The Denouement

The retreat of the Galicians into Eastern Ukraine and their link with the forces of the Directory was a momentous occasion in the history of the Ukrainian national movement. For the first time the West and East Ukrainian nationalists, who had for generations emphasized their fraternal bonds, came into contact with each other on a mass scale.

Despite their precarious position in the small stretch of Podilian territory that they controlled, there was hope that these two sorely pressed governments and armies would coalesce into a single and effective force. Militarily, the Ukrainians had never been stronger. The Galician army numbered about 50,000 men. Of all the Ukrainian, Bolshevik, and White Russian armies that fought in Ukraine, it was probably the most disciplined and efficient. As a result of its recent reorganization and the addition of several highly talented commanders, the 35,000-man army of the Directory had improved greatly. In addition, about 15,000 partisans, led by otamany such as Zeleny and Anhel, coordinated their activities with those of the Directory’s forces. Thus, the Ukrainians had a force of about 100,000 battle-tested troops that made them a contender to be reckoned with.

The influx of conscientious Galician officials also had a positive impact on the Directory’s administrative apparatus. For the first time, a semblance of law, order, and stability appeared on the Directory’s territory. This rise in administrative effectiveness, as well as the peasants’ growing disenchantment with the Bolsheviks, led to an increasingly favorable response to the Directory’s mobilization efforts on the Right Bank. However, the lack of arms and provisions forced Petliura to send many of the new recruits back to their homes.

It quickly became apparent, however, that the differences between the two Ukrainian governments went deeper than their ability to resolve them. First, a highly ambiguous relationship existed between Petliura’s Directory and Petrushevych’s dictatorship. In theory, the Directory was the all-Ukrainian government and therefore it claimed highest authority; in practice, however, it was the West Ukrainian government that had the stronger army and more efficient administration and so was not predisposed to accept policies with which it disagreed. Second, the two governments were at odds ideologically. The Directory consisted almost exclusively of leftist parties, while the West Ukrainian government had the backing of liberal parties with clearly conservative leanings. As a result, the easterners accused the Galicians of being “reactionaries,” and the latter returned the compliment by calling the former “near-Bolsheviks.” Highly organized and very nationally conscious, the Galicians reacted to the East Ukrainians’ organizational looseness, reliance on improvisation, and social radicalism with scorn. For their part, the East Ukrainians considered the Galicians to be provincial, bureaucratic, and incapable of grasping the broader context of the conflict in Ukraine. In the final analysis, it was clear that the vast cultural, psychological, and political differences that accumulated between East and West Ukrainians during the centuries of living in very dissimilar environments were now coming to the fore.

The impact of these differences became apparent during the combined Ukrainian offensive against the Bolsheviks that was launched in early August 1919.

On 30 August, Galician units marched into Kiev, recently evacuated by the Bolsheviks, and the Directory prepared for a triumphal entry the next day. However, later that day advance units of Denikin’s army also moved into the city and confronted the Galicians. Confused about how to react to the Whites – the West Ukrainian government often declared that it had no quarrel with Denikin – the Galicians pulled back, to the great dismay of Petliura and the East Ukrainians, who desperately desired the capture of Kiev for symbolic and political reasons. Days later, when Petliura finally convinced the Galicians to engage the Whites, it was too late to retake the city and the Ukrainian armies retreated westward, embittered with each other and involved in an unwanted conflict with the Whites. In effect, the struggle for Ukrainian statehood ended here. What followed was an extremely confusing and tragic epilogue. The Whites

Led by reactionary generals who were bent on restoring the old social order and “one, indivisible Russia,” the Whites despised the “socialistic adventurer” Petliura and the East Ukrainian “separatist traitors” almost as much as the Bolsheviks. (They had nothing against the Galicians, however, for they considered them to be foreigners.) The Whites’ stand on the Ukrainian issue was bluntly stated by Vasilii Shulgin, their leading propagandist, when Denikin’s forces captured Kiev: “The Southwest district [Shulgin refused to use the term “Ukraine”] is Russian, Russian, Russian… we will give it neither to the Ukrainian traitors nor to the Jewish executioners” (a reference to the numerous Jews in the Bolshevik Cheka or political police).⁸

With attitudes like this predominating among the Whites, it is not suprising that the overconfident Denikin refused even to consider several offers by Petliura to cooperate against the Bolsheviks.

By fall 1919, the situation of the Ukrainians was truly tragic. The Whites were attacking them from one side, the Bolsheviks were about to strike from another, and in their rear were the aggressive Poles and the hostile Romanians. This constantly shrinking “perimeter of death” became unbearable when, in October, the exhausted, undernourished Ukrainian armies, bereft of supplies and shelter, were struck by a typhoid epidemic. Within a few weeks the vast majority of these troops were dead, dying, or incapacitated by the disease. It was at this point that the once-proud Galician army disintegrated. By the end of October, it reported that it had only 4000 combat-ready men left. Petliura’s soldiers numbered only 2000. Those who remained tried to save themselves as best they could.

On 6 November 1919, the Galician commander, General Myron Tarnavsky, placed his men under the command of the Whites on the condition that they would not have to fight against other Ukrainians and that they be given a chance to recuperate. Meanwhile, Petrushevych and his associates made their way to Vienna, where they established a government-in-exile. Petliura and the Directory, for their part, sought refuge in Poland while their troops transformed themselves into partisan units that operated behind Bolshevik lines. Thus, in a depressing finale, remnants of the two Ukrainian governments and armies found themselves in the camps of each other’s enemies.

There was, however, a sequel to the protracted defeat of the Ukrainian struggle for independence. On 21 April 1920, Petliura, after renouncing all claims to Eastern Galicia (a move which enraged the Galician Ukrainians), concluded a pact with the Poles for a combined attack against the Bolsheviks in Ukraine. The Polish motive for entering into this unexpected agreement was their desire to create an East Ukrainian buffer state between themselves and Russia. They hoped that once Petliura’s reconstituted army appeared in Ukraine, their offensive would gain the support of the land’s anti-Bolshevik peasantry. As usual, matters went well at the outset and by 6 May the allied forces, numbering about 65,000 Poles and 15,000 Ukrainians, took Kiev.

The expected ground swell of peasant support did not materialize, however. Apparently Petliura’s personal popularity with many peasants was not great enough to overcome their traditional dislike of his Polish “landlord” allies. By June the Bolsheviks launched a counterattack, which eventually led to Polish/Soviet peace talks and the Poles’ abandonment of Petliura. The East Ukrainian army, which had grown to about 35,000 men, fought on alone against the Bolsheviks until 10 November 1920, when it was forced to abandon its small stretch of Volhynia and accept internment in Polish-held territory. Except for several unsuccessful partisan operations that were launched into Soviet Ukraine a year later, the war for Ukrainian independence was finally over.