were able to reach the goal in total more than a little more than a hundred people. On the territory of the western regions of the Ukrainian SSR, the total number of UPA members remaining at large was significantly lower than the number of the OUN underground. May 30, 1947 Shukhevych issues an order to unite the UPA and the armed underground of the OUN. On the same date, the UGVR decree was issued on establishing the official day for celebrating the "foundation" of the UPA - October 14, 1942. Officially, the UGVR "temporarily" stops the activities of the UPA structures on September 3, 1949.
In an attempt to eliminate the insurgent movement and undermine its social base, the party and state bodies of the Ukrainian SSR offered ordinary members of the OUN-UPA (including those who were simply hiding in the forests from mobilization) and their assistants an amnesty in case of surrender. From February 1944 to July 1945, 41,000 insurgents took advantage of these offers, of which 17,000 were prosecuted, which subsequently reduced the effectiveness of this measure. After careful consideration by the party and Soviet bodies of the cases of the rebels who accepted the amnesty, many of them were resettled east, to the industrial regions of Ukraine. In total, 6 amnesties were proclaimed for the members of the OUN-UPA in 1944-49. Ilya Obershin called himself the last rebel, who spent forty years in an illegal position and left the forests only in 1991, after Ukraine gained independence.
Since the mid-1990s, the issue of giving a special status to veterans has been raised in Ukraine OUN-UPA. For a long time, however, there were no significant changes in this regard.
On October 12, 2007, by decree of the President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko, Roman Shukhevych was awarded the title "Hero of Ukraine" "for his outstanding contribution to the national liberation struggle for the freedom and independence of Ukraine and in connection with the 100th anniversary of his birth and the 65th anniversary of the creation of the Ukrainian Insurgent army"
On December 3, 2007, the Kharkiv Regional Council, the majority of which was the Party of Regions, adopted a statement that “on the territory of the Kharkiv region, the OUN-UPA fought on the side of Nazi Germany,” and designated the UPA as “formations that were subordinate to the command of Nazi Germany and were used by them during World War II against the Soviet Union and the states of the anti-Hitler coalition. The deputies criticized Viktor Yushchenko's actions, assessing them "as a desire to impose on Ukrainian society a vision of events during the years of the Great Patriotic War from the point of view of a limited group of persons who are guilty of committing the most terrible crimes against the world and humanity", and also stated that "attempts to rehabilitate collaborationism and betrayals lead to discord, threaten the future of Ukraine.” The Kharkiv Regional Council urged “not to allow the glorification of the OUN-UPA” and suggested that the authorities in the region “dismantle, if any, any memorial signs erected in honor of the OUN-UPA or their militants.” The next day, the Ukrainian People's Party announced the need to disband the Kharkiv Regional Council for "anti-state and anti-Ukrainian activities."
The Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) is the armed wing of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists.
Story
The official date of the creation of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army is October 14, 1942 - the Cossack holiday of the Intercession, but separate Ukrainian nationalist armed formations have existed since the beginning of the war or earlier. The UPA owes its name to the armed formation "Polesskaya Sich", which operated in Polesie and Volhynia from the beginning of the war against the Bolsheviks, supported by the Germans. But the Germans, after a short cooperation, demanded that Borovets liquidate the group, therefore the UPA began to fight against the Germans.
The UPA operated on the territory of Galicia, Volyn, Northern Bukovina, modern Poland and Belarus, but separate detachments also operated on the territory of eastern Ukraine, the Donbass and even the Kuban. The advance of the rebels led to a partial change in the ideological beliefs of the organization, so - the UPA in the Donbass supported the idea of Soviet power, but without the monopoly of the Communist Party.
In February 1943, the 3rd OUN Conference approved the course for armed struggle against the German occupation regime along with the Bolshevik one. Since the summer of 1943, the UPA was forced to fight on two fronts - against the Red partisans and against the Germans. And in the spring of 1944, the first battles with regular units of the Red Army took place. Special operations of the NKVD against the UPA included dressing up NKVD officers in UPA uniforms and killing civilians in order to discredit the UPA.
In the summer of 1944, the composition of the UPA was replenished at the expense of the Galicia division, defeated near Brody. The creation of this division from the very beginning was actively opposed by the OUN (b), protesting against the mobilization of the most active national elements by the German side, but later the skills of the division's soldiers significantly helped the UPA.
In 1953, exhausted by Soviet purges and a long confrontation, the UPA ceased its active operations, however, separate pockets of resistance arose throughout the 1950s and 60s.
There is a problem of the historiography of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, connected both with the struggle against them by the Soviet authorities, which excluded reliable research during the existence of the USSR and labeled the UPA fighters as fascist collaborators, and with the glorification of the UPA after Ukraine gained independence. In addition, the study of history is also complicated by the attitude of the Polish side, since during the Second World War there were repeated clashes between the UPA units and the Home Army.
Therefore, the issue of official recognition of the UPA as a belligerent in World War II and the related provision of benefits to UPA veterans at the state level (several western regions have already adopted this decision at their level) still remains unresolved. However, since 2005, the anniversary of the creation of the UPA has been officially celebrated in Ukraine (October 14, 1942, the Day of the Intercession).
UPA commanders:
Until 1943, Dmitry Gritsay was the commander of the UPA, from 1943 to 1950 he was replaced as commander-in-chief of the UPA (pseudonym Taras Chuprinka), from 1950 to 1954 he headed the UPA.
Vasily Kuk managed to withdraw unnoticed significant UPA forces from the territory of the USSR through the territory of pro-Soviet Czechoslovakia to the border with Austria, where they surrendered to the Austrian border guards. Thus, a significant part of the UPA fighters got the opportunity to legalize themselves. However, the plan was to return in a few years and defeat the USSR. Unfortunately, many of the participants in the transition to Ukraine's independence did not live to see it.
Filmography:
- "Akce B" (Czechoslovakia, 1951)
- "Ogniomistrz Kaleń" (Poland, 1961)
- "Zerwany most" (Poland, 1962)
- "Annichka" (SRSR, 1968)
- "Biliy bird with a black sign" (SRSR, 1970)
- "Thought about Kovpak" (SRSR, 1973)
- "Anxious month of spring" (SRSR, 1976)
- "Zhorstok_ Svitanki" (Canada, 1980)
- "The failure of the operation" Ursa Major "(SRSR, 1983)
- "State border. Film 6. Beyond the threshold of victory" (SRSR, 1987)
- "Special Forces Detachment" (SRSR, 1987)
- "Stop Bunker" (Ukraine, 1991)
- "Carpathian gold" (Ukraine, 1991)
- "Cherry Nights" (Ukraine, 1992)
- "Stracheni Svitanki" (Ukraine, 1993)
- "Atentat - Osinnє vbivstvo near Munich" (Ukraine, 1995)
- "Neskoreny" (Ukraine, 2000)
- "One - in the field of war" (Ukraine, 2003)
- "Zalіna hundred" (Ukraine, 2004)
- "Distant postril" (Ukraine, 2005)
- "We are from the future 2" (Russia, 2010)
Documentaries
- "Spogad about UPA" (1993)
- "Three loves of Stepan Banderi" (1998)
- "War - Ukrainian rahunok" (2002)
- "War without Permozhtsiv" (2002)
- "Mizh Hitler and Stalin - Ukraine in the Second World War" (2004)
- "Bandera: War without rules" (2004)
- "In memory of Slavya Stetsko" (2005)
- "Museum Bandery near London" (2006)
- "Cathedral on Blood" (2006)
- "OUN-UPA: War on two fronts" (2006)
- "Ukrainian nationalism. Unlearned lessons" (2007)
- "UPA. Fighting Tactics" (double series) (2007)
- "UPA. Third force" (2007)
- "Secrets of the 55th century: Stepan Bandera. Contract suicide" (2007)
- UPA. TV show "Un Certain Regard": "Bandera" (Czech Republic, 2010)
The property of rebel songs is also actively used (the album "Our Partisans" by Taras Chubay and the Skryabin group), author's songs on this topic are created (for example, the song "Do not seem to anyone" by the Tartak group and Andrey Pidluzhny).
In 1940, during the beginning of preparations for the creation of its own armed forces, the Revolutionary Provision of the OUN also considered the issue of introducing a uniform into it.
At one of the meetings, the referent of the propaganda department Lenkovsky S. submitted a draft uniform and insignia, in the development of which Kozak E. and artists Semkiv, Lepky L., Dyadinyuk S., Chereshnevsky M. and Chirsky M. took an active part.
Among other things, samples of simplified “cogs” were proposed - collar stripes that were used in the Ukrainian Galician Army. They had a different color for each type of troops:
blue - for infantry;
yellow - for cavalry;
red - for artillery;
white - for aviation;
black - for technical parts.
Variants of mazepnok hats with trident cockades were also proposed.
However, due to objective reasons, these projects were never implemented, but were only partially implemented in the uniform of the Ukrainian police in the General Governorate, which had red "teeth" on the collars.
In 1941, the Instructions of the Revolutionary Provision of the OUN were developed for an asset in Ukraine during the war. In the section “Military instructions” there were also instructions regarding the uniform of the rebel detachments: from the very beginning of their organization, it was necessary to try to uniformly equip individual units in captured Soviet uniforms, and in its absence, in civilian clothes.
To wear on the left sleeve, it was necessary to make a blue-yellow bandage
10-15 centimeters wide.
Warriors of individual units, if possible, should have had the same headgear - hats or repainted Soviet helmets.
The instructions also provided for special insignia for foremen and foremen: the first had to have the left corner of the collar trimmed with white linen, the second had a white "pasok" sewn on the collar.
With the beginning of the Great patriotic war In 1941, detachments of the Ukrainian National Revolutionary Army were created, which used captured uniforms from warehouses left by the retreating Red Army.
The rebels were cheating appearance captured uniforms, sewing yellow-blue buttonholes on the collar, which were not used at that time by the Red Army.
The rebels also wore mazepinka hats, Red Army helmets with painted tridents and headbands made in national colors.
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Armbands Ukrainian formations, July-September 1941. |
At the same time, the headdress appears very characteristic appearance, called "petlyurovka". It was sewn in the shape of a cap, but the band was made in such a way that it had lapels with a V-neck in front, like a "mazepinka".
Petriurovki were sewn from blue or green fabric, and the top, band and chin cord were sheathed with a yellow or blue border.
The warriors of the "Sichs" created in many areas, as well as units in Rivne and Lutsk, also had uniforms with various differences in blue and yellow color and tridents. Projects of uniforms and insignia were developed at the local level and were not approved by either the Ukrainian or German authorities. Such an initiative was forced, since even temporarily the Ukrainian rebels did not want to be left without a uniform, and always believed that a national army would be created and it would have its own uniform.
However, a certain traditionalism in the Ukrainian uniform and insignia of the early 1940s has already developed and eventually appeared in the Ukrainian Insurgent Army.
After the start of the official creation of the units of the Insurgent Army, the need arose for their material and technical support, but in the conditions in which the underground army had to operate, this was not easy to do.
A single uniform did not exist then, since there were no conditions for its mass production. In the initial period, the economic reserves of the OUN were used, but the Ukrainian population became the main source of their replenishment.
Later, in order to solve everyday problems, a network of small enterprises was created for the manufacture of everything necessary, including uniforms.
The production of uniforms and shoes was mainly paid for with food and salt.
Small enterprises could not cope with the required volumes, so military clothing and footwear were constantly in short supply.
With the beginning of active hostilities against the German troops, targeted actions began to be carried out to seize weapons and clothing from warehouses and transports that were sent to the front, but in most cases the uniform was captured, all the same, in battle.
A certain uniformity in the uniform was desirable, so individual departments tried to pick up either German or Soviet uniforms. However, most of the uniforms were made from dyed home linen. It was these uniforms that began to be considered the officially established uniform of the UPA.
In the memoirs of contemporaries, one can find numerous testimonies about the uniform of the UPA.
“A man arrived from Polesie in the late autumn of 1943. He was then wearing a rebel uniform. Blouse and trousers made of gray rural cloth, sewn one by one on clandestine sewing machines.
The blouse had four pockets, fastened under the neck, had a collar.
The buttons were made in our workshops, as each one had a trident.
Winter hats were already worn then.
They did not yet have uniform raincoats, most were German. 1
“In June 1945, the hundredth Didyk gathered all the subdivisions and we camped on Mount Lopinnik above the village of Lopyanka.
Serious events were held there to dress our hundred. We sewed uniforms from hemp linen. In them we looked a little like soldiers, a little like sailors.
We had nothing to paint the canvas with, but we found a way out. A large number of black berries grew in the mountains. The archers swung over them and in a few minutes our uniforms resembled German camouflage robes. 1
Thus, already in the summer of 1943, a certain appearance of the UPA soldiers developed, which had partially civilian clothes, Soviet uniforms, police uniforms and linen uniforms with mazepinka, petliurovka, tridents on them and on belt buckles.
Later, captured Polish, German, Hungarian, Czech, Slovak, Romanian, Italian, and sometimes even English and American uniforms were also widely used.
Trophy headdresses were easily changed into mazepkinkas, and Soviet ones into petliurovkas.
Shoes - boots and boots - were also often obtained in battle, but many hundreds also had their own shoemakers, who used skins from underground slaughterhouses to sew skins.
In December 1943, the departments of the UPA began to receive white camouflage robes, which were sewn specifically for the rebels and were recognized as very practical camouflage equipment.
At the beginning of 1944, in Volyn, during one of the battles with the UPA rebels, Soviet partisans captured the project of the uniform and insignia of the "forest army"
This project was created, most likely, in late 1943 - early 1944 and can be considered as one of the stages on the way to transforming the rebel forces into the core of the regular army of the future Ukrainian State. The introduction of a system of military ranks and their differences was supposed to strengthen discipline and organization in the UPA, bring it closer to the general military structure.
This project provided for the cut of uniforms according to the German model. A linen blouse of a khaki color was introduced, which had patch pockets with pleats and fastened cuffs with black fabric on the sleeves.
The sergeant's blouse, which had two side and two chest pockets, had to be worn out, and all the rest - sub-sergeant's and Cossack's - with only two breast pockets, were tucked into trousers.
It was allowed to wear civilian clothes under the blouse.
Trousers of the "overalls" type were supposed to be sewn with two welt vertical side and two patch back pockets with flaps and ties at the bottom.
The headdress was supposed to be a field cap - a cap, the so-called "pie" - made of white linen or black cloth. On the front, a yellow metal convex cockade with a trident was to be attached to it, and on the left side - a triangular white cloth patch with the image of the head of the tour (for Polesye divisions).
The project also has images of shoulder straps and buttonholes on the collar (see below).
In the design of the senior epaulettes, the Polish influence is visible in the use of patches of a characteristic shape. In addition, it was planned to use eight-pointed stars embroidered with white thread to depict ranks from coroner to colonel-general.
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Shoulder straps made of black cloth with stripes of white fabric and stars were to be fastened to the blouse with a strap and a button covered with white fabric.
Buttonholes of a quadrangular shape with black fabric were intended to distinguish between Cossacks and junior officers, the same, but sheathed on both sides with a white ribbon - for elders, and a blue shield with a trident embroidered with gold thread and a wreath was the insignia of generals.
The military ranks in the project were based on the system introduced in the armies of the Ukrainian national-republican state associations of 1917-1920.
The title "Cossack" indicates that these sketches belonged to the Volyn-Polesye divisions of the UPA, since the UPA-West group in Galicia had the corresponding title of "archer".
Based on the fact that the UPA never received a full uniform, the functions of differences were assigned to some characteristic elements of the rebels' clothing.
First of all, this applies to headdresses - mazepinok and petliurovka, which were a clear sign of belonging
only to parts of the Ukrainian army. Ukrainian insignia in the form of different kind tridents: some had cockades used back in 1918-1921, others wore samples made for the Ukrainian auxiliary police in the General Province.
However, in most cases, the rebels themselves made differences with tridents from any material at hand - cartridge cases, tin, plastic, wood, fabric ...
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Another characteristic difference, confirming belonging to the UPA, were leather belts with tridents on buckles. They first appeared on the uniform of the Ukrainian police of the Governor General in 1940-1941, and in the Insurgent Army they began to be used from the very first months of its existence.
The buckles on the belts were also different: some were remade from the buckles of foreign armies, others were cut from brass artillery shells or cast
from metal.
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To restore order in the relationship between the soldiers of the UPA, the command decided to introduce military ranks (degrees).
By order of the UPA troops No. 8 of August 27, 1943
all UPA soldiers were named "Cossacks - the honorary title of a fighter for the Ukrainian State." According to their training and combat experience, the Cossacks were divided into three groups:
Cossacks-archers;
junior officers;
foremen.
By order of the UPA troops No. 8 of August 27, 1943, degrees and ranks were established for all Cossacks:
| ranks (degrees): | |||||
| Cossacks | junior officers | petty officer | mace foreman | general sergeant major | |
| ground troops | Cossack | foreman | cornet | Yesaul | cornet general |
| vestun | senior foreman | bail | lieutenant colonel | lieutenant general | |
| sergeant | centurion | colonel | colonel general | ||
| infantry general * | |||||
| naval forces | sailor | foreman | Ensign | lieutenant commander | rear admiral |
| sailor-vesun | senior foreman | lieutenant | centurion captain | vice admiral | |
| sergeant | senior lieutenant | admiral | |||
| fleet admiral | |||||
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* the following ranks were also established: general of artillery, general of cavalry, general of aviation, general of tank troops, general of engineering troops |
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The right to confer the title of vestun, foreman and senior foreman was given to the commanders of individual units, who enjoyed the rights of a regiment commander, the title of corporal - to commanders who enjoyed the rights of a division commander, all other ranks - only "Supreme Power, which has the right to legislate" - from July 1944 Ukrainian Chief Liberation Council ( Ukrainian Headquarters Vizvolna Rada).
Subsequently, perhaps in 1945,
Order No. 8 of August 27, 1943 was canceled by the order of the High Command, which made changes to the names of military degrees in the UPA:
| ranks (degrees): | |||||
| privates | junior officers | petty officer | mace foreman | general sergeant major | |
| ground troops | Sagittarius | vestun | cornet | major | cornet general |
| senior archer | senior vestun | bail | lieutenant colonel | ||
| mace | centurion | colonel | |||
| senior mace | |||||
It is worth noting that the UPA used a dual system of degrees - traditional military ranks and a functional system of command appointments.
Order No. 3/44 of January 27, 1944, in order to streamline seniority in the UPA, based on functional system, special insignia were introduced, which were worn on the left end of the collar and on the left sleeve of the uniform below the sleeve:
| rank | description | view |
| swarm | one patch |  |
| chotovoy | two patches |  |
| centesimal | three rectangular stripes in red |  |
| smoking | one chevron |  |
| squad leader | two chevrons |  |
| group leader | three chevrons |  |
| regional commander of the UPA | red trident over chevron |  |
| chief commander of the UPA | silver trident with oak leaf |  |
The basis of the signs was made of black fabric, the signs themselves were made of red.
Chiefs of staff, inspectors, heads of departments and staff members wore yellow badges.
The order noted that with the same functional seniority, the one who had the yellow stripe was considered the elder.
In addition 1/44 to Order No. 3/44 of January 27, 1944, the dimensions of these insignia are given:
collar width - 3 cm;
sleeve width - 6 cm;
the body of the black base protruded outward by 3 mm.
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Member of the "Separate Assignment Department", Rivne region, July 1941. |
| Information: Muzychuk, Marchuk "Ukrainian Insurgent Army" |
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UPA junior officer - West, 1944. |
| Information: Muzychuk, Marchuk "Ukrainian Insurgent Army" |
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The senior mace of the Lutsk training hut, 1943. |
| Information: Muzychuk, Marchuk "Ukrainian Insurgent Army" |
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Sergeant Sergeant, 1941. Signs of the command staff could be tridents lined with blue fabric, placed on bandages or sewn over the left pocket of the uniform. |
| Information: Muzychuk, Marchuk "Ukrainian Insurgent Army" |
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Information sources:
1. Muzychuk, Marchuk "Ukrainian Insurgent Army"
2. Manzurenko, Gumenyuk "UPA raid in Romania"
On November 6, 1943, the Red Army entered Kiev, thus ending up on the right-bank Ukraine. But the soldiers who fought Nazism for two and a half years were greeted by the inhabitants of this region not only with flowers, but also with machine-gun bursts from the Volyn and Galician forests.
The issue of the size of the UPA-OUN is extremely controversial. Many Ukrainian emigration sources claim that in 1944 its number reached about 100,000, maybe even 150,000. Orest Subtelniy writes that "more reasonable" estimates put the figure at 30-40 thousand fighters /9, 411/. Vladimir Kosik believes that “the average number of really UPA warriors was probably 40-50 thousand. /10, No. 6-7, p. II /. Modern Ukrainian historians estimate its number as of September 1943 at 35 thousand /7, book І, p.129/.
The head of the OUN(b) in Ukraine Ya. Stetsko (left) brings bread and salt to the Nazis.
Based on the data of supporters and historians of the OUN, you come to a startling conclusion. Having a number comparable to the Soviet partisans, the nationalists killed fewer Nazis than the partisans derailed the echelons. Throughout the territory of the OUN-UPA the army of nationalists in the amount of 35-150 thousand people killed no more than one Nazi per day.
By the way, Army General Nikolai Vatutin, who led the operation to liberate Kyiv, was mortally wounded by Ukrainian nationalists in February 1944. The last Commander-in-Chief of the UPA, Colonel Vasily Kuk, who during the war acted under the pseudonyms Vasily Koval and Lemish, tells about the war of Ukrainian nationalists against the Soviet army that was persecuting the Germans.
Vasily Kuk was born on January 11, 1911 in the Austro-Hungarian Empire - in the village of Krasnoye, Zolochaevsky district, Ternopil Voivodeship (now Bussky District, Lviv Region) into a peasant family. In addition to Vasily, the family had seven children, two of whom died in childhood, all the rest were members of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN). Two brothers were executed by the Polish authorities for their activities in the OUN in the 1930s. Vasily himself began working in nationalist organizations back in the late 1920s, and was later repeatedly arrested by the Polish police for revolutionary activities.
They will become the leaders of the UPA.
In the photo, Wehrmacht Major Evgen Pobeguschii, commander of the Roland battalion (
at a demonstration organized by the Nazis in Lvov (1943) (German chronicle)).
In 1941, the hand of "Roland" was about "done with the battalion "Nachtigal" at the 201st Schutzmannschaft Battalion, commanded by Major Pobeguschiy, for ideological work, deputy Hauptman Roman Shukhevych was awarded for ideological work.
From 1937 to 1954 (exactly 17 years old) Cook was in hiding. In 1940, when the OUN split, he joined the faction of Stepan Bandera and became one of the leading figures in the national Ukrainian resistance and organizers of the insurgent struggle. Since the spring of 1942, he headed the Wire (Leadership) of the OUN in the South-Eastern Ukrainian lands. At the end of 1943, Vasily Kuk led the "army group" UPA-South, which operated on the territory of Soviet Ukraine. Since 1945, he directly supervised the activities of the OUN in the Eastern Ukrainian lands, and since February 1945 - also in the North-Western Ukrainian lands.
Since 1950, after the death of the head of the UPA, General Taras Chuprynka (Roman Shukhevych), he headed the UPA. In 1950-54, Vasily Koval was the Head of the OUN in Ukraine, the Main Command of the UPA and the General Secretariat of the underground Ukrainian pre-parliament - the Ukrainian Main Liberation Council (UGOS - Ukrainian abbreviation - UGVR). . In April 1954, he was suddenly captured by a special group of the MGB, in 1954-60 he was imprisoned (only 6 years with such a record. That's really a cruel Soviet regime).
In 1960, an appeal was published with his signature to foreign members of the OUN. The letter condemned manifestations of Ukrainian collaborationism during the Second World War and called for an end to underground activities on the territory of the Ukrainian SSR. In his own words, Vasily Kuk did not abandon the content of this letter even in the 1990s.
In 1961-68 worked as a senior researcher at the Central State Historical Archive in Kyiv, in 1968-72 - at the Institute of History of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR (another proof of the atrocities of the Bolsheviks). ATTENTION! Under the cut, in addition to interviews and documents, there are very hard photos.
From 1972 to 1980, he was a commodity manager at Ukrbytreklamy. Currently retired, he heads the research department of the Brotherhood of former UPA fighters, so he knows the history of the Ukrainian national liberation struggle not only from rich personal experience, but also thanks to the studied documents and works of historians.
Legionnaires from the notorious Nachtigal battalion are the future commanders of the UPA.
With undisguised joy, they overtook the helpless old Jew in order to immediately take his life (Lvov, 1941) (from the tome W. Poliszczuk. Dowody zbrodni OUN i UPA, Toronto, 2000)
- Since when did the OUN start anti-Soviet insurgent activity?
The combat departments of the OUN were created back in 1939-40. under the Soviets in Western Ukraine occupied by them. The NKVD arrested Ukrainians en masse and deported them to Siberia. Part of the OUN fled to German-occupied Poland. The armed detachments of the OUN were created even then - the population had a lot of weapons left over from the Polish army, which was defeated in September 1939. In almost every village then and later, in 1941, an underground self-defense was created: you have to defend yourself if they want to arrest you and take you out ...
- And when was the UPA itself created, which met the Red Army fully armed?
In 1941, under the Germans of the OUN, armed detachments were also created, they were used to smuggle literature, and in general the underground without armed forces hard to imagine. Their number in 1941-42 amounted to about forty thousand people, plus self-defense.
- And how could this be, if the number of OUN at the end of the 1930s was 15-20 thousand?
It was already a mass movement, the people en masse entered into these semi-legal formations - fighting and self-defense. If some people were threatened by the German authorities, then they went to these armed groups, and the underground already taught them military affairs.
From the very beginning, since 1929, there was a military headquarters under the OUN, and under the Provod (Central Committee) of the OUN there was a military assistant - the head of military affairs. The headquarters supervised military training and planned military actions.
Then, when the UPA began to unfold at the end of 1942, the Military Headquarters became an independent structure. Three, so to speak, army headquarters were subordinate to him. UPA-West (Carpathians) in 1943 was headed by Vasily Sidor, UPA-North (Volyn, Polesye) - Dmitry Klyachkovsky (Klim Savur) and UPA-South (Kamenets-Podolsk, Vinnitsa, Zhytomyr, Kiev regions), which was headed by me. These three headquarters organized the UPA in different places, in accordance with local conditions ...
It is difficult to say how many fighters were in the UPA at the end of 1942 - it was already a mass movement. According to German and Soviet data, in 1943 the UPA numbered 100-150 thousand people. In addition, the UPA was helped by the network, the OUN underground. There were hospitals, and communications, and printing houses, and intelligence, and civilian departments. It is difficult to separate the UPA and the underground - this is one structure.
... The number of UPA in 1943-44 can be estimated at almost 200 thousand, plus the underground. And if we take the entire period of activity of the Ukrainian national liberation movement - from 1939 to 1955 - this is an army of about half a million people. Some were arrested, others came ... (that is, 20 times less than fought in the Soviet Army and partisans. And this is if you believe in the numbers mentioned).
- The struggle of the UPA-Germans - from 1942 to 1944, what forms did it take?
It continued all the time in different places in different ways. They broke prisons, freed people. With those Germans who robbed the Ukrainians, we fought with them (that is, we did not fight with the Germans. We only fought off food). What the Germans took from the population, we returned to the population. There were skirmishes and fights. We beat off the population that the Germans wanted to send for forced labor in Germany. In May 1943, the head of the militia of the assault detachments, Ober-Gruppenführer of the SA, Hitler's friend Viktor Lutze, was blown up on a UPA mine (a fairy tale, but many believe).
- It is well known about the Soviet partisan areas during the years of German occupation, but were there such nationalist areas in Western Ukraine?
There was, for example, the Kovelsky district, a kind of rebel republic was created there: laws were issued regarding land and schools. The lands were distributed so that citizens could use them, there was cultural and educational work, school policy, and its own administration.
These were small areas in the Carpathians and Volhynia - moreover, there are more in Volhynia: there are forests and territories where the Germans could not reach. There were signs everywhere: “Attention, partisans,” and the Germans did not meddle in the forest (very plausible).
- In the documents of the UPA and the Soviet documents there is a big difference in the estimates of losses. In Soviet documents, the losses of the UPA are almost always many times higher than the losses of the NKVD-MVD-MGB. And in the documents of the UPA, the gap is not so great, and often the losses of the Reds are greater than the losses of the rebels. How to explain such a difference?
They exaggerated our losses and downplayed their own. In addition, they killed the civilian population that came to hand, and recorded in the column "killed rebels." It is clear that in general, more rebels were killed than Chekist troops (further he will argue the exact opposite), since the communists were better armed, trained and had more opportunities, equipment. In general, it must be said that the losses depended on operations and battles. In those cases when the UPA took up defensive positions in the forest, and broke through from the encirclement, and the Reds advanced, the Chekists suffered more losses than we did (and when and where were there other battles? Maybe the UPA captured Kiev?).
I remember the battle near Gurbami in Volyn: it was in April 1944 - one of the biggest battles of the UPA with the Reds, I led the operation. From the side of the Bolsheviks fought about thirty thousand people, tanks, planes, with ours - about ten thousand (usually everyone calls the number 5 thousand). They wanted to surround us. They surrounded, fought for about a week, but then we found a weaker place, broke through and left. They were advancing, we were sitting in the forest, and they had heavy losses, but we lost one percent of the fighters in that battle - about a hundred people (while the losses of the Soviet troops are called several thousand). And in their reports, our losses amounted to two thousand killed - these were all civilians. Often, most of the “UPA losses” are civilians killed (civilians in the forest in the swamp. Yes, 2 thousand are all the surrounding villages).
As long as they are with the police. Then they will be transferred to the UPA.
Calculations of German losses in the fight against the UPA-OUN according to Petr Mirchuk / Petr Mirchuk. Ukrainian Insurgent Army. 1942-1952. Documents and materials. -Munich, publishing house im. Khvilovogo, 1953., pp. 29-44/ represented more than 1 (one) thousand killed, and according to the French historian Vladimir Kosik - about 6 thousand/Vladimir Kosik. UPA / Brief historical review. 1941-1944 / // Lviv. - Chronicle of Red Kalina. - 1992. - No. 4-5, 6-7, 8-9 /. / Calculations made by the author from the indicated sources. / (
6
).
So, as we see, there is a tragic contradiction. 300-400 thousand Bandera in just two years, having lost more than half of ALL those ever in their ranks killed and captured, managed to destroy from 1 to 6 thousand Nazis and 25 thousand Soviet military. And this is according to their own research and based only on Bandera's sources. The loss ratio is exactly the opposite of the claims. The losses of the Nazis are simply lost against the background of hundreds of thousands of civilians killed (Poles, Jews, Gypsies, Ukrainians). So with whom and against whom did the OUN (b) and its militants from the UPA fight a long time ago, the nationalists themselves answered.
- What was organizational structure UPA?
There was a main military headquarters, to which the headquarters of three regions were subordinate - UPA-West, UPA-North and UPA-South. And the OUN had exactly the same division: OUN-Galicia, OUN-Volyn and OUN-South. There were different living conditions, different conditions work. Then came the regions, districts, districts, sub-districts, villages - and the OUN grid covered the whole of Western Ukraine. And in the regional groups of the UPA there were already tactical departments of the front-line plan, depending on where they would fight. Then came kurens (battalions) and hundreds (companies), hundreds were divided into chots (platoons) and swarms (squads).
Yes, the end of the war meant nothing to us - the struggle for state independence continued (ridiculous. Several thousand people in three regions of Ukraine - 10% of the territory, the independence of all Ukraine was won back). Only the Soviets wanted to throw the Red Army units against the UPA, as they were marching back from Germany (if they wanted to, they did. Only these are not army functions, to fight with bandits). But they walked through the forest with noise, whistling, and in fact, the army did not fight with us. NKVD and fighter detachments - yes (not fighter detachments - there were none. There was SMERSH, there were units for protecting the rear of the front, there were commandant companies and garrisons in settlements). The extermination squads were mostly from local Poles, the authorities did not trust the Ukrainians, so the “hawks” were a danger to us (of course, having massacred several hundred thousand peaceful Poles before, during and after the Volyn massacre, it is foolish to expect love from the surviving Poles).
- With whom was it more difficult to fight - with the Germans or with the Soviets?
The Soviets had to fight longer. With the Germans one and a half to two years: from 1942-44 (that is, he himself admits that, despite the presence of combat detachments since 1939, they did not encounter the Germans at all until 1942, and then only took away the loot), and with the Soviets - ten years - with 44th to 54th.
- And whose methods of combating the UPA were more effective?
- Soviet methods are terribly vile.The Germans fought directly. The Soviets, unlike the Germans, used provocations. They dressed up as UPA units, killed civilians in order to turn them against us. And agents, and sending internal agents. The Germans and the Bolsheviks did not differ in the level of terror - both one and the other fired. But the Bolsheviks wanted to give the murders some legal form: "He committed some kind of crime, violated something, and therefore he must sign." And the Germans, without unnecessary ceremonies, killed all the Jews and Slavs (Apparently the UPA fought differently - without agents, without changing into Soviet uniforms, without provocations).
- Did any part of the population support the Bolsheviks?
Yes no one supported them (probably that is why the Bandera people had to forcibly mobilize the local population into their ranks. And this is recognized by all historians
UPA). Agents - those were intimidated by repression. The most successful methods of fighting the UPA were provocations. Disguised as rebels, the Bolsheviks enter the village, talk to the population, people tell them something. And then they repress the population and use the information received against the UPA.
- What about the expulsions of the population?
Yes, they were constantly, every year. And the blockades of the forests were also constant - they did not last long. They will carry out the operation, report on its implementation, after which we will attack them again, they will again conduct a blockade. And so in every village there were garrisons, for every 10 huts they had one secret informer. This system of terror and denunciations was so widespread that the NKVD themselves were afraid to talk to each other.
They were released and returned home - they began to kill. Certificate from departments of the Central Committee of the CPSU on the situation with former members of the OUN nationalist movement in Ukraine at the end of 1955, dated September 1956.
RGANI. F.3. Op.12. D.113. L.178-179
- The traditional accusation of the UPA is that its fighters killed civilians.
Well what can I say? If the civilian population is an agent, and betrays other people, it is clear that you will shoot him. If the “civilian population” wages war against the UPA, then you will kill him too. And we killed the chairmen of village councils or collective farms in rare cases, if he drives people to collective farms by force, takes away land from the peasants, and mocks the population. And most of it was not touched. There was no point in fighting against the population, since it helped us, supported us - we simply could not do it. Rumors that we are killing civilians just appeared because of the activities of the "false Bandera" - departments of the NKVD.
KATARZYNÓWKA, Lutsk county, Lutsk voivodship. May 7/8, 1943.
There are three children on the plan: two sons of Piotr Mekal and Aneli from Gvyazdovsky - Janusz (3 years old) with broken limbs and Marek (2 years old), stabbed with bayonets, and in the middle lies the daughter of Stanislav Stefanyak and Maria from Boyarchuk - Stasya (5 years old) with cut and open tummy and insides out, as well as broken limbs. The crimes were committed by the OUN - UPA (OUN - UPA).
The photographer is unknown. Photocopy from the original A - 6816 published thanks to the archive.
SARNY, region, Sarny county, Lutsk voivodeship. August 1943.
Karol Imach, a Pole, a resident of Sarny, caught by UPA terrorists while picking mushrooms in the forest near Sarny, and killed. There are 20 stab wounds on his body from blows inflicted with a knife or bayonet.
The photographer is unknown. The photograph is shown thanks to the son of K. Imach, as well as Professor Edward Prus.
PODYARKOV (PODJARKÓW), Bobrka County, Lviv Voivodeship. August 16, 1943.
The results of torture inflicted by the OUN - UPA Kleshchinskaya, from a Polish family of four in Podiarkovo.
The photographer is unknown. Photo published thanks to the archive.
WILL OSTROVETSK (WOLA OSTROWIECKA), district. August 1992.
On August 17 - 22, 1992, several hundred victims were exhumed - Poles from the villages of Ostrowki and Volya Ostrovetska, who were killed by the UPA on August 30, 1945. In the photo - part of the long bones taken out of the mass grave in the territory of Volya Ostrovetskaya. Nearby stands Leon Popek.
Photographer Pavel Vira. Publication: Leon Popek and others. Volyn Testament, Lublin 1997. Society of Friends of Kremenets and Volyn-Podolsk Land, photo 141.
BŁOŻEW GÓRNA, Dobromil County, Lviv Voivodeship. November 10, 1943.
On the eve of November 11 - the People's Independence Day - the UPA attacked 14 Poles, in particular, the Sukhaya family, using various cruelties. On the plan, the murdered Maria Grabowska (maiden name Suhai), 25 years old, with her daughter Kristina, 3 years old. The mother was stabbed with a bayonet, and the daughter's jaw was broken and her tummy was torn open.
The photographer is unknown. The photo was published thanks to the victim's sister, Helena Kobierzicka.
LATACH (LATACZ), Zalishchyky county, Tarnopol voivodeship. December 14, 1943.
One of the Polish families - Stanislav Karpyak in the village of Latach, was killed by a UPA gang of twelve people. Six people died: Maria Karpyak - wife, 42 years old; Josef Karpyak - son, 23 years old; Vladislav Karpyak - son, 18 years old; Zygmunt or Zbigniew Karpyak - son, 6 years old; Sofia Karpyak - daughter, 8 years old and Genovef Chernitska (nee Karpyak) - 20 years old. Zbigniew Czernicki, a one and a half year old wounded child, was hospitalized in Zalishchyky. Visible in the picture is Stanislav Karpyak, who escaped because he was absent.
Photographer from Chernelitsy - unknown.
POLOVETS (POŁOWCE), region, Chortkiv county, Ternopil voivodeship. January 16 - 17, 1944.
A forest near Yagelnitsa, called Rosokhach. The process of identifying 26 corpses of Polish residents of the village of Polovtse, killed by the UPA. The names and surnames of the victims are known. The occupying German authorities officially established that the victims were stripped naked and brutally tortured and tortured. The faces were bloody as a result of cutting off noses, ears, cutting the neck, gouging out the eyes and strangulation with ropes, the so-called lasso.
Photographer unknown - Kripo employee. The photograph, as well as the following, concerning Polovtsy, were published thanks to the secret head of the District Representative Office of the Government of the country in Chortkiv, Józef Opacki (pseudonym “Mogort”), as well as his son, Professor Ireneusz Opacki.
- In some works there is information about the elements of the chemical and bacteriological warfare of the Chekists against the UPA.
Yes, poisoned things were planted on us, springs were poisoned. Sometimes the Chekists "thrown out" medicines infected with typhus on the black market (and where is the typhus epidemic?). I had to have my own antibiotics. But these were isolated cases, and it cannot be said that such methods were effective.
Well, for example, we sent mail through girls in tubes of toothpaste, it was more convenient from the point of view of conspiracy. And so, they intercept such mail and send it to me through an agent. They don't know where I am, but they know it will reach me. And I get a tube filled with gas. I open it and immediately we start going blind. So we threw everything and ran out of the room into the air. For a week, there was some kind of grid before our eyes, we almost went blind, and then everything went away. If this happened indoors, then we would all get poisoned.
It's the same - you buy a battery for a radio and they know it's for the underground. And a mine will be slipped into this battery. Once, people were killed in an explosion. And then we checked these batteries already in the forest and there were cases when they exploded.
Food poisoning is normal.
Often we were afraid to take even milk from the population, because it was sometimes poisoned. Then what did we do - let the owner drink this milk himself, then I will drink too (that's just the population - NKVD agents. I would say it straight - many hated you. People wanted a peaceful life after liberation from the Germans, and you robbed and killed them After all, the food was taken away, there was nothing to pay with). But sometimes the Chekists gave an antidote to these agents, and then only one of us drank milk, while the others waited. He feels bad, but the owner is silent. Why are you silent? You poison people and keep quiet! What were we supposed to do with those gentlemen who knew that the milk was poisoned, and they gave it to us? The gentleman was shot dead (that's almost civilians for you), and they tried to cure the poisoned soldier.
- There is information that in the summer of 1946 a partial demobilization took place.
This was not a demobilization. In 1944, we could operate in large formations, while the enemy did not have such an opportunity. When the enemy has even larger detachments against your formations, then you must reduce your formations. They become more mobile and maneuverable, and less accessible to enemy reconnaissance. And if necessary, they could be brought together again into larger compounds. In 1944, in Volhynia, we had a unit of up to ten thousand people - several kurens. But from next year it was necessary to disband such a unit for kurens. And later, when the issue of providing our detachments with provisions became acute, in 1945-46 the kurens were disbanded into hundreds. In particular, our kurens had to be disbanded for the winter: how can we provide for many hundreds of people in the forest in winter? And in 1946, the Bolsheviks already had the opportunity to oppose us with very large forces, so there was a need, especially in cases of encirclement, to disband hundreds into chots. All this remained one structure, but hundreds and chots acted independently (And so they were reduced to zero).
- Under your leadership - in 1950-54 - how many people acted, and what were the main directions of the struggle?
At that time I didn’t have data on how many people were under my command - there was no need (very funny. The commander doesn’t know how many subordinates he has and doesn’t see the need for it. Based on how many people he plans operations for, it’s not clear. Although it’s just clear nothing was planned, just survived). In addition, the UPA detachments often changed their places of deployment, carried out raids in the Kiev region, Zhytomyr region, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Romania (it is not clear what kind of independence they won in other countries). Only according to the reports of the Soviet authorities, which are in the archives, can one make a rough estimate of the size of the underground in the early 1950s.
The UPA had two fronts. One is a military one, on it we could not win the war either with the Bolsheviks or with the Germans, since the ratio of armed forces and equipment cannot be compared. The second front was the ideological front. And on it we conducted strong propaganda about the national liberation struggle and the struggle for the Ukrainian state. The 50s, 60s, 70s passed, the tactics changed. In Soviet times, I met with dissidents, for example, with Vasily Stus, and with others. Often former UPA fighters participated in the dissident movement. The ideas that were proclaimed earlier continued to operate. And as a result, an independent Ukraine appeared.
And I, a fool, thought that the decision to create independent Slavic states was made by the leaders of the Communist Party in the republics. In Belovezhskaya Pushcha. And it turns out to be agents of the UPA.
Interviewed by Alexander Gogun
The interview was conducted on April 4, 2003 in Kyiv at the address: 22-B, Supreme Council Boulevard, apt. 31. On April 12, the translation of the interview into Russian was certified by Vasily Kuk.
Summary data on the losses of Bandera:"In total, for the period 1944-1955, in the process of law enforcement agencies interacting with units of the Soviet army and local security subdivisions public order measures to combat terrorism and other anti-state manifestations by nationalists, 153,262 were killed and 103,828 members of the OUN-UPA and their assistants were arrested, including more than 7,800 members of the Central, regional, regional, district super-district and regional wires, heads of districts and OUN groups, "security services", as well as "kurens" and "hundreds" of the UPA.
At the same time, one aircraft, two armored vehicles, 61 artillery guns, 595 mortars, 77 flamethrowers, 358 anti-tank rifles, 844 easel and 8327 light machine guns, about 26 thousand machine guns, more than 72 thousand rifles and 22 thousand pistols, more than 100 thousand grenades were seized, 80 thousand mines and shells, more than 12 million rounds. More than 100 printing houses with printing equipment, more than 300 radio transmitters, 18 cars and motorcycles were found and seized, a significant number of trains with foodstuffs and storages of nationalist literature were found. (Arch. case. 372, vol. 74, sheets. 159-160; vol. 100, sheets. 73-75).
(Certificate of the Security Service of Ukraine on the activities of the OUN-UPA dated July 30, 1993 No. 113 “In accordance with the Decree of the Presidium of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine dated February 1, 1993 No. 2964-XII “On checking the activities of the OUN-UPA”).
Note that this is not Soviet data, but a study by the SBU of independent Ukraine.
I would like to draw your attention to two key points.
First- none of the numerous organizations of Ukrainian nationalists represented the interests of the Ukrainian people simply because they did not belong to it (I'm talking about the organization, leadership, politics, and not about ordinary performers). Formed in different years outside of Ukraine proper, they were formed mainly from Catholic Ukrainians abroad, brought up in the realities of completely different states and financed by special services (Germany in the first place). Accordingly, regardless of the proclaimed goals, they existed exactly as long as they satisfied the requirements of the structures that contained them. Accordingly, none of the organizations has ever been considered by the authorities of Germany, Italy, Hungary, Romania (any other state) as some kind of state power of Ukraine or a government in exile, or in any similar capacity. They have never had any negotiations, not only at the highest, even at the middle level. As a rule, intelligence officers with the rank of colonels and military commanders, in whose area of responsibility the nationalists acted, were engaged in interaction and leadership.
Second- the number of those who died at the hands of Ukrainian nationalists (according to their own historians) obviously determines the priorities of the main enemies. First of all, these are the Poles, among whom the losses are the largest (although in terms of time - 90% were destroyed in one 1943 year). Next come conditionally I will call them - Soviet Ukrainians who served with the Soviet Army (formerly the Red Army), members of their families, aimed at restoring Western Ukraine, local asset et cetera. Of course, among them were Russians and Buryats, but the bulk of them are still Ukrainians by nationality. Then there were the Jews, who were exterminated mainly during pogroms (like Lvov in honor of the proclamation of the "Act of Visibility of Greatness" on June 30-July 7, 1941).
The losses of the Nazis fit into the statistical error and a simple "effect of the performer." When the rank and file of the same OUN-UPA independently makes decisions on the spot, contrary to the real policy of the organization.
On April 11, 1944, we are the signatories below: Deputy commander of the 1st d-at the 2nd political unit of the guards. l-nt Seribkaev E, paramedic guards. l-nt m / s Prisevok P.A, Komsomol organizer of the doctor of the guards st. s-t. Papushkin N.F and residents of the village of Nova Prykulya, Strusovsky district, Tarnopol region, vols. Grechin Ganka - 45 years old, Grechin Maryna - 77 years old, Vadoviz Esafat - 70 years old, Boychuk Milya - 32 years old, Boychuk Petro - 33 years old, have drawn up this act on the following:
March 23, 1944, at about 7:00 am in the village of Nova-Brikulya, Strusovsky district, Tarnopol region, Bandera men dressed in Red Army uniforms came, surrounded the village and began to gather people for work.
Among those shot were: t.t. Grechin Ivan - 55 years old, Homulek Maksym, Dudo Andrey - 65 years old.
Conclusion: Ukrainian-German nationalists-Bandera committed this criminal act, the execution of civilians, with the aim of provoking and opposing the civilians of the Red Army.
This document was signed by:
Deputy Commander of 1/206 Guards Lt Seribkaev
Paramedic 1/206 guards l-nt Prisevok
Komsomol organizer 1/206 guards l-nt Papushkin
+
Residents of the village of Grechin
Vodoviz
Boychuk"
(from the protocol of interrogation of Kutkovets Ivan Tikhonovich. February 1, 1944)
".... At the end of 1942 and the beginning of 1943, during the preparation and transfer of the OUN organizations to the underground and the creation of the UPA, the nationalists "illegally" published the information bulletin "Informator" and the magazine "Do Zbroi".
On the covers of these magazines it was indicated that they were printed at the illegal headquarters of the OUN, and on specially issued anniversary bulletins dedicated to the memory of the deceased "Bandera" "LEGENDA" and others, the place of printing was indicated in the organizational printing house in Odessa.
In fact, all this literature was printed in the mountains. Lutsk, in the regional printing house at the General Commissariat with the direct participation of the Germans .... "
