Litopy's UPA

[dobko]

The region of Volyn' (Volhynia) encompasses the contemporary provinces (oblasti ) of Volyn', Rivne, Zhytomyr, the northern parts of Khmel'nytskyi and Ternopil provinces and the Ukrainian ethnographic districts of southern Belorussian SSR. The south of Volyn' is predominantly an agricultural area with some forested and swampland regions, while in its northern parts lie the numerous bogs, swamps and heaths of Polissya (Polese) - the perfect terrain for guerilla warfare. This area witnessed in 1942-1943 the birth of the Ukrayins'ka Povstans'ka Armiya or UPA (the Ukrainian Insurgent Army), whose soldiers took up arms against both the German and the Soviet power with an aim of establishing an independent Ukrainian state. In time the UPA's activities spread to other parts of Ukraine. Peculiar to the underground movement was the designation of Volyn' as the PZUZ or Pivnichno-zakhidni ukrains'ki zemli (the North-Western Region of Ukraine).




Some reading for Micheal..... http://www.infoukes.com/upa/

[MichaelB_PL]

Originally Posted by dobko

(...)
Some reading for Micheal..... http://www.infoukes.com/upa/

Ok, I will read it if you think I should.


Michael

[dobko]

There are three sides to every story, Mike.

Your side, my side and the truth.... the truth being a little bit of everything.

Instead of comming here and attacking Ukraine perhaps you should find common ground and build on that.

[Serhii]

Oh Clay , how can you be so naive .... Those very special people from Samoobrona , Zwionzek rodzin polskich, Milosniki Lwowa ,etc.... ( far right chauvinistic organisations ) do not need any truth - NEVER !!!

I think it is good we can read their thoughts here - we have to know

Hopefully there are other bright Poles , not those....

[MichaelB_PL]

Originally Posted by dobko

There are three sides to every story, Mike.

Your side, my side and the truth.... the truth being a little bit of everything.

Instead of comming here and attacking Ukraine perhaps you should find common ground and build on that.

Hmmm... but build what?

As far as UPA and history in general is concerned, I guess I'm interested in facts and truth...'building' sounds like making politically correct 'softeners' to please everybody, with harm to the historical truth.

Poland and Ukraine have common political interests - Poland wants independent Ukraine as a buffer against Russia and Ukraine obviously wants to be independent - and there is already good cooperation in this aspect, as evident during the Orange Revolution.

As for a potential historical reconcillation between Poles and Galician&Diaspora Ukrainians (if I understand corretly, non-diaspora Ukrainians from other regions of Ukraine have bit different views on UPA) - I don't think it is very likely - the differences are too big.

Here I cannot not make a comment which sounds biased, but which I think reflects the reality - while many Poles aren't enthusiastic about admitting certain things but they are eventually capable of admitting them, many Galician&Diaspora Ukrainians seem to be set on a course which can only be described as denying uncomfortable historical facts and applying completely different standarts to what OUN/UPA did and to the things which were done by the forces in conflict with OUN/UPA.

To make a stronger point and use words of a non-Pole, let me quote a Ukrainian diaspora historian, Paul Himka:

Originally Posted by Himka

There has been almost no attempt on the part of the Ukrainian diaspora to confront the issue of war criminality in a less defensive and more soul-searching manner. (The few exceptions will be mentioned below.)

Instead, there persists a deafening silence about, as well as reluctance to confront, even well-documented war crimes, such as the mass murder of Poles in Volhynia by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA)[7] and the cooperation of the Ukrainian auxiliary police in the execution of the Jews.[8] In his submission to the DeschЙnes Commission in 1986 John Sopinka, counsel for the Ukrainian Canadian Congress, stated that Ukrainian nationalist organizations ⌠were not in any way allied with the Nazis.■[9] It has also been denied that the Ukrainian movement in World War II had any ideological predisposition which could have facilitated participation in genocidal actions. UPA veteran and military historian Lev Shankovsky, for example, asserted at a round-table discussion that organized anti-Semitism ⌠never existed in Ukraine. But there exists a myth about Ukrainian anti-Semitism■ promoted by Moscow.[10]

In the diaspora one frequently encounters a double standard in discussing war crimes and crimes against humanity perpetrated by Ukrainians as opposed to those perpetrated against Ukrainians. Memoirs and eyewitness accounts, for example, are considered untrustworthy evidence for the former, but trustworthy for the latter; that is, Jewish or Polish first-hand accounts of Ukrainian war crimes are dismissed as biased, while an important Ukrainian victimization narrative, the famine of 1932-33, has relied primarily on just such eyewitness accounts.[11] The argument is made that no order has ever been discovered instructing the UPA to kill Polish civilians in Volhynia.[12] On the other hand, that the famine of 1932-33 was the result of deliberate policy is never questioned, even though this too remains without its ⌠smoking gun■ (as of course does the Jewish Holocaust). The crimes of Polish police in Nazi service are taken to provide some measure of explanation or justification for the attack on Polish villages in Volhynia,[13] but never do Ukrainian diaspora authors suggest that Ukrainians should be held collectively responsible for the crimes of the Ukrainian police in German service.

(whole article is at http://www.univie.ac.at/spacesofiden...imka.html#fn11)

IMO, while the article describes Himka's views on the situation in the Ukrainian diaspora, it's the same with Galician Ukrainians...

Somebody might say "Poles are the same" - and he would be right... but IMO right only about the existence of the denial/justification/double standarts syndrome as such, while wrong about the scale - IMO, the "standart Polish version of history" did contain errors and lies like the 500 thousand of UPA victims or "every Ukrainian is a bloodthirsty murderer" image...or blank spots like mass murders done by AK... but I think Poles are recovering well from it.

On the other hand, I have the impression that the diaspora and Galician Ukrainians have much more trouble with the denial/justification/double standarts syndrome - not because the "standart diaspora/Galician Ukrainian version of history" contains more errors, lies and blank spots than the Polish one did, but because IMO the Poles are more or less able to re-adjust their version to match the historical facts... while the D/G Ukrainians...aren't.


In the text I quoted, I've highlighted one word with bold text - "defensive" - and this is exactly the word which has strucked me - this is exactly the impression I'm having when reading discussions with UPA-sympathizers - that they are somehow emotionally defensive, that for some reason they are emotionally unprepared to accept the more uncomfortable facts and that the problem lies exactly there - with the emotional defensiveness, not with evidence and knowledge of historical facts.

I don't know why it is so, but many times I have noticed that many D/G Ukrainians respond to critique of UPA as harshly as if somebody would insult their religious beliefs, like worship of UPA was the core element of their identity... which BTW would explain the defensiveness well...

Here I'd like to present something from a diaspora Ukrainian site about UPA at http://upa1.netfirms.com/:

Originally Posted by Site

Eternal glory to the dead, living and unborn warriors of
Ukrainian Insurgent Army!

We dedicate this corner of the worldwide Internet network to the brave knights of Ukrainian spirit, the brave defenders of the Christian faith, democracy, peace - to the warriors of Ukrainian Insurgent Army, whose glory is forever written into the history of humanity.
Thousands of brilliant battles, thousands of brilliant victories over a numerically prevailing (10 to 100 times more) enemy - this is Ukraine, this is the Ukrainian Army! The fearless fight till the last drop of blood and till the last cartridge and unbelievable courage in the face of death - this is Ukraine, this is the Ukrainian Army! The Army whose warriors defended honour and dignity of entire nation - this is Ukraine, this is the Ukrainian Army! The Army whose warriors were unhesitatingly giving their lives for honour and glory, for their nation, for their idea, for the state - this is the Ukrainian Army! The army that as first in XX century heaved up the sword of Jesus Christ in the fight against evil and Antichrist - this is the Ukrainian Army!

As we see here, this text is strongly filled with emotions... and look at the fragment I've highlighted - "heaved up the sword of Jesus Christ in the fight against evil and Antichrist". No Pole I ever knew, and in fact no person of any other nationality I know about spoke about any military formation's actions in such a way... BTW a way I consider blasphemous, but that is OT.

What I want to point out is that the words used there make it seem like the authors attitude toward UPA is more than enthusiasm, that it's de facto some kind of semi-religion - I mean I can understand that some diaspora Ukrainian does't know about UPA's war crimes and totalitarian ideology, but the phrases used in the text clearly show both that the author identifies UPA with Christianity AND that he's understanding of Christianity is very lacking.

This site is probably the biggest case of the syndrome I'm speaking here and I hopefully believe that most G/D Ukrainians are different, but I'm afraid that many of them may have the same problem as the site's author, but on a smaller scale - I think many of them may have a strongly emotional aproach to the matter, aproach which interferes with objective analisys of history.



Michael

[dobko]

Are you kidding me Mike?

That is one of the most ignorant and most anti-Ukrainian statements I've ever read.

"No Pole I ever knew, and in fact no person of any other nationality."


You need a life my friend.

[MichaelB_PL]

Originally Posted by dobko

Are you kidding me Mike?

That is one of the most ignorant and most anti-Ukrainian statements I've ever read.

"No Pole I ever knew, and in fact no person of any other nationality."


You need a life my friend.

1. Why ignorant? I'm simply shocked with absurd quasi-religious content of the website, like "heaved up the sword of Jesus Christ in the fight against evil and Antichrist". But then again, you are right in some way- I think Al-Qaida and other Muslim terrorist organisations are calling themselves "the hand of God",etc etc -the diasporan Ukrainian UPA-sympathizers aren't the only ones.

2. Would you please comment on the whole post, instead of concentrating on one sentence? What do you think of things that Paul Himka wrote and what do you think about blasphemous statements like "[UPA] heaved up the sword of Jesus Christ in the fight against evil and Antichrist" ?


3. Thank you for your concern for my lifestyle, but I'm doing ok.


BTW, if you disagree with me in any way, then please show your arguments, instead of speaking things which are semi-personal attacks like "You need a life my friend".
So far we have a Ukrainian diaspora scientist accusing the Ukrainian diaspora of inability to deal with difficults topics... and when I post about it, the only thing you are able to say is "get a life" and "are you kidding"? To me, it's exactly the kind of behaviour that P. Himka describes.

And to add something about the 'Litopys UPA' website - did you notice that it does't mention the UPA's warcrimes in ANY way? (maybe I overlooked it - is so, then show me where is the mention).
It's exactly the thing Himka writes about - UPA murders tens of thousands of civilians, but the diasporan Ukrainian history website 'forgets' to mention that.


Michael