What "Guest" is reporting from the journal "Dilo" is essentially sovok
Ukrainophobic smear Perhaps, also, he/she is citing it out of context, this I do
not know. But yes, there was a faction within the nationalist movement in
Halychyna that thought this way. Many different factions in Halychyna proposed
many different solutions to attain the same end, for a desperate people placed
well-below Western countries' radar screens yearning to get out from under a
savage occupant's heel. Ukrainian poet Lesia Ukrayinka summed up this yearning
in Latin very succinctly: "contra spem spero" - I believe in the impossible.
Sound familiar? Think: "Palestine".
Lenin and Mao thought that way,
hundreds of liberation movements in the world think that way, the Zionist Jews
in Palestine under the British Mandate most emphatically thought that way:
http://bit.ly/cp0hyO
So, the argument ran, who could argue with
success? They saw themselves as front-line avengers, as champions, for the
impardonable harm done to Ukraine by her rabid occupiers.
http://www.halychyna.ca/BZTOC/BZTOC1.htm
A current slogan of the
time was, "sotnia poliazhe, tysiacha znovu stane do borot'by" (a company of
fighters will die, a thousand more will rise to stand in their place). Think:
Palestine.
However, Ukrainians being a calm peace-loving people, the vast
majority and their moral authorities did not think that way. The illustrious and
blessed Metropolitan Andrii Shepetyskyi, head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic
Church in Ukraine which encompasses the vast majority of Galicia, vehemently
opposed it, wrote public denunciations of it and had his bishops and priests
repeatedly condemn it from the pulpit.
But then WW2 happened and the
Ukrainian nation was confronted with only these unpalatable options: lacking
their own national Ukrainian armed forces, to choose either to side with those
that kill only the body of the nation but leave its spirit alive (Germany); or
those that kill both the body and the spirit of the nation (the Soviet Empire);
or ultimately and idealistically to fight, contra spem spero, against all comers
as staunch insurgents (the idea of OUN, UPA, and Stepan Bandera).
History
is judging right now that the third choice was the correct one.
A journalist for "Dilo", the largest Ukrainian daily, Ivan Kedryn
knew
well both legal and illegal Ukrainian political life, and wrote in his
memoirs:
"The underground revolutionary movement’s leaders [...] thought
that
the worse is nation’s situation, the better for them, because it could
lead to the revolutionizing the whole nation."
The OUN’s terrorist actions,
and the authorities repressive contractions (like pacification) showed, that
there could be no constructive dialog between the Polish government and the
Ukrainian radicals.
Banderists murdered innocent Jews, Ukrainians, Poles. There is no justification to it.
obviously Ukraine's enemies MURDERED MORE because they won...while the Jews
were celebrating their freedom and creation and recognition of Israel in the
late 40's AFTER the war the Poles and Russians (and their Ukrainian
collaborators) were co-ordinating Operation Visla and population transfers while
Ukraine was undergoing the secret Famine of 1947. The transports to the GULAG
were also in full force; and any sign of "Ukrainization" was stamped out in a
genocidal manner by all of Ukraine's enemies!
Its a farce to call
anti-Ukrainians such as Khruschev and Brezhnev as "Ukrainians" and hold them up
as examples of what Ukrainians should be like!
Ukrainians were supposed to allow themselves to be genocided quitely...I don't think so! You would like that...its NOT going to happen! We are no different than anyone else.
Polish brutalization and slaughter of Ukrainians in the 1930s is vividly
described by witnesses in the 900-page book of memoirs "Berezhanska Zemlia" (in
Ukrainian)
http://www.halychyna.ca/BZTOC/BZTOC1.htm
More
particularly, the tenors here singing for Poland and against Bandera ought to
read the section titled Pacification ("Pacyfikaciya" in Ukrainian) which starts
in Part 1, page 235, of this book. Copy and paste this into the address bar of
your browser and read on:
http://www.halychyna.ca/BZTOC/OCR010.pdf#page=8
The vicious
depredations and destruction carried out by the Poles against the civilian
population are described here for only one region ("povit"), that of Berezhany,
a very small area of western Ukraine. Multiply that by a factor of 100; of 1
000; to obtain a fairer vision of what Poland did to Ukrainians in the inter-war
years alone.
The Polish president needed to read only this one small
section, clearly to understand how it was that Polish chauvinism and unbridled
atrocities gave birth to the OUN, the UPA, and to the formidable Stepan Bandera.
These are not fables. The Polish concentration camp Bereza Kartuska,
which did not take a back seat to any of the corresponding German KZ's, was set
up in the 1930s expressly to torture and defeat Ukrainian patriots. They failed.
My father was one of those who survived. He never spoke a word of Polish
thereafter until his dying day.
Ukraine's shameful past should not be hidden. If Ukrainians want to have such heroes like Bandera, they should also acknowledge genocide Banderists are guilty of.
Living as an oppressed minority under a totalitarian Polish occupation in the
1930s, my mother, then a school principal in Lemkivshchina, was fired after a
Polish manager asked her students what country they lived in; and they answered
"Ukraine." Also, my father, then a professor at the ancient University of
Kracow, was fired for refusing to convert to Roman Catholicism and to Polish
nationality.
In spite of this, today, Poland and Ukraine, MUST, and
largely have, forget the centuries of conflict and hatred and remain the close
allies they have rightfully become as a united front to prevent Tzar Putin from
reestablishing the Russian Empire.
"Ukraine's shameful past should not be hidden".
Ukraine was under a
repressive and illegal foreign occupation if that means anything to you.
Where would you like to personally go with this?
Poland has to be careful where its going with this, as Moscow would love
nothing more but to see a Poland-Ukraine divide that it can exploit. Warsaw
should understand that their policies during the Polish occupation of West
Ukraine were undeniably repressive. Many Ukrainians, including my grandfather,
had to travel further into Europe or to North America, just to be allowed to get
an University education as they were discriminated against from doing so under
Polish rule.
Hopefully by now, Poland has learned that its security is also
dependent to that of Ukraine's well being and the Polish president should
understand the past for what it was. Poland also tried to play its own version
of the "empire game" at the expense of its neighbours but failed and suffered
miserably with the onset of the war.
The appointment of Bandera to hero
status may be controversial for Warsaw to handle but Poland also has historical
figures whose heroism titles were earned by ruthlessly subjecting its neighbours
to forced servitude. Yushchenko is not publically condemning Polish "heroes" for
what they were.
Kaczynski should hold his tongue as there is no benefit for
Poland's past history to also be revisited.
Polands position on this matter is entirely understandable, as is that of the jewish community. Did we really expect silence and acknowledgement that history is complex? We're dealing with politics here. Kaczynski HAD to speak out... Yuschenko didn't do Ukraine any favors with this insensitive gesture. Those who sympathize with Bandera's goal of an independent Ukraine (and I include myself in that group) gain nothing by alienating the best ally Ukraine has had in recent years. And for what?.. A medal?... For a dead man?.. It's just plain dumb.
I note your words but Ukrainians have to stop apologizing for surviving.
Well, you overestimate Ukraine's importance. Good relations with Russia are essential. It seems that polish politicians understand it now.
Russia is a very inessential country, however they are a neighbor.
If the Poles don't want slave rebellions they should not practice slavery.
Bandera and his policies were crafted by the inhumane repressive treatment that he and Ukrainians received under Polish rule. How could it be otherwise. Eye for an eye....tooth for a tooth. A hero he certainly was when placed into the proper context of the time.
Eye for an eye? - 100,000 murdered peaceful Poles? It's sheer cowardice to attack civilians.
he hero of 1,54 m
a dwarf king, giant among those nationalistic dwarves
10 centimeters shorter than Putin, 2 centimeters taller than
Medvedev.
You may be onto something.
Murderer Bandera really was a tiny man - that might explain a lot psychologically.
So that little bit of 'wisdom' is your contribution....oh my!
I hope your intelligence is higher than your vocabulary
It was Polish tyranny that made him the man and hero that he was!
et tu Brutus?