Soviet Partisans in Ukraine

Soon after the German invasion, Communist party officials began to organize partisan units behind enemy lines. The Soviet Union organized many partisan bases in the 1920s and early 1930s in case of possible war. Then, at the end of the 1930s a new military doctrine was adopted. According to that doctrine, the USSR was supposed to wage only offensive wars and thus did not need partisan bases anymore. As a result, practically all the partisan bases were destroyed. Consequently, partisans could not play important role in 1941. They were badly organized and the population did not support them much. An official German report stated, for example, in August 1941: “Brought by air, Russian partisans do not have any influence on local population. Ukrainians catch them and hand over to us.” As the war continued and Nazi brutalities in the occupied areas became widespread, the partisan movement started to grow. In June 1942, in Moscow, the Ukrainian Partisan Command (UPC) led by Timofei Strokach, General of NKVD, was established. The UPC trained various partisan cadres, reconnaissance and diversion groups for working in German rears. It also coordinated the activity of partisan units, supplied them with weapons and medicines, and sent specially trained officers. The leaders of partisan units had Soviet military ranks and received officers’ salaries as if they were fighting in regular troops. The largest Soviet partisan units numbered several thousand people and made long raids in German rears. Partisans were quite active and efficient. In 1943, for example, they blew up 3,688 military trains and destroyed 1,469 railway bridges. Germany had to keep numerous garrisons and troops in Ukraine to repulse partisan attacks and protect communications.

Compared to Belorussia with its swampy regions, much of the open Ukrainian countryside was unsuited for partisan warfare. Thus, in Ukraine, Soviet partisans never became as significant as they were in Belorussia. In Galicia, where the OUN was well established, Soviet partisans had no popular base for their activity. Consequently, most of their operations in Ukraine were confined to parts of Volhynia and Polissia. In 1944 there were approximately 40,000 Soviet partisans in Ukraine.¹⁸

The Soviet partisan movement often complicated the position of peasantry. Many peasants found themselves pressed from both sides (Soviet partisans and Germans). If peasants helped partisans, they were punished by Germans. If they refused to help the partisans, they could be punished by them. (The help usually included food, shelter, and clothes.) Soviet partisans completely or partially burnt 30 Ukrainian villages. Many Ukrainian villages were burnt by Germans as well.¹⁹

The Ukrainian Insurgent Army (upа)

It was in Polissia and Volhynia that the first Ukrainian nationalist partisan units appeared and, surprisingly, at the outset they were not associated with the OUN. As soon as the Nazi-Soviet war broke out, Taras Bulba-Borovets, a local Ukrainian activist, formed an irregular unit called “Polissian Sich”, later renamed the UPA (Ukrainska Povstanska Armiia – Ukrainian Insurgent Army), for the purpose of cleansing his region of the remnants of the Red Army. He proclaimed himself the major otaman of Ukraine. When the Germans tried to disband his unit in late 1941, he started to fight both the Germans and the Soviets. In 1942, members of both OUN-M and OUN-B also established small units in Volhynia.

In early 1943 almost all units of the OUN-M, the OUN-B, and Borovets were united into the UPA under the leadership of OUN-B. D. Kliachkovsky (Klym Savur), a member of the OUN-B leadership, was elected commander-in-chief of the UPA.²⁰ The UPA quickly grew into a large, well-organized partisan army, which took control of large parts of Volhynia, Polissia, and, later, Galicia. Its numbers reached close to 40,000 fighters.²¹ 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.

In contrast to Soviet partisans, the UPA tried to avoid direct anti-German actions. The UPA units fought against the Germans only when being attacked or when it was necessary. They tried to spare local population from Nazi’s retaliating actions. More than 250 villages in Ukraine were burned with their inhabitants as punishments for Soviet partisan actions (the so-called collective responsibility practice). Moreover, in many regions of Volhynia and Polissia the UPA managed to protect German communications from diversions of Soviet partisans. By protecting German communications they protected Ukrainian civilians from retaliating actions. On the other hand, the UPA did not want to help the Soviet army by attacking the German army and thus losing their men. Regular fighting between the UPA and Germans started only from February 1943 and was not large-scale. The major enemies of the UPA were Soviet and Polish partisans.

In the course of the war the OUN changed its totalitarian ideology to get broader support. At its major large meetings in August 1943 and July 1944 the organization proclaimed democratization of the national movement. The OUN allowed the existence of several political parties instead of one, and gave up their slogan “Ukraine for Ukrainians!” Such democratic freedoms as those of speech, meetings, the press, consciousness, etc were also proclaimed, mostly to attract attention of the old western democracies (USA and Great Britain). The OUN hoped to get their help in the ‘fight against both dictators’: Hitler and Stalin. In general, the number one enemy of the UPA was the Soviet Union, the number two – Poland, and the number three – Germany.

When Soviet troops came to Western Ukraine in 1944 the UPA concluded an armistice with the Germans to spare its men for the fight against the Soviets. The retreating Germans left military supplies for the UPA and continued to supply the nationalists by air. Some Russian historians and pro-Russian politicians from Eastern Ukraine (N.Vitrenko, P.Symonenko) point to these facts as signs of collaboration between the Nazis and the UPA. Most Ukrainian historians, however, say that it was a practical decision on both sides as the Germans and the UPA had a very powerful common enemy.

Pro-Russian politicians in Ukraine claim that ‘serving’ Hitler was the greatest of Bandera’s crimes. Their opponents say that the relations between the OUN and Germans were tactical, while the strategic goal of the OUN was to achieve independence. At the same time they stress the fact that Fascist Germany and the Soviet Union cooperated until 22 June 1941. They also claim that the Communist regime in the USSR differed very little from the Nazi regime in Germany.