Resistance

As elsewhere in occupied Europe, underground resistance to the Germans in Ukraine developed soon after their arrival, primarily in response to Nazi policies. It was aided by the fact that the Germans did not have enough troops to control the vast areas they conquered.

It was in Polissia and Volhynia that the first Ukrainian nationalist partisan units appeared and, surprisingly, at the outset they were not associated with OUN. AS soon as the Nazi-Soviet war broke out, Taras Bulba-Borovets, a local Ukrainian activist linked with the UNR – Petliurist government-in-exile in Warsaw, formed an irregular unit called “Polissian Sich,” later renamed the UPA (Ukrainska Povstanska Armiia – Ukrainian Insurgent Army), for the purpose of clearing his region of the remnants of the Red Army. When the Germans tried to disband his unit in late 1941, he took his men into “the woods” to fight both the Germans and the Soviets. In 1942, members of both OUN-M and OUN-B, who were fleeing Koch’s repression, also established small units in Volhynia.

In late 1942, the OUN-B decided to form a large-scale partisan force and thereby lay the foundation for a regular Ukrainian army, which they believed would be needed when the Nazi-Soviet war came to an end. There were also extremely pressing immediate reasons for such a step: first, as German repression of the local populace increased, the villagers demanded that the OUN take steps to protect them, and, second, as Soviet partisans from Belorussia began to penetrate into northwestern Ukraine by late 1942, it was necessary for the OUN to assume the role of the “people’s army” in order to prevent the Soviets from doing so.

In order to unite all the nationalist units, the OUN-B forcibly incorporated the units of Borovets and OUN-M into its own forces for which it now usurped the name UPA. Roman Shukhevych, a member of the OUN-B leadership and the highest-ranking Ukrainian officer in the recently disbanded Nachtigall unit, was appointed commander-in-chief of the expanded force. Benefiting from the extensive and efficient OUN-B underground network, UPA quickly grew into a large, well-organized partisan army, which took control of large parts of Volhynia, Polissia, and, later, Galicia. Although many Ukrainian emigre and even some Soviet sources claim that, at its high point in late 1943 to early 1944, its numbers reached over 100,000, well-substantiated estimates place the figure at between 30,000 and 40,000 fighters.¹² Compared to other underground movements in Nazi-occupied Europe, the UPA was unique in that it had practically no foreign support. Its growth and strength were, therefore, an indication of the very considerable popular support it enjoyed among the Ukrainians.

The rapid growth of UPA necessitated the broadening of its political base. Although the OUN-B provided much of UPA’s leadership, it was clear that one integral nationalist faction could not claim to be representative of Ukrainians as a whole. Therefore, in July 1944, at the initiative of OUN-B, delegates from various prewar West Ukrainian political parties (but not the OUN-M) and spokesmen for the East Ukrainians met secretly near Sambir in Galicia to form the UHVR (Ukrainska Holovna Vyzvolna Rada – Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council).

Some of these ideological changes were already evident in 1943, when an OUN-B congress declared: “The OUN is fighting against imperialism and against empires… for this reason, the OUN is fighting against the USSR and against Germany’s ‘New Europe.’”¹³ Emphasizing its support for an anti-Nazi and anti-Soviet position, the UHVR also proposed several important amendments to integral nationalist doctrine. It called for greater tolerance of non-integral nationalist ideologies, rejected racial and ethnic exclusivity, and paid much greater attention to socioeconomic issues, which were of greatest interest to Soviet Ukrainians. Furthermore, UHVR urged the non-Russian nationalities of the USSR to unite against Moscow. It soon became evident, however, that no matter what adjustments the integral nationalists made, they would find it extremely difficult to survive in the tightly controlled Soviet system. The Ukrainian/Polish massacres

Not only did UPA take on both the Nazis and the Soviets, but in the mixed Ukrainian/Polish areas of Volhynia, Polissia, and Kholm, it also became involved in an exceedingly brutal conflict with the Poles. Regardless of the outcome of the war, Ukrainian integral nationalists were determined to drive the Poles (many of whom were colonists from the interwar period) out of areas where Ukrainians were a majority. For its part, the Polish nationalist underground army, the Armija Krajowa (AK), was just as determined to retain control of lands that had been part of the Polish state. The result was a murderous struggle – often encouraged by the Germans and provoked by Soviet partisans – between Ukrainian and Polish forces for territory and to settle old scores.

Tragically, it was the civilian population that bore most of the costs.

Soon after the German invasion, Communist party officials began to organize underground units behind enemy lines. Throughout the war Soviet partisans were tighly controlled by the Kremlin. Because the Soviet underground developed slowly and achieved few successes in 1941 and early 1942, it was reorganized by the Central Partisan Staff in Moscow in May 1942. A month later the Ukrainian Partisan Command was established, led by Timofei Strokach, a high NKVD official. After the victory at Stalingrad, the numbers and activity of Soviet partisans grew considerably, especially in the desolate, swampy regions of Belorussia.

But in Ukraine, Soviet partisans never became as significant as they were in Belorussia. Much of the open Ukrainian countryside was unsuited for partisan warfare. And in Western Ukraine, where the OUN was well established, Soviet partisans had no popular base for their activity. So most of their operations in Ukraine were confined to parts of Volhynia and Polissia.

The goals of the Soviet partisans were to disrupt German communications (they were especially effective in the so-called “railroad war,” that is, impeding the flow of German reinforcements to the front); to tie down much-needed German troops; to spread insecurity and disorder behind enemy lines; and to maintain a Soviet presence in occupied territories.

Among the major Soviet partisan commanders in Ukraine were Sydir Kovpak, Aleksander Saburov, and Petro Vershyhora. The celebrated Kovpak established himself in Polissia early in 1943. With a staff of well-trained officers and supplies delivered to secret airfields, he built up a force of several thousand men. In the summer of 1943, he launched a lengthy raid into the Carpathians. It did not achieve its main military goal – the destruction of the Carpathian oil fields – and most of the unit was destroyed. But the psychological and political impact of this raid was considerable, for it demonstrated the Germans’ inability to secure their hinterland and raised the possibility of a Soviet return.

Soviet authors are quick to note that their underground in Ukraine was a massive internationalist movement, consisting of sixty-two nationalities. But according to Soviet data, Ukrainians were clearly underrepresented in Soviet partisan ranks.¹⁵ Although Ukrainians were close to 80% of the population, they constituted only 46% of the fighters in the five major Soviet partisan units in Ukraine (only one-third of Kovpak’s men were Ukrainians). Russians were overrepresented, accounting for more than 37% of the partisans. Some Soviet works claim that the number of Soviet partisans in Ukraine was as high as 250,000 and even 500,000, while others put it at less than 50,000. Western specialists usually accept the last figure.¹⁶ In any case, Soviet depiction of its partisan movement as a massive, patriotic rallying of the Ukrainian masses against the Germans is misleading (as is the nationalist treatment of UPA, which makes similar claims). The vast majority of Ukraine’s population during the war remained politically uncommitted and was concerned not so much with resistance as with survival.