UPA actions against the USSR

At the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, the armed formations of the OUN (b) were actively involved in sabotage coordinated with the German troops and disorganization of the rear Red Army .

In late 1943 - early 1944, with the approach of Soviet troops (1st Ukrainian Front, 13th and 60th armies) to the areas of operation of the UPA, separate detachments The UPA offered them armed resistance together with the German troops.

As the UPA detachments found themselves in the rear of the Soviet troops, they either crossed the front line or continued attacks on small rear units and individual Red Army soldiers; part of the members of the UPA, following the orders of the leadership, cordially greeted the Red Army in order to dull the vigilance of the Soviet counterintelligence, collected intelligence information about the reserves and the movement of Soviet troops and transferred it to Department 1s of the Army Group South.

During this period, the UPA-North detachments were most active in the Rivne and Volyn regions (in the zone of operations of the 13th Army). From January to February 1944 alone, 154 attacks on units and individual servicemen of the Red Army were registered in the Rivne region, as a result of which 439 Soviet servicemen were killed. In a number of cases, the killings were committed with particular cruelty. In total, from January 7 to March 2, 1944, up to 200 attacks by UPA units on small columns with military equipment and small groups of Red Army soldiers were recorded in the 13th Army's zone of operations. As a result of one of these attacks, he was wounded in the thigh and later died the commander of the 1st Ukrainian Front, army General Red Army. Reports on the actions of the UPA / OUN looked like this: “On February 5, 1944, the gang attacked the Steshelsk junction. The sergeant of the railway brigade of the Red Army was killed, the bandits took 9 girls - servicemen of the spacecraft into the forest. In 1944, an ambulance train was blown up in the Rivne region, 40 nurses were taken into the forest. In with. Ivanovtsy in the Stanislav region, a hundred UPA "Spartana" shot 30 soldiers of the railway regiment of the NKVD. The UPA adhered to this tactic until March 1944. In April-May 1944, the nature of its actions changed dramatically. The reason for this was the preparation of the troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front for an offensive against the German troops. The leadership of the OUN instructed the commander of the "Southern Group" of the UPA ("Zagrava-Turov") Eney to disrupt this preparation - to disable the main railways and highways, prevent their restoration and begin active operations against the Red Army.

The UPA organized a number of sabotage on communications, and open armed demonstrations took place in the north of the Ternopil region, which were suppressed by the forces of the active units of the Red Army and the NKVD troops. During the clashes, the UPA-South units suffered significant losses, in connection with which the GK (Head Team) of the UPA disbanded the UPA-South and included the surviving units in the UPA-West and UPA-North, and also changed tactics - “... not to show any activity not to engage in clashes with the troops, to retain and continue to train personnel, to create sabotage and terrorist groups for the subsequent fight against Soviet power.

Only after the advance of Soviet troops to the West and the withdrawal of front-line units from the western regions of Ukraine in July-August 1944 did the active operations of the UPA resume again. In addition to ambushes on highways, shelling cars and killing individual servicemen, attacks on military depots and sabotage on communications, the actions of the OUN-UPA were also aimed at disrupting the mobilization campaign and food supplies for the Red Army. Separate military units were also attacked - for example, on August 18, 1944, in the area of ​​​​the village of Syulko-Bozhyk, Podgaetsky district, Ternopil region, the 1st battalion of the 1331st rifle regiment, which was moving to the front line, was fired from mortars and machine guns, as a result of which it suffered significant losses. VNOS posts were destroyed.

UPA units carried out attacks on regional centers in order to divert additional military units to protect them.

In the documents of the OUN-UPA, these actions are characterized as follows: “In all places, the mass liquidation of the Red Army began ... taking into account the composition of the army, only Russians and almost all Komsomol members” (OUN information report from the Stanislav (Ivano-Frankivsk) region; “10 Bolsheviks were taken prisoner "All of them were not Ukrainians, and some were Komsomol members. The prisoners were liquidated."

Sabotage on the communications of the Red Army and attacks on military cargo continued until the end of the war. In total, from the attacks of the UPA and armed members of the OUN (b) and during the suppression of the armed resistance of other nationalist and bandit formations (UNRA and Melnik’s detachments) in 1944, the Red Army suffered such losses: “killed and hanged” - 157 officers and 1880 soldiers and sergeants, wounded - 74 and 1770, respectively, "missing and taken to the forest" - 31 and 402. From the beginning of the year to May 1, 1945, 33 officers and 443 soldiers and sergeants were "killed or hanged", 11 officers and 80 soldiers and sergeants were missing without a trace.

After the elimination of large UPA armed formations in the spring and summer of 1945, OUN-UPA attacks on single Red Army servicemen who were on leave or on business trips continued until the end of the 1940s. In total, from the actions of the OUN-UPA in the period from 1944 to 1956, 3199 military personnel of the Armed Forces, border and internal troops USSR, of which 2844 before May 1, 1945.

UPA and OUN(b) in Poland

Memorial plaque with the names of the victims

The first units of the UPA - which came from Galicia and Volhynia - appeared in the southeastern regions of the region in the spring and summer of 1944. Active efforts to develop the OUN(b) network began after the allocation of "Zakerzonia" (the term used by the OUN(b) to refer to the territories lying to the west of the so-called "Curzon Line") into a separate "organizational region" of the OUN(b) in March 1945 R. Shukhevych appointed Y. Starukh ("Stag") as its leader. P. Fedoriv (“Dalnich”) was appointed to lead the Security Council of the OUN (b) in the “krai”, the UPA detachments were headed by M. Onishkevich (“Orest”). In the summer of 1945, another reorganization took place in the structure of the OUN (B), as a result of which the territory where the OUN (b) structures began to be called VO 6 "Xiang" (Military District "San").

The first task that the UPA was occupied with in the summer of 1945 was the destruction of resettlement commissions, military personnel of the Polish Army and the destruction by arson of villages from which settlers were evicted to the Ukrainian SSR. Polish settlements and civilians were also destroyed.

The attitude of the local population towards the OUN (b) and UPA, according to the captured reports of the OUN (b), in a number of areas inhabited by Lemkos, was “as towards people who deserted from the Red Army, who were guilty of something before the authorities, and having no other way out, went into the forest ." “Our movement is approached with distrust and apprehension… In general, the population does not believe that our movement has any weight and does not believe in the success of our cause.” Also, among the Ukrainians living in Poland, there were also sharper assessments “there are a lot of German police in the UPA, SS personnel who, saving themselves, involve others in their work.” They drew these conclusions by seeing those whom they remembered from the German police and from the stories of "life in the SS and on the German front."

The Polish police and security forces, which were in the process of formation, were not able to effectively counteract the activities of the UPA and OUN (b). In this regard, a number of areas were actually beyond the control of the Polish civil administration, and large UPA units (more than 100 armed persons) continued to operate on the territory of the PPR. In the Ukrainian SSR, such formations were liquidated by the summer of 1945. The total number of detachments of the UPA SB OUN (b) and the OUN (b) network is estimated at up to 6 thousand participants, of which up to 2.5 thousand are only armed members of the UPA.

The Polish authorities began the final liquidation of the OUN (b) and UPA on their territory in April 1947 by creating the Vistula task force for this. In the zone of operations of the Vistula OG, there were kurens (battalions) under the leadership of P. Mykolenko - "Baida", "Ren", "Zaliznyak" and "Berkut" and several smaller detachments of the UPA and the Security Council of the OUN (b). The operation against them was launched on April 19, 1947. The first actions showed the ineffectiveness of the use of large military formations against small enemy groups. Many of the units that arrived were unfamiliar with the terrain and enemy tactics. After the intensification of intelligence activities, actions were launched against the Bayda and Rena kurens, as a result of which they (according to the Polish side) lost up to 80% of their personnel. Their remnants were ousted from the territory of the PPR to Czechoslovakia and partly to the USSR. Hundreds (companies) of the Zaliznyak kuren were reduced to 15-25 people, one hundred were completely eliminated. By July 22, 1947, the smallest Berkut hut suffered the least, the liquidation of which should be completed by the 3rd Infantry Division.

By July 30, 623 people were killed, 796 were taken prisoner and 56 surrendered voluntarily. 6 mortars, 9 heavy and 119 light machine guns, 4 anti-tank rifles, 369 mines and 550 machine guns and carbines were captured. Own sanitary losses amounted to 59 killed and 59 wounded soldiers of the Polish Army. The Internal Security Corps lost 52 soldiers killed and 14 wounded. Also, 152 civilians died from the actions of the OUN-UPA. 1,582 suspects of belonging to the OUN(b) and UPA networks were also detained.

A special judicial body was created within the framework of the OG "Vistula" to consider the cases of those taken prisoner and detainees. Until July 22, 1947, they were given 112 death sentences, 46 were sentenced to imprisonment, and 230 cases were still pending. A filtration camp named "Central labor camp in Jaworzno" was created to hold the suspects. One of the last to be placed in it were 112 members of the UPA, transferred by Czechoslovakia.

The structures of the UPA and OUN(b) in Poland were formally disbanded by R. Shukhevych as “completely lost” in the early autumn of 1947. The “commander” of the VO 6 “Xiang” M. Onishkevich “Orest”, “Bogdan”, “Bily” himself was taken alive along with the archive on March 2, 1948.

Cooperation of the UPA with the Wehrmacht, the German police and security service (SD)

According to Ivan Kachanovsky, at least 46% of the OUN(b) and UPA leaders in Ukraine served during the Second World War in the police, the Nachtigall and Roland battalions, the SS Galicia division, local administration, or studied in German-organized military and intelligence schools. In particular, at least 23% served in the auxiliary police, Schutzmannschaft battalion 201 and other police formations, 18% in military and intelligence schools in Germany and occupied Poland, 11% in the Nachtigall and Roland battalions, 8% - in the district and local administrative bodies in Ukraine during the Nazi occupation and 1% - in the SS division "Galicia". At the same time, at least 27% of OUN(b) and UPA leaders were arrested or interned. German secret services, police or other occupying forces. The number of Nazi collaborators among the leaders of the OUN(b) and UPA may have been higher than the above estimates, since in many cases there is no information regarding their activities in occupied Ukraine and Poland at the beginning of the war.

The beginning of tactical negotiations and the establishment of ties between the German authorities and the OUN(b)-UPA falls at the end of 1943: at the same time, the actual folding of the "anti-German front" of the UPA begins. The “Tactical Instruction” approved on December 24, 1943 by the leadership of the UPA indicated that on the anti-German front the most important current task was to preserve forces and means for the “decisive moment of the struggle”. Only actions in self-defense were allowed. At the same time, cases were also indicated when UPA units could engage in armed clashes with German troops. These are cases of protecting civilians from pacification, punitive actions, as well as when seizing weapons and ammunition.

January 29, 1944 commander of the 13th Army Corps of the Wehrmacht Artur Hauffe ( German Arthur Hauffe) in his order noted that “the actions of the UPA against the Germans took on a smaller scale” and “in recent days, the nationalist gangs have been looking for contact with the German troops”, and in the case of “reaching the consent of the latter in the negotiations to conduct their battles exclusively against the Red Army, Soviet and Polish partisans” they were allowed to transfer a small amount of weapons and ammunition, while not allowing the possibility of its accumulation in large quantities. This approach was also approved by the command of the 4th Panzer Army, which included the corps. The cooperation of the German command and the UPA is also confirmed by reports Soviet partisans. Since February 1944, UPA units, together with units of the 14th Grenadier Division of the SS Troops "Galicia", have been fighting Soviet and Polish partisans in the Galicia district of the General Government

Fleeing from the terror of the UPA and part of the Ukrainian population (called "rezuny"), the Poles agreed to be sent to labor camps in Germany and sought to move to the districts of the General Government with a predominantly Polish population.

By the beginning of autumn 1943, many districts of the district of Volyn and Podolia of the Reichskommissariat of Ukraine became “ethnically pure” - according to the report of the UPA-SB for 1-10.09.43 (Mlyniv region), “during the reporting period, 17 Polish families (58 people) were liquidated ... The area as a whole cleared. There are no purebred Poles. The case of mixed families is being considered.”

At the same time, the anti-Polish actions of the UPA flowed into the territory of the Lublin district of the General Government - to the Kholmshchyna and Podlasie, where, in order to overcome the resistance of the Polish militia, which was stronger than in Volhynia, a number of UPA detachments were transferred from the district of Volhynia and Podolia of the Reichskommissariat Ukraine.

Units of the 14th Grenadier Division of the SS Troops "Galicia" also take part in the actions against the Poles. From the beginning of 1944, a large-scale anti-Polish action began in the Galicia district of the General Government. During January-March 1944, Polish settlements ("colonies") were attacked by UPA detachments and units of the 14th Grenadier Division of the SS Galicia Troops - the 4th and 5th regiments, which were under the jurisdiction of the SS and the police of the General Government. The most famous joint action of the UPA and the division of the SS Troops "Galicia" was the destruction of the Polish village of Guta Penyatskaya, where more than 500 civilians were killed. According to the Polish side, about 10,000 Poles were killed in the district of Galicia in the first half of 1944, and more than 300,000 more fled to the hinterland of the General Government.

On July 10, 1944, the commander of the UPA in the district of Galicia, Vasil Sidor, ordered "to constantly attack the Poles - up to the complete destruction of the latter on this earth." The implementation of this order was thwarted by the offensive of the Red Army, but the anti-Polish actions of the UPA units, although on a much smaller scale, continued in late 1944 - early 1945 and ceased on the territory of the Ukrainian SSR only with the mutual exchange of population between Poland and the Ukrainian SSR 1944-46.

The UPA detachments operating on the territory of Poland carried out attacks on the Poles until the end of the Vistula action in early 1947. The victims of the "retaliatory actions" of the UPA were mainly the civilian Polish population, rather than representatives of state structures. All in all, according to the historian Norman Davis, from 100 to 500 thousand ethnic Poles died at the hands of the UPA.

• Under the guise of the UPA, attacks on Polish villages to destroy the Polish underground were also carried out by Soviet sabotage detachments (partisans and NKVD detachments), forcing the Poles to seek contacts with the Red partisans, stimulating cooperation with the Soviet authorities, and also initiating attacks on Ukrainian villages, especially those who supported the UPA or serving as their bases.

• And sometimes UPA detachments under the guise of the NKVD and Soviet partisans staged punitive actions.

UPA actions against the Jewish population

A number of papers provide a core document OUN(b) dated May 1941 - the instruction "Struggle and activities of the OUN during the war" which indicated the tasks for the "organizational asset in Ukraine during the war" including "neutralization of the Jews", moreover, "both individually and as a national group" with the exception of assimilation.

Some members of the OUN felt that Jews needed to be discriminated against and removed from public life:

• I. Klimov prepared leaflets for the Regional Wire of the OUN (B) with anti-Semitic appeals.
• "Ukrainian peasant! Ukrainian worker! The land owned by the local Jews... is the property of the Ukrainian nation. Jews are the eternal enemy of the Ukrainian nation. From that day on, no one will go to work for a Jew. Jews must disappear from the Ukrainian land. Whoever goes to work for a Jew will be severely condemned and seriously wounded. Away with the Jews"
• “Don't let the Jews rob you,” said a leaflet distributed by the OUN in the village of Korostov, Zdolbunovsky povet. - Don't buy from a Jew. Drive the Jew out of the village. Let our slogan be: Away with the Jews"
• "Autobiography" of one of the leaders of the OUN (B) Yaroslav Stetsko: "Moscow and the Jews are the main enemies of Ukraine. Therefore, I stand on the position of the destruction of the Jews and the expediency of transferring to Ukraine the German methods of extremination [destruction] of the Jews, excluding their assimilation, etc.”
• Ya. Stetsko in the first days of the war was directly involved in the creation of the Ukrainian police to "eliminate the Jews"

According to some Polish historians, Ukrainian nationalists - and personally the future leader UPA Roman Shukhevych- involved in the killings and repressions against the Jewish and Polish population, which began immediately after entry into Lviv Battalion "Nachtigal"

Involvement of servicemen of the Ukrainian battalion "Nachtigal" in the repression and killings of civilians during Lviv(and to massacre of Lviv professors in particular) is currently a debatable issue. A number of works indicate that the pogrom was initiated by German propaganda and it began after the entry of the German occupation troops into Lviv when part of its inhabitants, who responded to the incitement of German propaganda, July 2 1941 perpetrated a pogrom of the Jewish population, during which about four thousand people died.

Lviv Jews

It should be noted that the accusations against the Nachtigal soldiers were brought only in 1959 in connection with the process against Theodor Oberländer, former officer of this battalion. A court in the GDR sentenced him in absentia to life imprisonment. But the trial, which took place in Germany, did not find evidence of the crimes of Oberländer and Nachtigall. There was no mention of Nachtigal's war crimes and Nuremberg Trials. It can also be noted that in the criminal cases against the detained soldiers of the Nachtigall, who later held command positions in the UPA, the investigation of which took place in 1944-1946, there is no mention of the participation of the Nachtigall battalion in war crimes.

Activities of the OUN-UPA in the temporarily occupied territories of the Byelorussian SSR and the Ukrainian SSR

The archives of the Security Service of Ukraine contain a collection of materials on the activities of the OUN underground on the territory of the temporarily occupied eastern and southern regions of the Ukrainian SSR. The exact number of documents has not been counted.

In the Luhansk region, 12 cases on this issue were identified, in Chernihiv - 68, in Poltava - 6, Kyiv - 41, Khmelnytsky - over 100 cases. Directly in the Industry state archive SBU in Kyiv - more than 300 cases. These are only those materials that were previously identified, and this is not yet the final number. In each of these cases, more than one person is involved - it is sometimes 10 or 100 people, so we are talking about thousands of underground workers. The names of these people were unknown, classified, and it is not known exactly about them.

Zhytomyr Oblast

In May 1943, the Main Command of the UPA-North sent a UPA unit on a three-month raid on the temporarily occupied Zhytomyr region and the western part of the Kyiv region of the Ukrainian SSR. During the raid, the department held 15 successful battles with German police units and groups of robbers. This department destroyed the German police school near Zhytomyr with an outpost of 260 policemen, and not far from the village. Ustinovka, Potievsky district (now the Malinsky district), on July 25 he defeated a German military unit, which was specifically sent to defeat this special department of the UPA. On the German side, there were more than a hundred killed, wounded and captured.

Sumy region

According to the information of the director of the Sumy archive Ivanushchenko, the OUN-UPA operated on the territory of the Sumy region temporarily occupied by German troops.

Crimean ASSR

The first attempts by Ukrainian nationalist organizations to penetrate Crimea date back to the summer of 1941. All of them are connected with the activities of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), which was the most active in this period. Yes, at this time in the ranks of the 11th German army advancing on the Crimea, several so-called OUN marching groups operated. Despite the fact that these groups were nominally part of the larger OUN Southern Marching Group, they were completely independent in their actions. Their tasks, write modern Ukrainian historians A. Duda and V. Starik, "included the advance along the Black Sea coast up to the Kuban." Throughout their journey, members of these groups were supposed to promote the Ukrainian national idea, and also try to penetrate into the “local self-government and auxiliary police” created by the German occupation authorities with a view to their subsequent Ukrainization. It should be said that the entire “Southern Marching Group of the OUN” belonged to the Melnyk branch of this organization, and its individual units were headed by people from Bukovina: B. Siretsky, I. Polyuy, O. Masikevich and S. Nikorovich - all prominent public figures, most of which had just been released by the Germans from Soviet prisons. The groups they led acted very secretly, often under the guise of translators for German military units, members of work teams and employees of the "economic headquarters".

Cooperation of UPA/OUN(b) with foreign intelligence services

After Churchill's March 1946 speech announcing the beginning of cold war, OUN, like other anti-Soviet formations of Eastern Europe became of interest to the intelligence services of Great Britain, the United States and, to some extent, France. Supporters of the OUN-B were especially active in these contacts.

Symbols of the UPA

The widespread misconception that the symbols of the OUN (b), which includes a red-black banner, arose as the symbols of the UPA, does not correspond to reality. The UPA used only " sovereign trident ».

UPA awards

By order of the High Command of the UPA (part 3/44) dated January 27, 1944, its own reward system. According to this order, any soldier could receive the award, regardless of rank and official duties. Proposals for the celebration could be submitted by hundreds of UPAs or senior commanders. After approval by the commission of the UGVR or the corresponding headquarters, an order was issued to reward the soldiers, and the message was published in the rebel newspapers.

War Merit Cross

Crosses of Military Merit, regardless of degree and class, had the same size: 27 × 27 mm (not counting the sash). Each order was based on an equal-ended cross with crossed swords protruding from under it. In the center of the cross was a rhombus with Ukrainian trident. The ribbon to the cross of a dark red hue had two black horizontal stripes. Crosses were worn on a five-pointed block, covered with a ribbon. Diamond-shaped "stars" made of metal identical to the metal of the cross were fixed on the ribbon of each cross.

Cross of Merit

Crosses of Merit, regardless of degree and class, had the same size: 27 × 18 mm (not counting the sash, which had a width of 30 mm). Each order was based on a stylized cross. In the center of the cross was a rhombus with a Ukrainian trident. The ribbon to the cross of a dark red hue had two black horizontal stripes. Crosses were worn on a five-pointed block, covered with a ribbon. On the ribbons, depending on the order, there was one or two horizontal metal strips of metal corresponding to the order.

modern Bandera in their parade

writing a letter to Obama

See the beginning on the website: For Advanced - Battles - UPA Part I

11.05.2011

Who are they? Heroes or traitors? They operated from the spring of 1943 in the territories: Volyn - the end of March 1943, Galicia - the end of 1943, Kholmshchyna - autumn 1943, Northern Bukovina - summer 1944, which in the period between the two world wars were parts of Poland, Czechoslovakia and Romania. In 1939-1945. most of these territories became part of the USSR. In 1941-44, the vast majority of the population of Ukraine, except for the western region, considered Ukrainian nationalists to be allies of the Nazis, which limited the region of operations of the OUN and UPA.

Propaganda publications of the OUN and the UPA “Idea and Chin”, “To zbroi”, “Visti z UPA Front”, etc., contain descriptions of numerous “UPA battles with German invaders”, starting from March 1943. In them, the enemy suffers numerous losses and, extremely rarely, retreats; the loss of the rebels in these "battles" is 1 to 16-50 "destroyed Germans." It is noteworthy that among the “battles with the Germans” there is a record of the operation in Ivanova Dolina (the Polish village of Yanova Dolina, defeated by the UPA at the end of April. Descriptions of “battles” similar in “effectiveness” and the number of “German losses” are published in the publications of the OUN and UPA up to until the summer of 1944.

Yanova Valley

Effects…

And to many other Yans ...

According to the publication of Yuri Tys-Krokhmalyuk (one of the coordinators of the creation and later an officer of the SS division "Galicia") "Armed Struggle UPA in Ukraine”, published in 1972 in New York by the Association of Veterans of the UPA (which is still considered one of the most significant sources of information about the UPA among a number of Western historians, and above all historians of the Ukrainian diaspora in Canada), in early May 1943 the UPA leads victorious battles with several SS divisions for a little-known Ukrainian town, after which he defeats the troops under the command of SS generals Platle and later Hinzler.

Further, according to the same Krokhmalyuk, Himmler personally, seeing such a catastrophic situation in the fight against the UPA and having held several meetings, sends to Ukraine "the chief partisan" in the Reich - Erich Bach-Zalewski, who also suffers defeat in the fight against the UPA, after which they recall him and impose a penalty on him. The most detailed work of Yuri Tys-Krokhmalyuk describes the battle of 3 UPA battalions with three SS divisions (according to his information, there were 30,000 people in only two divisions) at the beginning of July 1944, the latter suffer heavy losses and retreat without having achieved their goal; the loss of the rebels - a dozen people - and this was during the beginning of the Lvov-Sandomierz operation.

Lvov-Sandomierz operation - map

In actions against the Soviet partisans, the OUN and the UPA achieved significant success. They succeeded in complicating the combat activities of the partisans in many areas of Volyn-Polesie, and hindering the conduct of sabotage operations on German communications. The UPA was able to largely thwart the plans of the Soviet command to bring partisan formations into the territory of Galicia for operations on German communications in 1944.

The first mention of the activation of Ukrainian nationalists in actions against Soviet partisans dates back to the beginning of the spring of 1943, but in 1942 the nationalists tried to destroy small reconnaissance and sabotage groups dropped from aircraft into the territory of Volhynia. Since the formation of the UPA, in 1943-44, the destruction of Soviet sabotage groups by nationalist detachments has become a normal phenomenon. At the same time, attempts to conduct operations against partisan detachments and attempts to send their agents into them to destroy the command staff ended unsuccessfully.

At the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, the armed formations of the OUN (b) were actively involved in sabotage coordinated with the German troops and disorganization of the rear of the Red Army. In late 1943 - early 1944, with the approach of Soviet troops (1st Ukrainian Front, 13th and 60th armies) to the areas of operation of the UPA, separate UPA units offered them armed resistance together with the Germans. As the UPA detachments found themselves in the rear of the Soviet troops, they either crossed the front line or continued attacks on small rear units and individual Red Army soldiers; part of the members of the UPA, following orders, cordially met the Red Army in order to dull the vigilance of the Soviet counterintelligence, collected information about the reserves and the movement of Soviet troops and transferred it to Department 1s of the Army Group on the Southern Front.

Red Army units

According to the Polish historian Grzegorz Motyka, the actions of the OUN-B/UPA on the territory of Volhynia in 1943 were part of the overall plan of the OUN-B to “cleanse the territory” from “an undesirable element. This information is also confirmed by sources of the UNR and OUN of a non-Bandera direction, which also became the target of the activities of the Security Service and the gendarmerie of the OUN-B / UPA. According to the orders of Klim Savur (D. Klyachkivsky), in the areas controlled by the UPA, “skhidnyaks” were destroyed - encircled and escaped prisoners of war of the Red Army who hid in remote forest farms. With the advent of Soviet power in Western Ukraine, the struggle of the OUN-B / UPA with the “sexots” intensified - which were recommended to be hanged in public with a corresponding sign. The main social base of the “sexots” was considered to be teachers, employees of civil and financial institutions in the countryside and watchmen, railway workers, tram drivers and others in the city.

So out of a group of 15 people sent to one of the regional centers of the Rivne region to restore the national economy, only one managed to escape - 14 others were shot and abused over the corpses - one of the men was cut off his head, and the woman's face and legs. By areas of loss among Soviet citizens were: (including military personnel, employees of the NKVD-MGB-MVD and fighters of fighter battalions) - Volyn - 3500, Transcarpathian - 48, Ivano-Frankivsk - 10527, Drohobych and Lvov - 7968, Rivne - 3997, Ternopil - 3557, Chernivtsi - 796, Khmelnytsky - 133, Zhytomyr? 150.

A house burned by the UPA in the town of Bukovsko (photo taken in 1946)

At the first stage of the liquidation of the nationalist underground, the main miscalculations were considered to be the underestimation of its prevalence and readiness for action by the Soviet side, the insufficient number of forces involved and their technical equipment. As more forces were brought in (since the autumn of 1944), the weakness of coordination between the various structures, the weakness of the undercover and reconnaissance movement was indicated. After the liquidation of large and medium formations (winter-spring 1945), the liquidation of small ones was not staged properly, the forces involved in the operations were often worse armed than their opponents (rifles against machine guns and machine guns), the same poor coordination between different structures led to confusion and in many cases to shooting "at their own." After the elimination of small units. The restructuring of the NKVD in the spring of 1946 and the transfer of the main part of the functions to the MGB had a bad effect on the quality of operational work. The change in tactics of the nationalist underground reacted belatedly. Weak leadership at the grassroots level of work and lack of reasonable initiative led to stagnation as a result of operations.

In 1946, 1619 shares were registered by OUN-UPA, of which 78 were attacks on employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of State Security. 2612 families of "bandits and gang accomplices" were deported - 6350 people. 1947 became last year for the OUN and UPA on the territory of Poland - the resettlement of the Ukrainian population and the activity of the Polish law enforcement agencies forced the remnants of the UPA and the OUN underground to move to the West in the safest way - through Czechoslovakia. Of the one and a half to two thousand people of the "Zakerzonskaya" UPA, passing the route in several stages, detachments consisting of several hundred fighters were able to reach the goal in total more than a little more than a hundred people. On the territory of the western regions of the Ukrainian SSR, the total number of UPA members remaining at large was significantly lower than the number of the OUN underground. May 30, 1947 Shukhevych issues an order to unite the UPA and the armed underground of the OUN. On the same date, the UGVR decree was issued on establishing the official day for celebrating the "foundation" of the UPA - October 14, 1942. Officially, the UGVR "temporarily" stops the activities of the UPA structures on September 3, 1949.

Trying to eliminate the insurgency and undermine it social base, party and state bodies of the Ukrainian SSR offered ordinary members of the OUN-UPA (including those who were simply hiding in the forests from mobilization) and their assistants an amnesty in case of surrender. From February 1944 to July 1945, 41,000 insurgents took advantage of these offers, of which 17,000 were prosecuted, which subsequently reduced the effectiveness of this measure. After careful consideration by the party and Soviet bodies of the cases of the rebels who accepted the amnesty, many of them were resettled east, to the industrial regions of Ukraine. In total, 6 amnesties were proclaimed for the members of the OUN-UPA in 1944-49. Ilya Obershin called himself the last rebel, who spent forty years in an illegal position and left the forests only in 1991, after Ukraine gained independence.

Since the mid-1990s, the issue of giving special status veterans OUN-UPA. For a long time, however, there were no significant changes in this regard.

On October 12, 2007, by decree of the President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko, Roman Shukhevych was awarded the title "Hero of Ukraine" "for his outstanding contribution to the national liberation struggle for the freedom and independence of Ukraine and in connection with the 100th anniversary of his birth and the 65th anniversary of the creation of the Ukrainian Insurgent army"

On December 3, 2007, the Kharkiv Regional Council, the majority of which was the Party of Regions, adopted a statement that “on the territory of the Kharkiv region, the OUN-UPA fought on the side Nazi Germany", and designated the UPA as "formations that were subordinate to the command of fascist Germany and were used by him during the Second World War against the Soviet Union and the states of the anti-Hitler coalition." The deputies criticized Viktor Yushchenko's actions, assessing them "as a desire to impose on Ukrainian society a vision of events during the years of the Great Patriotic War from the point of view of a limited group of persons who are guilty of committing the most terrible crimes against the world and humanity", and also stated that "attempts to rehabilitate collaborationism and betrayals lead to discord, threaten the future of Ukraine.” The Kharkiv Regional Council urged “not to allow the glorification of the OUN-UPA” and suggested that the authorities in the region “dismantle, if any, any memorial signs erected in honor of the OUN-UPA or their militants.” The next day, the Ukrainian People's Party announced the need to disband the Kharkiv Regional Council for "anti-state and anti-Ukrainian activities."

March of OUN UPA Veterans

March of OUN-UPA veterans.

Monuments to the victims of the OUN-UPA

Despite the formation in February and the adoption in August 1943 of the strategy of "struggle on two fronts", the main "enemy" of the OUN and UPA was Soviet Union, and the fight against the Germans was to take place in the form of "self-defense of the people." M. Stepnyak's proposals to start mass actions against the Germans were rejected by the III Conference of the OUN in February 1943 and the Great Assembly of the OUN in August 1943. Nevertheless, by the second half of 1943, the armed groups of the OUN (b) and the UPA took control of most of the uncontrolled or weakly controlled by the German administration of the rural areas of the General Okrug Volyn - Podolia. The German administration continued to control the main supply routes for large settlements ...

August 22nd, 2012

DRIVING from the territory of the USSR in 1944, the Second World War left numerous centers of the nationalist underground on the western outskirts of the country. The most bitter and long-term resistance to the restoration of Soviet power took place in Ukraine. This became possible due to the presence of political and military organizations of local nationalist forces there - the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA). They were able to place in their ranks the largest number of active and covert fighters among all similar movements in the USSR (in total, from 400,000 to 700,000 during the period of the struggle). Statistics show that in the period from February 1944 to the end of 1945, Ukrainian underground nationalists carried out about 7,000 armed attacks and sabotage against Soviet troops and administrative structures, which amounted to almost 50% of all similar actions (about 14,500 in total) in the rear of the Red Army during this time. At the same time, to suppress the Ukrainian underground, an unprecedented mobilization of law enforcement and ideological bodies was undertaken, among which the leading role belonged to the structures of the NKVD-NKGB (later the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of State Security). Regardless of the efforts and sacrifices expended by the USSR, the Ukrainian insurgency was finally crushed in the end.
First battle groups The UPA appeared in the fall of 1942, and in April 1943, on the eve of the large-scale offensive of the Red Army in Ukraine, Stepan Bender's supporters managed to create a partisan army of up to 50,000 active fighters. The UPA was subordinate to the OUN, and the latter carried out political and strategic management their armed forces on a regional basis. Since 1944, in each regional branch (regional wire) of the OUN, there was a post of military assistant who led the headquarters and detachments of the UPA in the territory under his jurisdiction. Almost all the commanders, as well as a significant part of the UPA fighters, were members of the OUN, which turned the Ukrainian nationalist partisans into an ideologically homogeneous force.

At the same time, the UPA also had its own regular command system. At the head was the main headquarters, headed by the commander-in-chief appointed by the leadership of the OUN (in 1943 - lieutenant colonel Dmitro Klyachkovsky, in 1943-1950 - coronal general Roman Shukhevych, and in 1950-1955 - colonel Vasil Kuk). The organization was based on the territorial principle: in 1943 four general districts were created - "North", "West", "South" and "East". However, mass guerrilla warfare was launched only in the northern and western districts. Each General District was divided into several military districts, and they were divided into tactical areas. Each of these structural units had a high degree of autonomy and could operate and be provided practically independently.
As part of the tactical sector, there were usually 3-5 large insurgent detachments. Units and divisions of the UPA combined elements of regular and partisan formations. They were free to operate, moving from front-line confrontation and powerful offensive raids to many local ambushes and raids. The most large-scale formation of the UPA was the “kuren”, a cross between a regiment and a battalion (for example, in the fall of 1943, the Turov kuren numbered about 3,000 fighters, and the Tyutyunnik kuren only 400). It consisted of at least three "hundreds" (companies), each of which consisted of 3-5 "even" (platoons). The lowest structural unit was the "swarm" - a squad or just a group of several fighters. In 1943-1944. there was a tendency for the UPA to act almost by front-line methods: tactical formations from several kurens - "pens". However, by 1945 (in the Carpathian mountain range - by 1947), under the onslaught of Soviet forces, Ukrainian nationalists were forced to disband the kurens and many hundreds into smaller units. By 1949, they switched to purely partisan actions in small groups of several people (“boevkas”).
When creating their units, Ukrainian nationalists strove for their maximum unification: among the kurens and often even hundreds there were units of anti-tank guns or anti-tank guns, mortars, heavy machine guns, mounted scouts, rear and medical teams. This turned each detachment into an operational unit capable of operating independently for a long time. Therefore, having dispersed the UPA unit, units of the NKVD troops often received not an improvement, but a worsening of the situation: they had to fight at once with many medium and small groups of rebels.
The UPA was created with all possible elements of the regular armed forces and became a kind of army without a state. Clear organizational hierarchy, strict discipline, scale military ranks and even attempts to create regulations and the introduction of a single form played a role in increasing the combat capability of the rebels. The UPA had a system of schools for training officers and junior commanders, hospitals, weapons workshops, warehouses, etc. However, in the course of the expansion of Soviet anti-partisan operations in Ukraine, all these structures increasingly moved underground, which affected the effectiveness of their work.
most strong point The UPA was its personnel. The vast majority of the fighters consciously shared the ideas of Ukrainian nationalism, and the brutal nature Stalinist repressions in Ukraine, he provided almost each of them with personal accounts to the Soviet authorities. Over 65% of the fighters were rural youth, who were excellently oriented in their native places and had connections among the population. Many Ukrainian nationalists acquired combat skills in various formations of Nazi Germany.
However, the UPA also had obvious weaknesses. Chief among them is the chronic shortage of weapons and ammunition among Ukrainian nationalists, the main sources of which were the capture from the enemy or gathering on the battlefields. For example, in 1943-1944. the saturation of most units with small arms did not exceed 50-70% of the required number of barrels. As the number of the UPA decreased by the end of the 40s. almost every fighter already had a personal weapon, but the average ammunition in a campaign was only 20-30 rounds and 1-2 grenades per person.
The NKVD had to face such an adversary in Ukraine when the fronts of the Second World War shifted to the west. On the eve of the struggle in February 1943, the Ukrainian District of the Internal Troops of the NKVD was formed, headed by Major General M. Marchenkov. The first clashes between the UPA detachments and the Chekists began in 1943. In the first eastern and southeastern regions liberated by the Red Army, the "blue caps" managed to prevent the plans to create the general districts of the UPA "South" and "East". During these operations, the main burden of the struggle fell on the shoulders of the units of the Main Directorate of the NKVD troops for the protection of the rear of the active Red Army. However, as the theater of operations shifted to the west, responsibility passed to the operational bodies of the NKVD-NKGB and the internal troops of the Ukrainian district.
A large-scale confrontation between the UPA and the NKVD began in February 1944, when the Red Army entered the Carpathian region, Volhynia, Polissya, as well as other Western Ukrainian lands. Ensuring the security of the rear of the Red Army and the cleansing of the liberated areas, the NKVD and the NKGB faced fierce and well-organized resistance in Ukraine, for which, as it turned out, they were not fully prepared.
At the first stage of the struggle - somewhere until the end of 1944, while Western Ukraine was considered as the rear areas of the active Red Army - the main enemy of the UPA were mainly the line units of the Main Directorate of the NKVD Troops for the Protection of the Rear and the Ukrainian District of the Internal Troops of the NKVD. To the extent of their responsibility, units of the border troops of the NKVD and troops of the NKVD for the protection of railway facilities were involved in the operations. The escort troops of the NKVD were involved mainly in the escort and protection of persons detained during operations. Considering that Ukraine was located in the main direction of the Second World War, the grouping of NKVD troops there was one of the largest: as of the spring of 1944, 2 divisions, 15 rifle and 2 mountain rifle brigades, 3 separate rifle regiments, 1 , 5 cavalry regiments, 2 tank battalions and 5 armored trains (including 1 division, 9 brigades, 1 cavalry regiment and 1 tank battalion, which amounted to about 33 thousand soldiers and officers). To this should be added 6-8 thousand border guards and up to 2 thousand military personnel of the NKVD troops for the protection of railway facilities. But at the same time, the number of active UPA fighters during this period is estimated at about 35-38 thousand. The leadership of the NKVD-NKGB initially failed to ensure the significant numerical superiority necessary for a successful anti-partisan struggle - the forces of the parties were quite comparable. The command of the internal troops tried to achieve partial superiority in numbers directly in the areas of operations.
However, in conditions when the rebels, who were well-versed in the situation, acted in large detachments, even this did not at all ensure success for the "blue caps". For example, in the battle of April 22-25, 1944 near Gurba, a 15,000-strong group of NKVD troops, supported by a battalion of light tanks, an armored train and aviation, failed to break the defenses of 8 kurens and 3 hundred UPAs (up to 4 thousand fighters), supported by 1.5 thousand rebel peasants and 200 former German and Hungarian prisoners. As a result, the UPA detachments left the battle in perfect order, having lost only 180 people (the peasants, however, died or almost all fell into the hands of the Chekists). The losses of the "blue caps" amounted to over 800 people, including 120 killed, and 15 light tanks - UPA anti-tank crews from former Wehrmacht artillerymen disabled the tank battalion in just half an hour. And there were such cases this stage a lot of struggle.
Having suffered losses approaching 10% of the personnel by the end of 1944 (1424 killed, 2440 wounded, hundreds missing), the NKVD could only respond by compiling a report of doubtful reliability to the “party and government” on the destruction and capture of 108 thousand. bandits” and the seizure of 26,000 weapons. In it, the number of "Bandera gangs" was estimated at 25 thousand people - that is, in comparison with the beginning of the year, it decreased by 13 thousand fighters at best. It should be recalled that the losses of the Banderaites were by no means only those who were killed or captured during Chekist operations, and the damage they inflicted on the Soviet side was several times higher than the losses of the NKVD-NKGB bodies themselves - the nationalists also destroyed the Red Army, policemen, party and Soviet asset, etc.
The leadership of the NKVD-NKGB was aware that it was possible to deal with such an enemy only by cutting off his connection with the local population and defeating large partisan formations, but in 1944 the Chekists were not up to par in solving these problems. Given the weakness in Western Ukraine of local Soviet authorities and, consequently, the network of informers, the "blue caps" at first could only comb the villages. However, at that stage, this only aroused the anger of the villagers against the Soviet regime.
It should be noted that the main problem of the NKVD troops in 1944 was the lack of mobility. If a large-scale operation against the UPA was planned in some area, then the advance of the allocated forces was accompanied by all the impressive attributes of the movement of large masses of troops: columns stretched along the roads, camps and rear services were deployed, an intensive radio exchange was carried out - often without any cipher. Of course, the UPA almost always had the freedom of choice: to concentrate their troops and fight, or to covertly get out of the way.
After initial failures, the leadership of the NKVD-NKGB quickly drew conclusions about the need for new forms of struggle. 1945 became the year of "big raids" in Ukraine. By this time, in the most restless areas, the organs of the Soviet and party administration gradually began to get on their feet. The local militia was recruited, the so-called extermination battalions and detachments were formed from among the party and Komsomol activists, and a network of informers appeared.
In 1945, raids were organized mainly at the level of administrative districts under the leadership of the local departments of the NKVD and the NKGB. At the first stage, a “provocation by force” was carried out, designed to call the local UPA units to an open clash. A small detachment of "blue caps" (usually up to a company) carried out several particularly tough sweeps in the villages and at the same time made it clear that he had broken away from his own. Overly confident in their abilities, the nationalists quickly took the “decoy company” into circulation, and then the main forces of the round-up entered into action. Actively using aviation and artillery, large forces of the NKVD troops, with the participation of local party activists, who were used as guides, began a concentric attack on the area where the rebels were discovered. It was technically much easier to pursue the kurens and hundreds of UPAs involved in the fighting than to scour the forests and mountains in search of them. After under the blows the large formations of the UPA broke up into small detachments, a large raid turned into several small ones, carried out at the level of individual parts of the NKVD. They included, in particular, combing settlements in search of wounded and hiding insurgents and their accomplices.
The largest of the raid operations was carried out in April 1945 in the Carpathian region on the line of the new Soviet-Polish border with the involvement of over 50 thousand military personnel of the NKVD troops, the Red Army and the personnel of the fighter battalions under the leadership of the commander of the Ukrainian district of the internal troops of the NKVD M. Marchenkov. As a result, about 500 rebels were killed and more than 100 were captured, and several thousand suspicious persons were arrested. The result is tangible, but by no means stunning. The same can be said about the results of 1945 for the NKVD-NKGB in general. The UPA noticeably weakened, but continued to strike just as boldly, and Ukrainian peasants to help it with food and information, hide the wounded and supply new thousands of volunteers.
Seeing the insufficient effectiveness of traditional KGB methods, at the next stage of the struggle against the UPA, the party leadership, represented by the first secretary of the Central Committee of the CP (b) U N. Khrushchev, assumed a coordinating role. "Knock the ground out from under the feet of the Bandera gangs" - this was what Khrushchev saw as the main condition for victory. And the soil from which the UPA drew strength was the Western Ukrainian village. It was to interrupt the rebels' contact with the local population that the tactics of the "big blockade" introduced by Khrushchev and his People's Commissar for State Security, Lieutenant General V. Ryasny, were aimed. It had a specific start date: January 10, 1946. Then, permanent garrisons of the NKVD troops began to be introduced into all the settlements of Western Ukraine. A platoon or company was usually quartered in the village, and a regiment or brigade took control of the area. At the same time, operational departments of the NKGB were created in each regional center, numbering 100-300 full-time employees. During the "great blockade" the mobilization of the NKVD-NKGB forces in Western Ukraine reached 58.5 thousand people.
The operational measures of the NKVD-NKGB during the period of the "big blockade" were distinguished by a thorough and multi-stage character. Having occupied the settlement, the unit of internal troops, in cooperation with professional operatives and local supporters of the Soviet government, began the "development of the territory." At first, general searches were carried out in the residential sector and mass arrests were carried out in order to identify "bandit hiding places" and "Bandera accomplices." At the same time, methods of physical intimidation of residents were used. The detainees were "pressed" until someone started talking. Given that in Western Ukraine there was practically not a single village that was not connected with the rebels in one way or another, in this way it was often possible to obtain quite valuable information. In addition, “split” people, out of fear of retribution from the nationalists, often sought protection from the “authorities” and joined the ranks of informers ...
Having dealt with the village, the "blue caps" began to methodically clear the area, in particular, unexpectedly combing the forests at night and setting up ambushes in places where the rebels were most likely to appear - at springs, on forest paths, etc. This also gave certain results, even despite the fact that the personnel involved in such "search and secrets" themselves often found themselves taken by surprise by the detachments. Any clash was a signal of the presence of "Bandera" nearby, and then reinforcements were called in and a raid began according to all the rules described above. The excessive self-confidence of the UPA commanders and fighters played into the hands of the Soviet power structures, who often did not shy away from the battle even when they should have. In 1946 alone, 1,500 clashes were noted, during which the rebels lost over 5 thousand people killed. However, the losses of the NKVD-NKGB bodies were also great, but the result was worth it. Due to the fact that the network of garrisons of the "blue caps" and far around the posts and secrets thrown out by them tightly entangled Western Ukraine, the connection of the rebels with the local population was significantly hampered.
In addition to the internal troops of the NKVD, an extremely important role in the implementation of the "big blockade" was played by operatives of the NKGB, the police and the local party activists. In carrying out the task of "knocking out the soil" from under the feet of the UPA, the mission of bringing the Western Ukrainian population to the obedience of Soviet power fell on their shoulders. And here they showed a lot of energy and ingenuity.
The main achievement of the operational work of the period of the "big blockade" is the creation of a dense network of informants, which literally permeated all regions of Western Ukraine and all sections of its society. As noted by the well-known fighter against anti-Soviet resistance, General Pavel Sudoplatov, head of the Department “F” of the NKVD of the USSR, who was in charge of these issues, “creating a wide agent network in Western Ukraine turned out to be much easier than it seemed at first.” At the same time, the vast majority of informers, contrary to popular belief, were by no means malicious people, but victims of the repressive apparatus of the Stalinist regime. Skillfully using the traditionally strong attachment of Ukrainians to their relatives, operatives of the NKGB-MGB processed thousands of relatives of OUN-UPA members, promising them "indulgence" to their relatives in exchange for information. In the same way, they broke the captured rebels and their assistants, threatening reprisals against their families. The total size of the army of informers in Western Ukraine will probably never be known. On the example of the Stanislav region, where on July 25, 1946, the Chekists reported on the recruitment of 6405 informers and agents, taking into account the total population, it can be established that almost every fifteenth inhabitant in the zone of UPA activity during the period of the “big blockade” “knocked”. Despite all the efforts, the OUN “bezpeka” failed to identify and eliminate a sufficient number of informers so that the rest began to fear the insurgent “fetter” around their necks more than the repressions of the “blue caps”.
During the period of the “big blockade”, the Soviet authorities not only established total surveillance of the population, they also had the most powerful propaganda and psychological pressure. The perpetrators of the pacification of Western Ukraine themselves perfectly understood that the Soviet ideology was deeply alien to its population. Therefore, the simplest and most effective tool - intimidation - was put at the heart of the impact. Any action of the UPA was invariably followed by a large-scale campaign of retribution by the NKVD-NKGB, up to the burning of entire villages. Thus, the population developed a negative conditioned reflex: if the rebels hit somewhere, expect trouble. People began to curse the UPA not from the awakened consciousness of Soviet citizens, but from constant fear for their lives and property.
To a large extent, another very effective move of the Chekists was aimed at discrediting the UPA in the eyes of the Western Ukrainian population: the creation of detachments of the so-called “false Bandera”. The authorship here belongs to the head of the NKVD of the Ukrainian SSR V. Ryasny, who can be called one of the most successful organizers of the struggle against the UPA. On his initiative, back in 1945, from those owning Ukrainian NKGB officers and former Soviet partisans began to form groups capable of long-term autonomous action. They numbered from several to several dozen people each. By the middle of 1946 there were over 150 such detachments numbering about 1800 people. “In terms of their appearance and weapons, knowledge of the language and local everyday characteristics, the personnel of special conspiratorial groups are no different from the UPA bandits, which deceives the liaisons and leaders of the UPA and the OUN underground,” General Ryasnoy reported to Lavrenty Beria. “If it is impossible to capture the intended leaders of the OUN-UPA, the members of the special groups destroy the latter, and in many cases they also create the impression that the destruction of the leaders of the OUN-UPA was committed by the bandits themselves, provoking enmity in the OUN environment.” One of the tasks of such groups was, under the guise of rebels, to commit violence against the local population, creating a negative reputation for the struggle of Ukrainian nationalists.
Among the undercover methods used by the Chekists, a significant place was also given to the introduction of their informants and militants into the ranks of the UPA. It is significant that told in the famous television series " state border»The story of an agent who managed to infiltrate the highest echelons of the UPA and contributed to the liquidation on February 12, 1945 of one of the leaders of the rebel army, Dmytro Klyachkovsky (Klim Savur), is based on real events. Only, in fact, it was not a border guard officer who was introduced into Klim's lair, but a converted UPA centurion Stelmashchuk, who was subsequently shot. A number of KGB operations are known, when agents from among the former Bandera managed to rise to the very top of the OUN-UPA structure. It was one of them who in 1954 was captured sleeping by the last commander of the UPA, Vasyl Kuk.
It was also practiced to dump on the Ukrainian "black market", through which the UPA replenished its stocks, medicines infected with the plague pathogen, exploding power supplies for radio stations, canned food with crushed glass. It must be admitted that at the undercover level, the "blue caps" did not just win against the UPA - they led dry.
It was not in vain that we gave such a significant place to the description of the operational and undercover methods that came into use by the NKVD-NKGB during the period of the “big blockade” of 1946. The fact is that it was during this period that the mechanism for suppressing the Ukrainian national movement was created and came into effect, against which it ultimately failed to resist. Under his influence, the UPA fighters, who started as an "army folk heroes"and the sovereign owners of their native mountains and forests, began to turn into lone wolves hunted and cut off from the world, and only their fierce hatred supported the war for many more years ...
The immediate results of the "big blockade" were two fatal steps that the leadership of the UPA was forced to take. First, in the summer of 1946, it was decided to finally disband the system of general districts, moving to a scattered territorial command of detachments. Secondly, by the winter of 1946-1947, it was planned to build many underground bunkers in hard-to-reach places and prepare the necessary supplies for the wintering of personnel, since the rebels' access to the villages was interrupted and communication with the population was extremely complicated. The implementation of the first of these plans allowed the UPA to even intensify the struggle somewhat in 1947-1948, but the refusal to form a united front of struggle deprived the Ukrainian nationalists of any chance of victory. As for the second plan, the combat activity from now on practically froze with the appearance of snow cover. In the spring, the fighters who survived in the nightmarish conditions of underground wintering rose to the surface so exhausted that the combat potential of the UPA was catastrophically reduced. The general conclusion is that Khrushchev-Ryasny's "big blockade" tactics dealt a fatal blow to the UPA, although this did not manifest itself immediately.
Nevertheless, the Kremlin demanded immediate results, and the activities of the Khrushchev-Ryasny alliance were subjected to the "highest" criticism. In March 1947, Lazar Kaganovich was appointed to the post of First Secretary of the Central Committee of the CP(b)U, and soon after that, Lieutenant General M. Kovalchuk took the post of Minister of State Security of the Ukrainian SSR, and T. Strokach headed the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

Weapons, equipment and radio equipment seized by the MGB officers from the OUN bunker. 1951

The change in leadership and administrative reforms had a rather specific effect on the operational and undercover methods by which the structures of the Ministry of Internal Affairs-MGB (since March 3, 1946 they received a new name) continued to fight the UPA. There were no technical changes, but the emphasis was significantly shifted. In 1947-1948, despite the fact that the garrisons of the "blue caps" continued to occupy Western Ukrainian towns and villages, large-scale military operations against the rebels were carried out infrequently. From January 21, 1947, by special orders of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of State Security of the USSR, the fight against national movements was attributed to the exclusive competence of the state security agencies, and the undercover component for a time became the leading one. This period was characterized by a significant expansion of the network of informants. Became more intense attempts to introduce secret agents into the UPA-OUN. The destruction of prominent functionaries of the underground and the commanders of the rebel army by terrorist methods was practiced. Intensively raided in Western Ukraine special detachments of "false Bandera". In most cases, the use of internal troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs against UPA units in the period 1947-1948. preceded by the receipt of undercover data on their whereabouts and numbers. However, the "blue caps" did not remain without work.
Continuing the strategy of "knocking the ground out from under the feet" of the Ukrainian rebels, L. Kaganovich initiated the adoption in early October 1947 of the "Plan for the transportation of special settlers from the western regions of the Ukrainian SSR." According to him, it was planned to send up to 100 thousand people mainly to Siberia (in reality, at least twice as many were expelled from Western Ukraine). The deportation of the Ukrainian population was carried out according to a clear scheme: the families scheduled for eviction usually received about 6-12 hours to pack, and they were allowed to take up to 250 kg of things per person, including a supply of food for a month. Transportation to the place of special settlement was carried out by railway, the exiles were transported to the echelon "on their own", and a specially allocated platoon of escort troops stepped in to escort each train. The protection of the abandoned property until it came under the jurisdiction of local authorities was carried out by local departments of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Technically, the implementation of the “blue caps” during October 1947, the deportation of the population of entire regions of Western Ukraine should be assessed as organized and carried out with frightening clarity and speed.
However, contrary to expectations, the deportation of Kaganovich and the “undercover boom” of his chiefs of state security and the police did not lead to the defeat of the UPA. The results of anti-insurgent measures of the MGB-MVD in Western Ukraine in 1947-1948. turned out to be insufficient. Undoubtedly, some leaders of the UPA detachments and the OUN underground, as well as many ordinary nationalists, died or were captured. However, in general, Ukrainian freedom movement even experienced a period of some activation. The reason for this was rooted in the fact that the UPA detachments that survived the period of the “big blockade” learned to operate on information and material “self-sufficiency”. The eviction of the inhabitants of the villages, with which they had practically no connection since 1946, they endured relatively easily. In addition, scattered “boevki” turned out to be much more resistant to undercover provocations than large detachments; and the insurgent "bezpeka" has gained a wealth of experience in identifying and neutralizing agents of the MGB. Moreover, now the exposed informant often did not immediately end up with a “fetter” around his neck, but for a long time continued to supply misinformation skillfully slipped to him by nationalists. In 1947-1948. Ukrainian nationalists killed about 3,000 employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of State Security, as well as party and Soviet workers, which significantly exceeded their own real losses during this period. It was a kind of prestige goal scored by the UPA into the Soviet gates just before the denouement.
Under pressure from the Kremlin, the MGB-MVD at the beginning of 1949 returned to the tactics of large Chekist military operations in Western Ukraine. By order of the Minister of State Security of the Ukrainian SSR M. Kovalchuk, four divisions of internal and escort troops (the 81st and 82nd Internal Troops of the NKVD-MGB of the Ukrainian District, the 65th rifle of the internal troops of the NKVD-MGB of the Ukrainian district, 52nd escort troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs). A massive combing of the area and cleaning of settlements began, carried out in combination with the maximum activity of the MGB agents and informants. In the conditions of the overwhelming numerical superiority of the "blue caps" and the extreme exhaustion of the UPA forces, this was enough for a decisive victory. After the defeat of all the main units of the UPA in the Carpathians, the commander-in-chief of the rebel army R. Shukhevych on September 15, 1949 issued an order to disband the last remaining units. Having survived his army for a short time, on March 5, 1950, its commander-in-chief, as a result of an undercover operation of the MGB of the Ukrainian SSR under the leadership of General P. Sudoplatov, was discovered in the village of Belogoroshcha near Lvov. Fighting back, Shukhevych shot a major of the MGB and wounded three explosives fighters, but was killed while trying to break through.
The history of the UPA actually ended there. Its last commander, V. Cook (Lemisch), despite desperate efforts, failed to recreate the insurgent movement. Further armed resistance in Western Ukraine continued by isolated underground and partisan groups, and even irreconcilable loners. According to the Ministry of State Security of the Ukrainian SSR, as of March 17, 1955, in the western regions of the republic there were only 11 disparate “boivkas” numbering 32 people and 17 lone fighters, and the OUN underground network did not exceed 300-500 people. That's all that was left at the end of the struggle from the once thousands-strong UPA army. The Soviet state security organs fought them with undercover and operational-search methods. Separate explosive units at the platoon-company level were periodically involved in providing operations - cordoning, combing the area, etc.
The suppression of the Ukrainian nationalist movement required the USSR to concentrate its efforts to the limit. The struggle went on for a long time and with varying success. Ultimately, however, the NKVD-MVD and the NKGB-MGB had the firmness and ability to achieve the final fulfillment of their tasks. In the fight against Ukrainian nationalists, Soviet Chekists and policemen demonstrated such a level of professionalism and effectiveness that may well be an example for modern Russian law enforcement agencies.
Dmitry ZHUKOV

The idea of ​​creating this collection of memoirs appeared in September 2013. Then a small group of authors of the resource “I remember” gathered in Lviv. We wanted to record the memories of war veterans living in the western regions of Ukraine, and our Kyiv colleagues intended to interview former UPA fighters. To our surprise, there were quite a few of them. Even more surprising was the fact that among the respondents there were quite interesting, from a historical point of view, personalities: Shukhevych's personal contact, people from his inner circle, the head of the OUN SB (security service), SS men from the Galicia division ...

Impressed by the results of the work of my colleagues, I had the idea to find those who were involved in the elimination of Bandera. Of course, I assumed that we had a very difficult task ahead of us, but I had no idea how much ...

Earlier, in the memoirs of Soviet veterans, there were occasional short stories about clashes with Bandera. But against the background of the main memory - the war - for most of them it remained only a brief episode in an eventful military biography and did not become "a matter of a lifetime", like those of opponents. Looking through the lists offered by the Lviv Councils of Veterans, I began to pay more attention to the names, next to which there were marks of the NKVD, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, or the names of partisan detachments and formations (a lot of partisans were sent to fight banditry and nationalists).

But it is not for nothing that it is said: "He who seeks, let him find." The first interesting interlocutor on a topic of interest came across to me in one of the districts of Lviv at the celebration of the Day of Partisan Glory. At first, however, the veteran was very reserved, but gradually opened up and gave an exhaustive interview that marked the beginning of the cycle. But at the end of the conversation, he also asked to remove certain moments and names from the interview. Yes, and from some of his reservations and pauses, it became clear that many bright episodes of the narrator’s combat youth would forever dissolve in the dusk of the past ...

Lviv veterans cordially received the guest with big land and willingly shared their memories of the military period of their lives, but as soon as the thread of the story approached the 44th year, they began to be cautious or even left the topic. Direct questions were answered cautiously and in monosyllables, with the standard excuse “you will write, but we still have to live with them here.”

I had to deal with similar things more than once in the future. For example, out of several Kyiv veterans of state security, only one gave an interview, and even then it was very lengthy. Later, the reason for such restraint of the respondents became clear to us. One of the Crimean veterans spoke about a certain paper that, during Yushchenko's rule, everyone who had been involved in the liquidation of Bandera in the past was forced to sign. In it, allegedly on behalf of the then President of Ukraine, the veterans were asked not to say anything good or bad about the OUN-UPA...

The tense situation in Ukraine did not contribute to the revelations either.

It is quite possible that this is why a former MGB investigator from Poltava, who worked in Volyn in the late 1940s, refused to talk to us. Quite by accident, the photographs of a young operative with a PPS on his shoulder, taken at the scene of crimes committed by nationalists, fell into my hands, excited the imagination and promised textured material. What joy of discovery was brought by this accidentally discovered end of a new thread from a ball, this calm phrase of the interlocutor that his fighting friend is alive and in solid memory. And what a disappointment - the refusal of an interview. Neither persuasion nor recommendations helped us then.

Categorically refused the meeting and a state security veteran from Sarn, legendary person, whose name, according to the stories of former militants, scared children in western Ukraine ... We could not even imagine that the “thunderstorm” of Volyn Bandera was still alive! And how hard it was to come to terms with the impossibility of even a little bit opening the curtain of secrecy that hides from us the past deeds of these harsh and serious people.

What can I say, the veterans living in Russia were not particularly eager to remember that cruel time. We received several decisive refusals in Moscow. Literally at the last moment, a veteran of the internal troops, who lives in my hometown and literally on the next street, refused to be interviewed!

But the topic was captivating with its urgency. More and more immersed in it, I tried in every possible way to find the threads of contacts. I had to search mainly by word of mouth - "someone somewhere heard someone's grandfather talking about Bandera ..."

Only thanks to the authority and connections of Artem Drabkin did I get to know interesting person, veteran of foreign intelligence Georgy Zakharovich Sannikov. He allocated only half an hour for the meeting, but what! I managed to record a short, but very capacious and emotionally rich interview. And most importantly, through him we got access to the Kyiv veterans of state security, including the legendary Colonel Bondar - Boris Efimovich Steklyar himself.

A major contribution to the work was made by my co-author on the collection, Yuri Trifonov. Thanks to his perseverance, we received a number of excellent interviews from Crimean veterans, and also found a chain of contacts in Lutsk, where we managed to go just a week before the coup in Kyiv.

It was a troubled time - riots were already in full swing in Kyiv. The Chairman of the City Council of Veterans met us very wary. He was more interested in the material side of the matter and our attitude to the shooting on the Maidan, rather than why we came. As if anticipating future events, he muttered: “Here we are, Crimea and Moscow…”

I sincerely thank for the maximum assistance and hospitality of the Volhynians, residents of Lutsk: respected colonel N, trustee of the Museum of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Kononenko brothers from the Lutsk city committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine, as well as residents of the Kolka region. Unfortunately, bad news came from Lutsk: the Museum of the Ministry of Internal Affairs was burned down, the city committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine and the Kononenko brothers themselves were seriously injured ...

I would like to express my gratitude to the Lvov branch of the Communist Party of Ukraine, which, helping us, made every effort. Although the Lviv communists had enough of their own problems: regular attacks and arsons on their headquarters were commonplace even in the relatively calm 2013... I remember with special warmth our voluntary assistant Kuzmich from the city of Drohobych, which he himself called only “Banderstadt ". Without all these kind and honest people, the book would not have happened.

Despite numerous difficulties, in principle, we managed to get a certain cross section among the veterans surveyed. The collection contains memories of former partisans, an employee of SMERSH, investigators and operatives of the NKVD-MGB-KGB, a “exterminator” - a fighter of a fighter squad, as well as members of special military groups and even one border guard.

I cannot help but thank my Kyiv colleague Alexei Ivashin, whose advice and assistance in working on the collection can hardly be overestimated. Initially, we wanted to form a book from the memoirs and militants of the UPA and those who were involved in their liquidation. However, while the collection was being prepared, a change of power took place in Kyiv, and this was followed by a series of well-known events. The situation in society both in our country and in Ukraine has heated up to the limit. Comments on the site "I remember" showed the ambiguous attitude of its visitors to the memories of former militants. To be honest, even for a trained reader, some of the revelations of the nationalists can be taken aback. Therefore, by mutual agreement, we decided to publish separately. Unfortunately, history has taken another turn: we are again on opposite sides of the barricades...

Rogak Alexey Pavlovich

Interview and lithoprocessing: Yuri Trifonov

I was born in 1927 in the village of Chervonoe, Andrushevsky district, Kyiv region. My father, Pavel Mikhailovich, a literate man at that time, worked as an agronomist on a state farm, and my mother, Ksenia Nikiforovna, worked as a secretary of the village council. Parents were staunch Bolsheviks. Dad still in his youth at the time civil war served in the Red Army, then went through the Soviet-Finnish and Great Patriotic Wars. On the latter he was seriously wounded and died in 1964. You understand that the beliefs of my parents largely determined my own fate: in life we ​​were led by the party. In less than eighteen years, I became a member of the CPSU (b).

My native village was very large, there were two state farms, one collective farm, as well as a distillery and a sugar factory. There was a big market in the center of the village. Father then disappeared in constant traveling along the party line. We had a good hut, a good garden grew nearby. There was a chestnut tree on which I liked to climb.

Businessman-driver of the Kolkovsky district military commissariat Rogak Alexey Pavlovich, 1946

The famine of 1932-33 was engraved in my memory for the rest of my life. I was then in my seventh year. At that time, all the grain was taken from the peasants to the last grain. Mom, as the secretary of the village council, received some bread. There was also milk from a cow, so we were not allowed outside due to relative fatness - me and my sister Lyuba, born in 1924.

Next to us, across the road, lived my same-age Olya Grischuk. She ran to us, and we fed her as best we could. But somehow she suddenly disappeared for three days. Mom told me: “Lenya (everyone called me that then), run away and find out what’s the matter, why Olya doesn’t come?” I crossed the road, went into the hut, just crossed the threshold from the kitchen into the room, I see this picture: there is a bed on which the dead Olya and her living mother are lying, and a woman, distraught with hunger, gnaws her daughter’s nose and ears ... Seeing me, she screamed something. I was terribly frightened and rushed through the threshold home. Mom called the area. The police arrived accompanied by some men.

Olya's mother died three days later. My husband, Grischuk, disappeared somewhere, I don't know. An old uncle Denis and the whole Mikhalsky family were dying next to us. People suffered from malnutrition, died under fences, falling from impotence right on the go. Across the street from us lived a family in which the girl died in the throes of hunger. They saved themselves by picking rotten potatoes in the gardens. They ate boiled quinoa and nettles.

Soon my father arrived, who at that time worked in the district political department, and brought to us to feed two boys of eighteen or nineteen years old: Ivan Bereznyak and Sasha Ogorodnik. They could no longer walk because of hunger, dad picked them up under the fence. Mom gave them milk for two weeks to restore strength. Then they gradually came to their senses. Sasha, I remember, went to work at the bakery in order to be near the bread. Vanya also worked somewhere ...

Wondering what caused the famine? I will answer frankly. Before the famine, there was enough grain, but terrible things began to happen on the ground. Mom came home from work from the village council and wept bitterly. Special commissions went door to door and, if they noticed a piece of bread or extra grain, they immediately took it away and took it away somewhere. When in the autumn of 1933 this arbitrariness ceased and the grain began to be returned, people immediately came to life.

But there were still problems with nutrition. Once, after my father's arrival, we slaughtered a bull-calf ... At night, the windows were usually closed with wooden shutters, and the doors with metal bars. Suddenly, at dusk, someone knocks on the window. The father pulled out the revolver and said: “Come on, everyone climb on the stove!” Something banged on the shutter, shards of glass rained down. Then dad shot a couple of times through the window in order to scare the unknown. When he went out into the yard, he met his neighbor Kostya, who had come running to the noise. There was no one else there, but in the bushes they found the cap of another neighbor who lived nearby. It turned out that if there were no father, then all the meat would be taken away from us. It was even worse for those who had a cow. I had to chain her legs to the walls of the barn and put on an iron collar around her neck. And still it didn’t help: some thieves cut off the cow’s head and legs from my aunt, and took the carcass away. Such was the terrible year of 1933...

In 1934, I went to school, studied for a month in the first grade, after which the teachers transferred me to the second. I already knew the primer by heart, because when my sister Lyuba went to school, I studied with her. He drew well. We studied in Ukrainian, Russian was taught several times a week.

Live in prewar years got a little better. There were no tractors then; they plowed on horses and oxen. Cars were also rare, although I remember that my father was brought home from the political department for the weekend in a car. But all the same: the store started working, good harvests went. A huge loaf of white bread appeared on free sale, which was called "bonda". In addition, meat, salt, matches and sugar were freely sold in the store. Life got better.

Rogak Pavel Mikhailovich father of Alexei Pavlovich, 1941

In 1941, just before the start of the war, I graduated from the 7th grade. In May of that year, my father was sent to work in the former Czech colony of Podzamche, Volyn region. There were about a hundred houses in Podzamche. The colonists were taken somewhere to Czechoslovakia, and Ukrainians began to arrive in their place. They created a state farm, his father was appointed its chairman. We lived in an apartment, they were already preparing a house for us, but then the Great Patriotic War. I remember June 22 well.

Next to me lived a girl neighbor Valya. In the morning, she suggested that I go to the bookstore to buy textbooks for the 8th grade in advance. Take her to the store. Before reaching the bridge over the river Styr, we see that near the rafters lies a dead major with two rectangles on his buttonholes. Despite the heat, the deceased was wearing an overcoat. A German plane was flying in the sky and shooting somewhere. We started ticking back. They ran home and told their parents everything. Father decided to send us back to the Kyiv region. But as soon as we left Lutsk, some military men turned our truck around. I had to return and go to the regional center of Kolka.

The father went into the army. Mom went to the farm as a milkmaid. There were four children in the family: me, older sister Lyuba, brother Kolya and sister Tanya. We lived in a barn by the river.

In July 1941, the Germans drove into Kolki without a fight in armored vehicles, motorcycles and bicycles. Our uncle Fyodor was the secretary of the Kolkinsky district committee of the Komsomol, so he immediately began to hide. The police immediately began to chase him as a communist. The policemen were mostly young people. Uncle Fyodor, among many others, soon went into the forest, where he created partisan detachment"For the Motherland!". I became his contact. Ulyana worked as a teacher in the Kolka school, I forgot her patronymic. She gave me data on a piece of paper for the partisans. The fact that I knew German quite well helped me to avoid searches. Our Mahalsky neighbors were born Volksdeutsch and their children spoke only German at home. And near the neighbors, I myself learned. He freely passed through patrols, easily talked with the Germans, answered their questions in detail. So they considered me as one of their own. I took the secret piece of paper to the Black Vines forest, which stretched all the way to Berdichev. I went there about thirty meters, looking for a place where there was a rotten tree, inclined to the ground, in the hollow of which I left a piece of paper. Tellingly, I never once saw partisans in all that time.

During the occupation, my mother stopped going to work and did housework at home. In 1942, the Germans began to drive young people to Germany. I was not taken in my youth, but the elders were rowed for a sweet soul. The raids began. It was forbidden to go outside at night. The policemen behaved differently... Somehow one of them came and warned us to leave the house, otherwise the Germans might take us away because of a partisan uncle. As a result, in 1942 we were forced to leave the village and hide in Sytnitsa. Everyone knew that Bandera people were sitting in the vicinity of the district. But then they still behaved calmly, did nothing bad to the local population. At that time, I was tending a herd of 50 calves. My partner was an old Pole.

In 1943 we heard about Sidor Kovpak and his battles with the Germans. They talked about him very little, because his troops fought far from us. No one received news from the front either. That year there was a massacre of Poles, the so-called Volyn massacre. Of course, they are also good - they attacked the local population. For example, Ukrainians were slaughtered in the village of Coastal. Well, Bandera did not remain in debt. The Poles quickly left the village, and soon they were evicted to Poland.

set us free Soviet troops at the beginning of 1944. And it so happened that I was sent to a special school for the MGB troops, which was located near Kyiv in Pushcha-Voditsa. They took me there in the direction of the village council, although I was not suitable for my age. But for the knowledge of the German language and for helping the partisans they accepted. Worked until September. First of all, we were taught to navigate the terrain. Appointed someone senior in a group of four people. After that, they were ordered to go to a certain place. It was necessary to go through the forest for three kilometers, and it was required to arrive at the appointed time. They gave a compass to the group. Everyone received a machine gun with ammunition, a duffel bag, a piece of bread, a map in hand. Watches were given only to the senior of the group. The first time I miscalculated and did not come to the right place. Then the exits began to be made only in the dark time of the day - we were raised at two or three in the morning. In the afternoon, they began to learn how to shoot: first from the "small things", then they were given a carbine each, and in the end we mastered the PPSh, PPD and PPS quite well. With the latter, I went to Kolki on combat missions. Very comfortable machine, light, with a folding butt.

After graduating in October 1944, I was enlisted in the fighter group of troops of the Ministry of State Security of the USSR at the Kolkovsky District Military Commissariat. The group included 18 people. Among them are several strong guys, graduates of our special school, specially sent from Zaporozhye. In addition, the group was reinforced by experienced fighters. These were former partisans of the Kolkovsky district: Ivan Fedorovich Shakur, Vladimir Stepanovich Medlyarsky. Local young lads also joined: Aleksey Nikolaevich Mordyk, Aleksey Stepanovich Yanchik, Nikolai Olefirchuk, Grigory Zayats, Reikin, Ivan Andrushchenko. Lieutenant Ivanov commanded us. The tasks were set by the military commissar Nikolai Nikolaevich Torbeev, unfortunately, a soft and weak person. We were armed with PPSh and PPS submachine guns, two or three Degtyarev machine guns. Personally, in addition to the machine gun, I always had two grenades and a TT pistol. My partner was the machine gunner Kuzma Kirillovich Zagorovets, who during the occupation was actively partisan in the Kolkovsky district.

In general, the population of the village strongly supported the Soviet regime. There were 32 young fighters in the local "exterminators", including 23 lads from the village of Kolki. The rest were from the villages of Staroselye, Kopylye and Reznichi. Ulyan Romanovich Lavrentiev, a former partisan and a good friend of mine, was our deputy for educational work.

We were standing right in the regional center of Kolka, after the occupation there were more than a hundred intact huts left in it. Carried guard duty in the military registration and enlistment office. But first of all, support local authorities and conducted work to attract conscripts to serve in the Red Army. In our region in 1944-45 there was a dual power: communists during the day, and Banderists at night. In general, the name "Bandera" was not in use, we simply called them bandits and fascist-Vlasov agents. Basically, groups of 20-30 people fought with us. They did not risk attacking Kolki, because there was a garrison of MGB troops numbering 200 bayonets.

My first fight with the bandits took place in the village of Ostrov, if I'm not mistaken. Through the MGB, agents from among the local residents reported that a small group of Bandera had settled there. We surrounded the village. Then our group on horseback broke right into the center of the village. The firing started. I immediately jumped off the saddle, fell to the ground and began to shoot back. Chaos, shooting everywhere! I gave turn after turn ... Who knows, maybe he shot someone. The enemy group was completely eliminated. I remember two strong tall bandits.

Then I had a chance to face the enemy in Rudniki. As soon as I approached some hut, a grandmother with an empty bucket pushed out towards me. Seeing me, she threw a bucket, made a cry. The bandits immediately opened heavy fire from machine guns at us from the windows. The bullet hit me lightly in the forehead. He fell on his back, rolled over, began to shoot back ... In general, he somehow escaped. The bandits are gone...

Rogak Alexey Pavlovich, 1944

In Kulikovichi, when they were walking along a beam on the outskirts of the village under a forest, they ran into an ambush. But they jumped out of it successfully, although they did not kill anyone, because the bandits quickly retreated. Neither we nor they had any losses.

In Malaya Osnitsa we were crossing a river when they started shooting at us. And again everything went well, there were no losses on our part. In general, as such, the battles with Bandera did not work out: we ran into ambushes or participated in the environment of the discovered bandits. There were short skirmishes: the enemies fired several bursts, threw a couple of grenades and immediately retreated. It is difficult to judge the losses of the Bandera people, because they always tried to take the bodies of the dead, and even more so the wounded, with them.

Our most difficult battle took place in the village of Novoselki in the late autumn of 1944. In the evening we arrived there in a car taken by the MTS, and in our cart with an easel machine gun. Settled over the river in one of the houses. Before dawn, a gang surrounded us, the battle began. We fired back desperately. This time, there were no casualties. The bandits killed Senior Lieutenant Titov and two residents of the village of Kolka: Dyachinsky and Naglyuk, a cart driver. The MTS car was burned. The lieutenant died through his own fault: having heard the shooting, he jumped out of the hut in a panic and rushed from our group to the bridge to hide. There his bandits shot him. The body was found 300 meters from the hut. We also shot someone, the machine gun helped us a lot in this. But again, the enemy took the bodies and withdrew.

To begin with, a brief educational program - based on Wikipedia and slovari.yandex.ru:

Stepan Andreevich Bandera(Ukrainian Stepan Andriyovich Bandera) (January 1, 1909 - October 15, 1959) - one of the leaders of the Ukrainian nationalist movement in Eastern Poland (Galicia), Hero of Ukraine (2010), in 1941-1959 head of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN (b)) .

Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN)- a terrorist organization of a nationalist persuasion, operating in the western regions of Ukraine in the 20-50s. 20th century Arose in 1929 as "Ukrainian military organization"(UVO), then changed its name. The founder and first leader of the OUN was Evgen Konovalets, a former colonel in the Austro-Hungarian army. During the Revolution of 1917 and the Civil War, he actively participated in the nationalist movement in Ukraine, along with S. Petliura. At one time served as the military commandant of Kiev.The ideological platform of the OUN was the concept of radical Ukrainian nationalism, characterized by chauvinism and xenophobia, which had a pronounced anti-Russian orientation and focused on the use of extremist means to achieve the goal - the creation of "independent", "square" Ukraine.

After the Red Army entered the territory of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus in September 1939, the OUN, in cooperation with German intelligence agencies, began the fight against Soviet power. The preservation of the influence of the nationalists was largely facilitated by the methods by which the communist regime was imposed on the Western Ukrainian lands. Ukrainian nationalists warmly welcomed the attack of fascist Germany on the USSR and from the first days of the war supported the German troops and the occupation authorities. Members of the OUN helped the German fascists in the "final solution of the Jewish question", that is, the destruction and deportation of Jews in the occupied territories, served in the occupation administration and the police. Even when it became completely clear that Hitler would not grant Ukraine any semblance of "independence", the nationalists did not stop cooperating with the Nazis. With their active support, the SS division "Galicia" was formed.

The Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) is an armed formation of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists.

It operated from the spring of 1943 in the territories that were part of the General Government (Galicia - from the end of 1943, the Kholm region - from the autumn of 1943), the Reichskommissariat Ukraine (Volyn - from the end of March 1943), and the Romanian Transnistria (Transnistria) (Northern Bukovina - from summer 1944), which until 1939-1940 were part of Poland and Romania.

In 1943-44. UPA detachments carried out ethnic cleansing of the Polish population in Western Volyn, Kholmshchyna and Eastern Galicia.

In 1943-1944, UPA detachments acted against Soviet partisans and detachments of the Polish underground (both communist and subordinate to the London government, i.e. Home Army).

But about the crimes of the UPA.

The UPA was established on October 14, 1942 by decision of the leadership of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN). It was headed by Roman Shukhevych, holder of two knightly orders of Nazi Germany. President Yushchenko declared him a hero of Ukraine, and from the UPA itself he is trying to represent a belligerent during the Second World War.

Meanwhile, there is not a single document testifying that the UPA units fought with large forces of the Wehrmacht. And here are the documents about joint action Ukrainian nationalists with the Nazis - more than enough. And even more documents tell about the savagery that they did " national hero» Roman Shukhevych and his brothers in arms.

It is known for sure that the published newspaper Surma, bulletins and other nationalist literature were printed in Germany. Part of the nationalist literature was illegally published in Lvov and other cities of Western Ukraine. Recently, the Russian Foreign Ministry published documents. Here is some of them:

The head of the 4th Directorate of the NKVD of the USSR, Pavel Sudoplatov, in a message dated December 5, 1942, testifies: “Ukrainian nationalists, who were previously underground, met the Germans with bread and salt and provided them with all kinds of help. The German occupiers widely used the nationalists to organize the so-called "new order" in the occupied regions of the Ukrainian SSR.

From the Protocol of interrogation of Kutkovets Ivan Tikhonovich, an active Banderite. February 1, 1944:
“Despite the fact that, at the behest of the Germans, Bandera proclaimed an “independent” Ukraine, but the Germans delayed the issue of creating a national Ukrainian government ... It was unprofitable for the Germans to create a Ukrainian national government, they “conquered” Ukraine and considered it an eastern colony of the “Third Empire” and power over They did not want to share Ukraine with Bandera, and they removed this rival. In addition, at that time, the Ukrainian police, created by the OUN, carried out an active security service in the rear of the German army to fight partisans, to detain Soviet paratroopers and to look for Soviet party activists.

Worthy of attention is the circular "On the Treatment of Members of the UPA" issued on 12.2.44 by the so-called Prützmann Fighting Group. From it it is clear how the UPA "fought" with the Germans a year and a half after its creation:

“Negotiations that began in the Derazhnya region with the leaders of the nationalist Ukrainian Insurgent Army are now also continuing in the Verba region. We agreed: members of the UPA will not attack German military units. The UPA is currently sending scouts, mostly girls, to the territory occupied by the enemy and reporting the results to the representative of the intelligence department of the combat group. Captured Red Army soldiers, as well as captured persons belonging to Soviet gangs, will be delivered to a representative of the intelligence department for interrogation, and the alien element will be transferred to the combat group for assignment to various work. In order not to interfere with this cooperation, which is necessary for us, it is ordered:

1. UPA agents who have certificates signed by a certain “Captain Felix”, or pretend to be members of the UPA, let them pass freely, leave their weapons to them. Upon request, agents must be immediately brought to the 1st (representative of the intelligence department) battle group.

2. Parts of the UPA when meeting with German units for identification, they raise their left outstretched hand to their face, in which case they will not be attacked, but this can happen if fire is opened from the opposite side ...

Signed: Brenner, Major General and SS Brigadeführer.

Another "heroic" stage in the history of Ukrainian nationalists and personally UPA commander Roman Shukhevych is the fight against Belarusian partisans. Historian S.I. Drobyazko in his book “Under the banner of the enemy. Anti-Soviet formations in the German armed forces” writes that in 1941 on the territory of Belarus the first Ukrainian police battalions were already formed from prisoners of war of the Red Army.
“Most of the Ukrainian battalions of the auxiliary police carried out security service on the territory of the Reichskommissariats, others were used in anti-partisan operations - mainly in Belarus, where, in addition to the battalions already created here, a number of units were sent from Ukraine, including 101, 102, 109, 115, 118 , 136th, 137th and 201st battalions.

Their actions, as well as the actions of other similar units involved in punitive actions, were associated with numerous war crimes against the civilian population. The most famous of which was the participation of a company of the 118th battalion under the command of cornet V. Meleshko in the destruction of the village of Khatyn on March 22, 1943, when 149 civilians died, half of whom were children,” he writes.

And now - the word to Bandera themselves. Here is what was published in 1991 in No. 8 of the Vizvolny Shlyakh edition, which was published in London:
“In Belarus, the 201st Ukrainian battalion was not concentrated in one place. His soldiers in couples and hundreds were scattered over different strongholds .... After arriving in Belarus, the kuren received the task of guarding the bridges on the Berezina and Zapadnaya Dvina rivers. Departments stationed in settlements, was charged with protecting the German administration. In addition, they had to constantly comb the forests, identify and destroy partisan bases and camps, ”writes Bandera M. Kalba in this publication.

“Each hundred guarded the square allotted to it. 3rd hundred lieutenant Sidor were in the south of the zone of responsibility of the Ukrainian battalion, the 1st hundred of ROMAN SHUKHEVICH was in the center ... Pursuing partisans in unfamiliar territory, the soldiers fell into an enemy ambush and were blown up by mines ... The battalion spent nine months on the "partisan front" and received in this fight invaluable combat experience. According to approximate data, the legionnaires destroyed more than two thousand Soviet partisans,” he notes.

As they say, no comment. Even the Banderaites themselves directly indicate what the “national hero” Shukhevych was doing in Belarus. For what kind of Ukraine he fought against the fraternal Belarusian people - one can only guess.

Finally, in 1943-1944. UPA detachments in Volhynia and Galicia exterminated over 100 thousand Poles. The Polish publication “Na Rubieїy” (Nr 35, 1999), published by the Volyn Foundation, describes 135 methods of torture and atrocities that the UPA fighters used against the Polish civilian population, including children.

Here are just a few of those fanatics:
001. Driving a large and thick nail into the skull of the head.
002. Stripping hair from the head with skin (scalping).
003. Striking with the butt of an ax on the skull of the head ...
005. Carving on the forehead "eagle" (Polish coat of arms) ...
006. Driving a bayonet into the temple of the head. ..
012. Piercing children with stakes through and through.
016. Cutting the throat….
022
023. Cutting the neck with a knife or sickle….
024. Striking with an ax in the neck ...
039. Cutting off women's breasts with a sickle.
040. Cutting off women's breasts and sprinkling salt on wounds.
041. Cutting off the genitals of male victims with a sickle.
042. Sawing the body in half with a carpenter's saw.
043. Infliction of stab wounds to the abdomen with a knife or bayonet.
044. Punching the belly of a pregnant woman with a bayonet.
045. Cutting the abdomen and pulling out the intestines in adults ...
069. Sawing a body lined with boards on both sides, in half with a carpenter's saw ...
070. Sawing the body in half with a special saw.
079. Nailing the tongue of a small child to the table with a knife, which later hung on it ....
080. Cutting a child into pieces with a knife and throwing them around ...
090. Hanging a monk by his feet near the pulpit in the church.
091. Planting a child on a stake.
092. Hanging a woman upside down on a tree and mocking her - cutting off her chest and tongue, dissecting her stomach, gouging out her eyes, and cutting off pieces of her body with knives ...
109. Tearing the torso with chains...
126. Cutting the skin from the face with blades ...
133. Nailing hands to the threshold of the dwelling ...
135. Dragging a body along the ground by legs tied with a rope.
We only add that the list of UPA crimes is by no means limited to this. Russians, Czechs, Jews became their victims, but most of all... the Ukrainians themselves, who did not actively cooperate with them.