Dr. Grzegorz Rossoliński-Liebe and Ideology of Stepan Bandera and OUN-UPA, crimes committed by Ukrainian nationalists on Jews and Poles, as well as past in the service of politics.
(Interview is simply a edited and completed version of the podcast Are you aware? p. Bandera. Fascism, genocide, worship. Life and story of Ukrainian Nationalist).
Grzegorz Rossoliński-Liebe
Historian, working at the Free University of Berlin (Freeie Universität Berlin). He studied at the European University of Viadrina in Frankfurt on Oder and defended his doctorate at the University of Hamburg. He was a scholarship holder of The Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Fritz-Thyssen-Stiftung and Fondation pour la Mémoire de la Shoah. Author of many publications on the past of fascism, the Holocaust, nationalism and anti-Semitism.
Rafał Górski: How deep did Bandera and fascist ideology connect?
Grzegorz Rossoliński-Liebe: Stepan Bandera undoubtedly had a lot to do with fascism – for years he was created as the leader of the Ukrainian nation in the fascist state.
The interest of Bandera, as well as of his full generation of fascist ideology, begins in the 1920s. Young Ukrainian nationalists are then influenced by the views of Dmytro Doncov, who was 1 of the main ideologists of Ukrainian fascism and extremist nationalism.
In forming the Ukrainian nationalist movement Bandera plays an crucial role, becoming the leader of the younger generation of Ukrainian Nationalist Organizations over time.
The CNS was founded in 1929 in Vienna by Ukrainian planet War I veterans. Ukrainians lost the conflict to make their own state, but after the war, Ukrainian veterans formed the Ukrainian Military Organization in Prague in 1920. In 1925, the UWO office was moved to Berlin, while after the establishment of the UWO Ukrainian Nationalist Organisations in Vienna in 1929, it formally became part of the CNS. In the early 1930s, Bandera became 1 of the leaders of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists.
Is the CNS violent in the 1930s?
The CNS is an organization that reaches for force in its most utmost manifestations – its victims are Polish politicians, but besides Ukrainian political activists considered by nationalists to be besides convenient to the Polish state and Jews. In June 1934, Bronisław Pieracki – Polish Minister of the Interior – was killed by a associate of the OUN, Hryhorija Maciejko. After this murder, there are 2 loud trials against the CNS – 1 taking place in Warsaw and the another in Łódź. During both processes, accused members of the CNS openly mention to fascist symbolism, including by performing fascist salutes.
At that time, CNS publications can find praises of Italian fascism and arguments that fascism should become a vehicle of conflict for the creation of the Ukrainian national state. On the another hand, it should be stressed that erstwhile the fascist movement appeared in Italy, Doncow and another nationalist ideologists wrote that Ukrainian extremist nationalism resembled Italian fascism, but the CNS should officially operate under the banner of nationalism.
How is the CNS politically situated after the outbreak of planet War II?
In 1940 there was a divided in the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, resulting in 2 fighting factions. At the head of 1 of them, focusing the younger generation of the CNS, was the Bander (OUN-B, the alleged bander), and at the head of the second Andrij Melnyk (OUN-M, the alleged melnikows).
Following the German attack on the russian Union, On 30 June 1941, OUN-B announced in Lviv the declaration of independency of Ukraine and established a temporary government with Prime Minister Jarosław Stećka, putting the Germans into dismay.
The state proclaimed at that time survived only a fewer days. In early July 1941, Germany arrested most of the members of the government and Bandera himself was placed under home arrest in Berlin.
When studying the plans drawn up by the CNS-B for the creation of this state, it is perfectly visible that it was to be a fascist state, and that the Nationalists from the CNS-B were mostly inspired by the Slovak example, where under the German protectorate a clerical-fascist state was created, the leader of which was Fr Jozef Tiso – as well as events in Croatia, where the fascist state of Ustasha was created in April 1941. Bandera and another OUN-B leaders then sent a letter of congratulations to Ustasha's leader, Ante Pavelić, hoping that Hitler would let them to form a akin state. But they were incorrect about Hitler's plans. It was a minute erstwhile the CNS-B began to slow decision distant from Fascism – but it was a slow process that practically never ended.
After the war, Bander and another OUN-B veterans presented the proclamation of the state in Lviv in 1941 as an anti-German act, denying that the OUN was a fascist movement and thus lying an crucial episode in the past of the OUN.
Does the arrest by the Germans of Bandera close the fascist phase in the past of the CNS?
After the arrest of Bandera in 1941, the fascist ideology inactive plays an crucial function in the CNS – this is seen, among others, during the collaboration of Ukrainian police and members of the CNS with Germany during the extermination of Jews in Western Ukraine. At that time, about 800 1000 Jews were murdered – 550 1000 in east Galicia and 250 1000 in Volyn.
The members of the CNS were motivated by racial motives – the extermination of Jews was to be a step towards the creation of a "clean ethnically" national Ukrainian state. The 1941 concept of this country assumed that only cultural Ukrainians – Jews, Poles or Russians – could live in it.
At the end of 1942, members of the CNS-B establish UPA – Ukrainian Insurgency Army, which together with the CNS-B will be liable for the extermination of the Polish civilian population in Volyn and in east Galicia. Bandera resides at this time in Berlin and then in a concentration camp in Sachsenhausen as a political prisoner and is not oriented in the changes that happen in the CNS-UPA. However, erstwhile he is released in late 1944, he inactive believes in fascism and wants to usage the fascist ideology to fight the russian Union, which is then the main enemy of the Ukrainians – and will be so besides after the end of the war.
As a consequence of cultural cleansing on the Polish population, which was done by Ukrainian nationalists from the CNS-UPA, Poles are no longer seen as an crucial enemy of the Ukrainian state – unlike before planet War I. The same is actual of Jews, who are almost no longer in Ukraine – were murdered by Germans and Ukrainians during the German occupation.
After the end of the war, Bandera continues his independency activity on emigration, but will no longer play an crucial political role. In 1959, in Munich, he died in an assassination by KGB agent Bohdan Staszynski.
How did the postwar cult of Stepan Bandera shape?
In the authoritative interviews which Bandera gave after the war ended, he denied that the CNS-B was a fascist organization – and at the same time continued to usage elements of this ideology to fight the russian Union. In turn, the people who formed Bandera after his death created his image as fascist leader. In post-war years, this cult develops among Ukrainian expatriates who evacuated from the territory of Ukraine along with the German army in 1944.
After the death of Bandera, during the celebrations to his honour organised by Ukrainian emigration – both in West Germany and in the United Kingdom, Canada, USA and Australia – fascist elements are inactive visible, but are not the main component of these celebrations.
What about today?
Before Putin attacked Ukraine, Bandera was considered a hero by a large part of the Western society of Ukraine – and I mean both intelligent elites and average people, as well as extremist nationalist organizations, including neofascist. Each group sees Bandera somewhat differently.
For the majority of Ukrainians, he is simply a national hero who fought for independency of Ukraine – but already neofascist organizations openly mention to fascist themes in the past of the CNS-B and Bandera itself, they know and distribute publications published by the CNS in the 1930s and 1940s.
The title of your book includes the word “genocide”. Do you think that in the 1940s in Volyn and in east Galicia we had to deal with genocide committed by Ukrainian nationalists?
Genocide is an crucial part of the past of the CNS, UPA and Bandera itself. In the book I am trying to describe very thoroughly how the CNS and UPA helped Germans execution Jews in Western Ukraine, as well as what the participation of both organizations in the assassination of the Polish population in 1943 in Volyn and in 1944 in east Galicia. I besides compose about the CNS and UPA killing Ukrainians helping Jews and Poles, as well as supporting the russian Union.
Genocide, "purification of the area" and mostly national force are very crucial components in the past and ideology of the CNS-UPA.
Using the word genocide genocide) to describe the crimes of Ukrainian nationalists on Polish and judaic people makes the most sense from a technological point of view. UN and UPA force is being studied as part of an interdisciplinary trend called genocide studies. genocide studies).
Problems arise erstwhile politicians, and sometimes scientists, begin instrumentalizing the word genocide, to equalize the suffering of Poles with victims of the Holocaust – or usage it to deny the execution of Ukrainians by Polish perpetrators. These are cases where the word “genocide” is utilized to accomplish political or moral benefits. So here we are dealing with 2 discourses: technological and political.
