Conflicting Narratives

In contemporary discussions, the identity of Transcarpathia is a disputed issue. The author Oleksa Myshanych has carried on a vigorous polemic against any attempt to define a Rusyn identity and nation, something he calls an “experiment with no scientific basis” (Myshanych 2012, 93).

Perhaps most problematic is the discussion of the OUN’s behavior, especially its unwillingness to antagonize Germany, which has proved an embarrassment even to its own postwar historians (Mirchuk 1968, 551, 560, 585). A contemporary Polish historian has suggested that the emigre leadership was persuaded that Carpatho-Ukraine had to be conceded to Hungary because they expected that there would be an opportunity to create a Ukrainian state in the wake of Hitler’s push to the east (Motyka 2006, 68). This way of thinking led to a clash between the emigre leader­ship and the more uncompromising generation of Galician youth, which shortly afterwards, in February 1940, split from the organization and created the Stepan Bandera OUN(B) wing in opposition to the Andrii Melnyk OUN(M) wing.

The Carpatho-Ukrainian episode is the moment at which the OUN’s fatal alignment with Germany occurred. Germany, however, failed to support a Ukrainian state on this occasion, or when it invaded Poland in 1939, or when it began a war against the Soviet Union in 1941. In the fall of 1941 and early in 1942, the Gestapo began arresting all OUN members, including many who had been active in Carpatho-Ukraine. Ivan Rohach, for example, had been a member of the Carpathian Sich Supreme Council. In 1942, he worked in Kyiv as editor of the OUN(M)'s newspaper Ukrainske slovo (Ukrainian Word).

The Carpatho-Ukrainian episode can therefore be seen as the first temptation offered by German leaders to the OUN, and more broadly to nationalist-minded Ukrainians, one that drew the latter into a dance of collaboration/resistance over the next three years. It was also an indica­tion that the German promise of statehood would not be fulfilled.

However, among nationalists, one of the strongest reasons for sup­porting Carpatho-Ukraine was the international publicity it brought to the cause of independence. The autonomous state made news around the world and served notice of the Ukrainian aspiration for statehood. In 1939, the Canadian scholar Watson Kirkconnell described the Ukrainian question as the “greatest unsolved problem in nationality” and predicted that there would be no solution to Eastern Europe’s political problems without “a reasonable realization of Ukrainian nationhood” (Kirkcon- nell 1939, 89). Through the Carpatho-Ukrainian episode, many readers around the globe learned for the first time of Ukraine’s economic impor­tance and strategic geopolitical location.

A number of commentators, Kirkconnell among them, were persuaded in 1939 that Hitler would set up a Ukrainian state if he moved on Kyiv (Kirkconnell 1939, 74). Others emphasized the legitimacy of Ukraine’s drive for independence. In a radio address to the Canadian public in Jan­uary 1939, G. W. Simpson said:

Englishmen for decades would not face the facts of Irish nationalism until the persistence and toughness of Irish resistance compelled rec­ognition on the basis of equality. European statesmen in crisis after crisis have ignored the fundamental reality of group consciousness, group self-respect and group desire for political expression and free­dom, with consequent disaster to European stability.

(Simpson 1939, 4)

The Carpatho-Ukrainian state of 1938-39 is still raised in contem­porary discussions concerning Transcarpathia, whether these deal with

The War for Carpatho-Ukraine in 1938-39 109 issues of regional and national identity, minority linguistic and cultural rights, or revanchist claims from abroad. For those studying the events of 1938-39, archival materials are now more readily available, although access to Russian and Hungarian archives is still restricted.⁹ A num­ber of publications have now reproduced key documents, such as the pronouncements and circulars of the Khust government (Delehan and Vyskvarko 2009, 13-14). However, several questions still require elucida­tion, among them the immediate events leading up to the largely symbolic declaration of independence, the role of the OUN, and the behavior of Germany and neighboring states. These questions, which touch upon the conflicting interests of several governments and regional players make the brief history of the autonomous state, in the words of two scholar from Ukraine, “probably the most disputed question in the historiogra­phy of our country’s modern period” (ibid., 3).

Notes

1. When it became part of Czechoslovakia in 1919, the territory was called Sub­carpathian Rus (Pidkarpatska Rus; in Czech, Podkarpatska Rus). Soon after gaining autonomy, it officially called itself Carpathian Ukraine, but in English- language publications it has generally been referred to as Carpatho-Ukraine. Magocsi uses the term Carpathian Rus’ to designate the area that he considers inhabited by Rusyns. Under Hungarian rule, up to the end of the First World War, this territory was known as Uhorska Rus or Hungarian Rus. Today it is nor­mally referred to as Transcarpathia or the Transcarpathian oblast of Ukraine.

2. For a concise summary of the scholar’s case for Rusyn autonomy, see Magocsi (2015).

3. For a discussion of Magocsi’s views, see contributions by Taras Kuzio, Serhy Plokhy, Dominique Arel, and Alexander Motyl to “Special Section: The Scholar, Historian and Public Advocate,” Nationalities Papers 39.1 (2011): 95-109.

4. For the government’s declarations on the language question and the rights of minorities to schooling in their own language, see Delehan and Vyskvarko (2009, 32-33, 67, 80, 91).

5. Many tropes of this history writing can be found in Vasyl Pachovskyi’s Istoriia Zakarpattia (1946), which was written in 1921 and republished following the end of the Second World War. It describes the region’s evolution from ancient times, including the long oppression of the people at the hands of Hungar­ian rulers and its exploitation by Jews (168-69). Yurii Borshava’s Vid Uhor- skoi Rusi do Karpatskoi Ukrainy (Philadelphia, 1956) is a similar account and is addressed to the Rusyn community in Pittsburgh. Among novelistic treatment of these themes, one could mention Volodymyr Birchak’s Volodar Rostyslavych: Istorychna povist z XI-ho viku (Volodymyr Rostyslavych: A Historical Novel from the Eleventh Century, 1930), which describes an inva­sion by the Hungarian army, and Ulas Samchuk’s Hory hovoriat (The Hills Speak, 1944), which describes life under Hungarian rule before the First World War, the population’s exploitation by Hungarians and Jews, and its gradual conversion to a Ukrainian identity.

6. The territory was left with 11,000 square kilometers (from the earlier 12,639), and a population of 552,000. Shandor gives the following nationality com­position for the territory after the Vienna Arbitration: Ukrainians 413,481 (75.9%), Jews 65,828 (12.8%), Hungarians 25,894 (3.25%), Czechs and

Slovaks 17, 495 (3.25%), Germans 8,715 (1.60%), Poles 78 (0.02%), others 13,268 (2.44%) (Shandor 1997, 84).

7. See Shkandrij (2015) for an analysis of these broadcasts.

8. The newspaper existed from 15 May 1938 to 15 March 1939 as an organ of the Ukrainian People’s Union (Ukrainske Natsionalne Obiednannia) and was edited by Svyryd Dovhal and Vasyl Grendzha-Donskyi. From November 1938, it became the official organ of the Carpatho-Ukrainian government. From its first issue, the newspaper stated that it was not dependent on any political party, but served the interests of the entire population.

9. Some scholars have complained that Hungarian archivists have been reluctant to provide researchers from Transcarpathia with materials that might expose “the horrors of what was done to members of the Sich and nationally con­scious Ukrainians” (Khudanych 1996, 3).

References

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Delehan, Mykhailo and Serhii Vyskvarko. 2009. Karpatska Ukraina (1938-1939). Uzhhorod: Vseukrainske derzhavne vydavnytstvo “Karpaty”.

“Dovkola spravy Zakarpattia.” 1938. Novyi shliakh. 14 October.

Editorial. 1938. Toronto Daily Star. 5 December.

Kentii, Anatolii. 2005. Zbroinyi chyn ukrains’kykh natsionalistiv, 1920-1956: Istoryko-arkhivni narysy. Vol. 1. Kyiv: Derzhavnyi komitet arkhiviv Ukrainy.

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