Agentura: Soviet informants' networks & the Ukrainian underground in Galicia, 1944-48

East European Politics and Societies

Volumn 11, Issue 1, 1997, Pages 89-130

  Burds, Jeffrey ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 0041857970     PISSN: 08883254     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/0888325497011001003     Document Type: Article

References (128)

1. Cited in a pamphlet of the organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, "Toward Greater Revolutionary Vigilance." Iu. Klen was the pseudonym of Ukrainian Volksdeutsche writer, Oswalt Burghart. [Prokliatie roky]. Gosudarstvennyi Arkhiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii (GARF), f. R-9478, Glavnoe upravlenie po bor'be s banditizmom MVD SSSR (1938-50 gg.) (GUBB MVD/NKVD SSSR), op. 1s, d. 643, ll. 181-99. This copy of the document was submitted by T.A. Strokach, Ukrainian People's commisar of internal affairs, to V.S. Riasnoi, Soviet People's commissar of internal affairs in Moscow on 8 February 1946. The underground pamphlet was one of several "anti-Soviet listovki" distributed in L'viv on the night of 3 February 1946.
2. Cited in a pamphlet of the organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, "Toward Greater Revolutionary Vigilance." Iu. Klen was the pseudonym of Ukrainian Volksdeutsche writer, Oswalt Burghart. [Prokliatie roky]. Gosudarstvennyi Arkhiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii (GARF), f. R-9478, Glavnoe upravlenie po bor'be s banditizmom MVD SSSR (1938-50 gg.) (GUBB MVD/NKVD SSSR), op. 1s, d. 643, ll. 181-99. This copy of the document was submitted by T.A. Strokach, Ukrainian People's commisar of internal affairs, to V.S. Riasnoi, Soviet People's commissar of internal affairs in Moscow on 8 February 1946. The underground pamphlet was one of several "anti-Soviet listovki" distributed in L'viv on the night of 3 February 1946.
3. Cited in a pamphlet of the organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, "Toward Greater Revolutionary Vigilance." Iu. Klen was the pseudonym of Ukrainian Volksdeutsche writer, Oswalt Burghart. [Prokliatie roky]. Gosudarstvennyi Arkhiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii (GARF), f. R-9478, Glavnoe upravlenie po bor'be s banditizmom MVD SSSR (1938-50 gg.) (GUBB MVD/NKVD SSSR), op. 1s, d. 643, ll. 181-99. This copy of the document was submitted by T.A. Strokach, Ukrainian People's commisar of internal affairs, to V.S. Riasnoi, Soviet People's commissar of internal affairs in Moscow on 8 February 1946. The underground pamphlet was one of several "anti-Soviet listovki" distributed in L'viv on the night of 3 February 1946.
4. Throughout this paper, OUN refers to the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists and UPA to the the Ukrainian Insurrection Army, which grew out of it after July 1941. Contrary to ehe impression left by Soviet archives, the Ukrainian rebel resistance was not monolithic, but represented a diverse motley of rival bands with widely varying methods and visions. See John A. Armstrong, Ukrainian Nationalism, 3rd ed. (Englewood, N.J.: Ukrainian Academic Press, 1990)
5. The two key agencies of the Soviet secret police were the NKVD and the People's Commissariat of State Security (NKGB). In March 1946, they were renamed the Ministry Internal Affairs (MVD) and the Ministry of State Security (MGB). The spetsgruppy were subordinated to the NKVD's GUBB. They were usually headed by three-man teams made up of representatives from the NKVD and SMERSH (the Soviet military's counterintelligence unit) with ranks of at least junior lieutenant. For a comprehensive personnel list of members in GUBB in West Ukraine as of May 1946, see State Archives of the Russian Federation (GARF), f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 527, ll. 109-17.
6. The chief task of GUBB agents was infiltration, sabotage, and annihilation of anti-Soviet opposition. The Soviet Military Encylopedic Dictionary, published in Moscow in 1983, defines diversiia - diversion or sabotage - as "the actions of individuals or groups (squads, units, or partisan detachments) in the enemy rear to put military production or other facilities out of commission, interfere with the command and control, cut communications lines, and destroy military personnel and equipment." See Colonel I. G. Starinov, Over the Abyss: My Life in Soviet Special Operations (New York: Ivy Books, 1995), viii.
7. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1s, d. 643, 1. 13. Top secret letter from T. Strokach, then Deputy Commissar to MVD in Ukraine, to A. M. Leont'ev, Chief of GUBB NKVD SSSR in Moscow, dated 30 December 1945. I have consistently translated the Soviet Russian term "bandit" in this context as rebel, 'bandgruppy as rebel bands, and 'bandproiavleniia' as rebel actions. This is to distinguish anti-Soviet rebel opposition from genuine bandits who were lumped together in Soviet official parlance. In heavy blue crayon on the cover page of the document, Leont'ev wrote: "To Konstantinov: Familiarize yourself with this document, [and pass it on] to the chiefs in your section, (dated 12 March 1946)" Konstantinov added below: "Comrades Goroshenko, Starochuk, Sharanov: Carefully study [this document] and put forward your proposals. Konstantinov," dated 1 April 1946. The report, "Agentura NKVD-NKGB v deistvii," is a Russian translation of the original Ukrainian version: ll. 14-34. Its contents are remarkably consistent with the standard Soviet text for training NKVD personnel to organize information networks: Gosudarstvennoe Politicheskoe Upravlenie Ukrainskoi SSR. Sekretno-Operativnoe Upravlenie. Otdel Informatsii i Politkontrolia. Instruktsiia o postanovke informatsionno-osvedomitel'noi raboty okruzhnykh otdelov GPU USSR (Khar'kiv, 1930). [Numbered copies]. From a copy preserved in the Arkhiv SB Ukrainy, Kiev.
8. This paper is based on research in six archival collections in Moscow, Kiev, and L'viv. Besides work in the secret collections of the State Directorate for the Struggle against Banditism (1938-1950) in Moscow, I have also drawn from materials in the archives of the Ukrainiian SB, as well as the archives of the Central Committee of the Communist party of Ukraine in Kiev, supplemented with materials from L'viv, the command center for the Soviet pacification of West Ukraine. These local materials have been particularly useful, since they contain the bottom-up picture, as expressed in field reports from ongoing operations, as well as confiscated documents copied to I.S. Grushetskii, secretary of the Executive Committee of the L'viv Party apparatus. (Most of the original materials used in this paper have been copied and facsimile copies are presently available (from 1 July 1998) for researchers to study and review in the Ukrainian Archives Collection at the University of Toronto. The collection, constructed by the author working in collaboration with archivists in Moscow, Kiev, and especially L'viv, contains xerox copies of over 40,000 manuscript pages on the history of West Ukraine during the period 1943-1953. As such, it is the largest and most comprehensive collection on the subject available outside of the former Soviet Union. Place names and transliterations correspond with the Library of Congress system for translations from Russian and Ukrainian. For the sake of consistency, all place names have been rendered in their Ukrainian equivalents. By far the most horrifying documentary evidence on the operation of Soviet spetsgruppy was the material seized from the corpses of Ukrainian rebels. As a rule, following a firefight, the corpses were photographed and searched, and any documents were immediately turned over to the NKVD for analysis. Those documents were reviewed and, in the event of discovery of something of particular importance, translated, analyzed, and passed on to appropriate officials in Kiev or Moscow.
9. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1s, d. 643, 1. 16. The pivotal role of agentura in Soviet operational plans was likewise powerfully reflected in the printed instructions for all NKVD regional directors in the kalendarnyi plan or schedule for the Soviet expansion into Eastern Europe in September 1939. See the full text in GARF, f. 9401, Ministerstvo Vnutrenikh Del SSSR, 1934-1960 (MVD SSSR), op. 12, d. 51, ll. 34-40. MVD Circular No. 199ss, "O razrabotke operativnogo mobplana po agenturno-operativnym meropriiatiiam na voennoe vremia," issued under the name of NKVD I.I. Maslennikov and supervisor of the moblan (plan for mobilization) General I.S. Sheredega. For instance, by the end of the first month of occupation (25 October 1939), the First Special Section of the NKVD was expected to "Prepare a list of agentura, investigative and other archival materials" (1. 35 ob.) Likewise, the first step after reconquering German-occupied zones at the end of the war always consisted of capturing and processing archives of the German occupying forces. For examples, see the detailed top secret surveys of materials performed by NKVD analysts in Derzhavnyi Arkhiv L'vivskoi oblasti (DALO), f. 3, op. 2, d. 127, ll. 132-49. Likewise, numerous examples of the use of archives by the NKVD to track down enemies: for example, DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 67, ll. 78-104.
10. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1s, d. 643, 1. 16. The pivotal role of agentura in Soviet operational plans was likewise powerfully reflected in the printed instructions for all NKVD regional directors in the kalendarnyi plan or schedule for the Soviet expansion into Eastern Europe in September 1939. See the full text in GARF, f. 9401, Ministerstvo Vnutrenikh Del SSSR, 1934-1960 (MVD SSSR), op. 12, d. 51, ll. 34-40. MVD Circular No. 199ss, "O razrabotke operativnogo mobplana po agenturno-operativnym meropriiatiiam na voennoe vremia," issued under the name of NKVD I.I. Maslennikov and supervisor of the moblan (plan for mobilization) General I.S. Sheredega. For instance, by the end of the first month of occupation (25 October 1939), the First Special Section of the NKVD was expected to "Prepare a list of agentura, investigative and other archival materials" (1. 35 ob.) Likewise, the first step after reconquering German-occupied zones at the end of the war always consisted of capturing and processing archives of the German occupying forces. For examples, see the detailed top secret surveys of materials performed by NKVD analysts in Derzhavnyi Arkhiv L'vivskoi oblasti (DALO), f. 3, op. 2, d. 127, ll. 132-49. Likewise, numerous examples of the use of archives by the NKVD to track down enemies: for example, DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 67, ll. 78-104.
11. See "O sovmestnoi deiatel'nosti OUN-UPA s okhrannoi politsiei i SD," a twenty-seven-page top secret report of NKGB Colonel Voloshenko to Grushetskii, dated 7 October 1944. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 67, ll. 78-104.
12. From a top secret report of the Lopatyn raion regional chief Malanchuk (25 December 1944), DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 66, l. 46.
13. Top secret report entitled "Spravaka o 'skhronakh' OUN-UPA," prepared by Major Volchenko, Chief of the Second Department of the First Section of GUBB NKVD (5 July 1945). GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1s, d. 381, ll. 136-41.
14. Report of Grushetskii to Khrushchev in May 1945. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 212, l. 121.
15. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1s, d. 381, l. 136.
16. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1s, d. 381, l. 136.
17. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1s, d. 381, l. 136. Cf., DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 212. ll. 121-22.
18. See the schematic drawings of West Ukrainian rebel hideouts in GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1s, d. 381, ll. 138-40.
19. . GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1s, d. 381, l. 136. In 1995, the author visited his first skhron in Dora village, near Yaremche, Ivano-Frankivsk oblast in the Carpathian mountains. The hideout was located at the ridge of a cliff overlooking the local river, a treacherous 100 meters down from a difficult mountain path. In 1954, four Ukrainian nationalists were betrayed by a fifth member of their unit. Held under siege in the hideout for more than a month, the four rebels - three men and a woman - chose to commit suicide rather than to surrender to the Soviets. In 1991, a large white cross and crude cement plaque have been erected to honor the dead.
20. The underground hideouts in Galicia accounted for a development that deeply frustrated Soviet authorities, who noted repeatedly in 1944 and 1945 that local populations "faded away" into the forests when Soviet forces appeared. But the role of underground hideouts in Galicia was nothing like the central tactical significance of tunnels in Vietnam, which transformed mere peasant villages into powerful fortresses; see Tom Mangold and John Penycate, The Tunnels of Cu Chi (New York: Berkeley Books, 1985).
21. Adapted from top secret monthly reports to Zlenko, Tsentral'nyi Dirzhavnyi Arkhiv Hromadskykh Organizatsii (TsDAHO, formerly the Central Party Archives of Ukraine), f. 1, op. 23, d. 1741, ll. 23-25, 27, 31-36, 40-41; and top secret report of Korotchenko, et.al. to Nikita Khrushchev, dated 2 January 1947, TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 4965, ll. 3-4.
22. See OUN-UPA instructions on the construction of underground hideouts in TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 931, ll. 36-39; TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 2968, l. 22.
23. DALO, f. 3, op. 1s, d. 70, l. 38.
24. DALO, f. 3, op. 1s, d. 70, l. 5 ob.
25. Based on report of Pomorianskii raikom (raion Party Committee) secretary Kunits, f. 3, op. 1, d. 192, ll. 125, dated 25 January 1945.
26. From a captured UPA Protocol, dated 11 July 1945. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 213, ll. 170.
27. Data for seven districts in West Ukraine compiled from reports in GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 349, l. 1; d. 352, ll. 69-77.
28. Top secret communiqué entitled "Ob operativnoi obstanovke v zapadnykh oblastiakh Ukrainy," dated 28 May 1946, TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 2867, l. 26.
29. Top secret report to L'viv Obkom Secretary Grushetskii from the deputy director of the NKVD Border Patrol (in L'viv) on the Ukrainian Front, dated 6 October 1944. DALO, f. 3, op. 1s, d. 70, ll. 5-6 ob.
30. OUN-UPA instructions to raion directors issued in the late spring of 1946. TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 2968, l. 47.
31. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 423, ll. 57-60.
32. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 423, ll. 57-60.
33. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 70, e. 42.
34. See, for instance, the report in DALO, f. 3, op. 2, d. 458, l. 69.
35. Top secret report to Grushetskii from the deputy director of the NKVD Border Patrol (in L'viv) on the Ukrainian Front (6 October 1944). DALO, f. 3, op. 1s, d. 70, ll. 5-6 ob.
36. UPA instructions to all units and ethnic Ukrainian villages based on the West Ukrainian-Polish border, seized by NKVD border troops on the Rava-Rus'ka line in July 1945. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 213, ll. 162-164.
37. DALO, f. 3, op. 1s, d. 70, l. 1.
38. DALO, f. 3, op. 1s, d. 70, l. 2.
39. DALO, f. 3, op. 1s, d. 70, l. 2.
40. DALO, f. 3, op. 1s, d. 194, ll. 59-60.
41. DALO, f. 3, op. 1s, d. 70, l. 6.
42. Report of raion rebel chief, L'viv oblast dated March 1947. DALO, f. 3, op. 2, d. 121, ll. 108-13.
43. DALO, f. 3, op. 1s, d. 70, l. 3.
44. The memorandum was dated 4 September 1944. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 126, l. 355. For similar cases, see GARF, f. R-9478, op 1, d. 126, ll. 327-29. The inclusion of the patronymic "Vasil'evich" in this document (generally identified with Russian usage and not typical of Galician forms of address) was rather common in lists of targets generated by the Ukrainian rebel underground.
45. See the separate transcripts of the interrogations of both men at GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 126, ll. 356-59.
46. On deliberate Soviet operations to falsely implicate underground rebels as Soviet collaborators, see two such cases in TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 1742, ll. 310-311.
47. DALO, f. 3, op. 1s, d. 70, l. 1.
48. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 292, 1.29 ob.
49. From top secret instructions of OUN officer Baty on 11 August 1944. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 70, l. 37.
50. From the interrogation transcripts of the commandant of the rebel SB in Mdinovskii raion, Rivne oblast, Ivan Iavors'kyi, dated 14 April 1944 (l. 54). In a top secret report on OUN-UPA terror prepared by the chief of the First Section of GUBB NKVD, Major General A.P. Gorshkov, dated 26 December 1944. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 381, ll. 53-61. A copy of the original instruction from Oleksa appears in a cache of documents captured by Soviet forces. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 126, l. 326. Popular anger over whole-family reprisals led OUN-UPA officials to repudiate such actions by 1945. In "Instructions to Unit Commanders" dated 21 November 1944, rebel officers were issued a gentle reprimand against cutting off the heads of suspected collaborators: "You ought not to cut off the heads of [Soviet] secret agents (seksoty) any more." GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 126, l. 306. Within five months, the signals were much clearer and more strongly worded; instructions from UPA General Command in May 1945 ordered: "Conduct mass annihilation of secret agents (seksoty), but do not transfer guilt to their family members. You can [however] confiscate or destroy their property." GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 292, l. 14.
51. "K seksotam, donoschikam, istrebitel'iam, i t. d." In a top secret OUN directive, dated February 1946, preserved in KGB files in L'viv, the OUN commander "Iuliian" upraided regional chiefs for not circulating the broadsheet in its entirety. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 436, l. 44.
52. DALO, f. 3, op. 1s, d. 70, l. 4.
53. From a top secret report of the Lopatyn raion chief Malanchuk, dated 25 December 1944. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 66, l. 47. On the social and cultural meaning of alternative forms of violence, see Natalie Davis, "Rites of Violence," in Society and Culture in Early Modern France (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1975), 152-88.
54. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 381, l. 58.
55. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 381, l. 58.
56. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 381, l. 60.
57. The focus here on Ukrainian rebel use of terror and atrocities to intimidate Soviet collaborators by no means implies that Ukrainians were any more violent than other ethnic groups (Poles or Soviets). The point is not to attribute guilt, but to study the tactical role of violence and terror.
58. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 381, l. 60.
59. Report from L'viv from gorkom (city Party committee) secretary Shyptiak (27 August 1944), DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 66, l. 12.
60. From a top secret report on OUN-UPA terror prepared by chief of the first section of the GUBB NKVD, Major General Gorshkov, dated 26 December 1944. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 381, l. 54.
61. TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 2968, ll. 201-03.
62. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 381, l. 57.
63. From OUN Instructions in 1945. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 292, l. 29.
64. Directive of Ukrainian Minister of State Security S.R. Savchenko to regional MGB chiefs, dated 15 June 1948. TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 5465, ll. 307-13.
65. TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 1741, l. 48.
66. Gleaned by NKVD investigators from eyewitness reports of a speech of an OUN-UPA colonel in a village assembly convened by force at the end of June 1945 in village Lishnevichi in Brodsk raion (L'viv). DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 212, l. 166.
67. Six-page top secret report of Lieutenant-General MGB-L'viv A.I. Voronin to the Drohobych obkom in September 1946. DALO, f. 5001, op. 7, d. 279, ll. 119-21 ob.
68. Data for February 1944-April 1945 adapted from top secret report of Leont'ev, dated 17 May 1945. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 352, ll. 43-45. Data for 1946 adapted from top secret monthly reports to Stalin, Molotov, Beria, Zhdanov, and Kuznetsov from Minister of Internal Affairs S. Kruglov (12 May 1946-28 January 1947). GARF, f. R-9401, op. 2, d. 136, l. 5; d. 137, l. 176; d. 138, ll. 133-134; d. 139, ll. 48-49; d. 139, l. 143; d. 139, ll. 267-268; d. 139, l. 105; d. 168, l. 94. Aggregate data total over 18,000 assassinations for the period up to April 1947. However, categories of victims were available for only 11,725.
69. M. V. Koval', Ukraina i drugii svitovii i Velykii Vitchyznianii viinakh, 1939-1945 gg. Proba suchasnoho kontseptual'noho analizu (Kiev, 1994), 46-47.
70. See the fascinating and generally reliable account of guerilla leader Juozas Daumantas, Fighters for Freedom: Lithuanian Partisans versus the U.S.S.R (1944-1947) 2nd ed. (Toronto, 1975), 125. We can extend such practices to all countries in the Soviet western borderlands, since the same NKVD/NKGB officers often moved from one republic to another, depending on the degree of local resistance.
71. Ibid., 138.
72. Ibid., 125.
73. Ibid., 125-26. Today, throughout West Ukraine, one can find in isolated hills or woods well-tended crosses or other monuments to fallen rebels from this era.
74. The legacy of devastation in the western borderlands has been summarized in several studies. See Alec Nove, An Economic History of the USSR (New York: Penguin Books, 1989-1991); James R. Millar, "Conclusion: Impact and Aftermath of World War II," in Susan J. Linz, ed., The Impact of World War II on the Soviet Union (Totowa, N.J.: Rowman & Allanheld, 1985), 283-91; and William Moskoff, The Bread of Affliction: The Food Supply in the USSR During World War II (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 47.
75. The legacy of devastation in the western borderlands has been summarized in several studies. See Alec Nove, An Economic History of the USSR (New York: Penguin Books, 1989-1991); James R. Millar, "Conclusion: Impact and Aftermath of World War II," in Susan J. Linz, ed., The Impact of World War II on the Soviet Union (Totowa, N.J.: Rowman & Allanheld, 1985), 283-91; and William Moskoff, The Bread of Affliction: The Food Supply in the USSR During World War II (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 47.
76. The legacy of devastation in the western borderlands has been summarized in several studies. See Alec Nove, An Economic History of the USSR (New York: Penguin Books, 1989-1991); James R. Millar, "Conclusion: Impact and Aftermath of World War II," in Susan J. Linz, ed., The Impact of World War II on the Soviet Union (Totowa, N.J.: Rowman & Allanheld, 1985), 283-91; and William Moskoff, The Bread of Affliction: The Food Supply in the USSR During World War II (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 47.
77. One finds repeated complaints from NKVD commanders regarding the shortage of qualified personnel to run agentura operations against local ethnic groups. See, for instance, then Minister of Public Security in Poland Ivan A. Serov's top secret report to Beria, dated 16 October 1944, reprinted in NKVD i pol'skoe podpol'e, 1944-1945 (Po 'osobym papkam' I. V. Stalina) (Moscow, 1994), 37-42. Also see the complaints among raion chiefs in various conferences in L'viv throughout 1944 and 1945: DALO, f. 3, op. 1, dd. 191, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196, 198, 201.
78. Top secret report of V.S. Riasnoi and Leont'ev to MVD SSSR S. Kruglov, dated May 1946. GARF, f. 9478, op. 1s, d. 527, ll. 109-17.
79. GARF, f. 9401s, op. 2, d. 92, l. 68. From top secret copies of UPA-NVRA documents and instructions forwarded from Soviet People's Commissar of Internal Affairs V. S. Riasnoi to Beria, and then to Stalin on 6 January 1945. In over seventy documents from the Special Files for Stalin regarding West Ukrainian affairs, 1944-1948, this is the only one where a verbatim translation of OUN instructions was included for Stalin's personal review. The obvious issue was the threat posed to the security of the Soviet presence by such rebel assassination squads. See also Yuriy Tys-Krokhmaliuk, UPA Warfare in Ukraine: Strategical, Tactical and Organizational Problems of Ukrainian Resistance in World War II (New York, 1972). On underground tactics from a Soviet perspective, see A. P. Kozlov, Trevozhnaia sluzhba 2nd edition (Moscow, 1975), 159-228.
80. GARF, f. 9401s, op. 2, d. 92, l. 68. From top secret copies of UPA-NVRA documents and instructions forwarded from Soviet People's Commissar of Internal Affairs V. S. Riasnoi to Beria, and then to Stalin on 6 January 1945. In over seventy documents from the Special Files for Stalin regarding West Ukrainian affairs, 1944-1948, this is the only one where a verbatim translation of OUN instructions was included for Stalin's personal review. The obvious issue was the threat posed to the security of the Soviet presence by such rebel assassination squads. See also Yuriy Tys-Krokhmaliuk, UPA Warfare in Ukraine: Strategical, Tactical and Organizational Problems of Ukrainian Resistance in World War II (New York, 1972). On underground tactics from a Soviet perspective, see A. P. Kozlov, Trevozhnaia sluzhba 2nd edition (Moscow, 1975), 159-228.
81. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 352, ll. 43-45; GARF, f. R-9401, op. 2, d. 136, l. 5; d. 137, l. 176; d. 138, ll. 133-34; d. 139, ll. 48-49; d. 139, l. 143; d. 139, ll. 267-68; d. 139, l. 105; d. 168, l. 94.
82. Data based on preceding twenty-three months in report for 10 December 1948. DALO, f. 3, op. 2s, d. 467, l. 92.
83. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 191, ll. 13-15.
84. See the instructions of Soviet Deputy of Internal Affairs Lieutenant-General V. Riasnoi to Ukranian MVD T. Strokach, dated 17 December 1946: "O razrabotke OUN v sviazi s orientirovkoi ee na anglichan i amerkiantsev." GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1s, d. 521, ll. 279-280.
85. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1s, d. 643, ll. 14-34.
86. Top secret report from Strokach to Beria dated 29 March 1944, regarding the activities of the Polish underground in Polish territory. GARF, f. R-9401, op. 2, d. 64, l. 227.
87. Gabor Rittersporn, "The Omnipresent Conspiracy: On Soviet Imagery of Politics in the 1930s," in J. Arch Getty and Roberta Manning, ed., Stalinist Terror: New Perspectives (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993).
88. 25 November 1944 Addendum to instructions, dated September 1944. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 292, l. 35 ob.
89. DALO, f. 3, op. 1s, d. 70, l. 2ob.
90. Emphasis added by the author. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 126, l. 320 ob. OUN-UPA instructions to regional propagandists dated 22 September 1944.
91. From a report to the Central Committee of the CPSU of I. Bogorodchenko of the L'viv obkom (oblast Party committee), dated 24 September 1945. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 214, l. 111.
92. Based on report of Pomorianskyi raikom secretary Kunyts, f. 3, op. 1, d. 192, ll. 121-22.
93. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 192, l. 126.
94. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 192, l. 122.
95. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 192, l. 123.
96. On the multi-ethnic mix in interwar southeastern Poland, see Stephan Horak, Poland and Her National Minorities, 1919-1939 (New York: Vantage Press, 1961).
97. In the long run, the deportation of the Poles (exchanged for ethnic Ukrainians deported en masse from Polish zones) favored Soviet pacification of West Ukraine by uprooting the partisan base of underground rebel units living just over the border in Poland, outside the jurisdiction of Soviet forces. On the exile of Poles from western Ukraine and western Belarus, see Keith Sword, Deportation and Exile: Poles in the Soviet Union, 1939-1948 (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994); and Krystyna Kersten, The Establishment of Communist Rule in Poland, 1943-1948 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991).
98. In the long run, the deportation of the Poles (exchanged for ethnic Ukrainians deported en masse from Polish zones) favored Soviet pacification of West Ukraine by uprooting the partisan base of underground rebel units living just over the border in Poland, outside the jurisdiction of Soviet forces. On the exile of Poles from western Ukraine and western Belarus, see Keith Sword, Deportation and Exile: Poles in the Soviet Union, 1939-1948 (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994); and Krystyna Kersten, The Establishment of Communist Rule in Poland, 1943-1948 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991).
99. It is ironic that Soviet power was able to accomplish what years of war between ethnic Poles and Ukrainians could not: the "liberation" of West Ukraine from the Poles. As an ethnic Ukrainian stage actress declared in 1945 to a Soviet informer, "This is the first intelligent step on the part of the Bolsheviks since the liberation of L'viv. If the Bolsheviks had from the very beginning of the liberation of L'viv not been so preoccupied with the Banderivtsi, but instead arrested the Poles, then today there wouldn't be a single Banderivets: they would have all crossed over to the side of Soviet power. . . ." DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 214, l. 7 ob.
100. See for example the instructions to raion NKVD field officers on "The Mass Recruitment of Informants," dated 10 December 1945. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 226, ll. 71-72.
101. See GUBB personnel files in GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 527, "Perepiska po shtatam i lichnomu sostavu ob pereferiinikh organov NKVD" (1946).
102. From a top secret report of A. Leont'ev to S. Kruglov. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1s, d. 352, ll. 75-76, dated 3 August 1945.
103. Top secret report of Saraev, entitled "Spravka o sostoianii operativno-boevoi deiatel'nosti istrebitel'nykh batal'ionov zapadnykh oblastei USSR." TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 2967, ll. 53-54.
104. The complete file of the case, including transcripts of NKGB interrogations of the agents as well as the transcripts of the underground's interrogation, are preserved in GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 643, ll. 237-311. On the request of archivists, and out of respect for the rights of individuals (in accordance with the Russian Federation's law on state secrets dated August 1993, which restricts such material for seventy-five years), I have released only the field pseudonyms (klichki) of key collaborators. Apparently, the NKGB mistakenly identified a corpse at the scene as Chuprynka. In fact, Roman Shukevych, the supreme commander of the UPA - alias Taras Chuprynka - was killed outside of L'viv on 5 March 1950. See Armstrong, Ukrainian Nationalism, 223. According to Pavel A. Sudoplatov, the chief of the NKVD section devoted to diversion and sabotage who ran the operation which liquidated Shukevych, "The organized guerilla resistance in Western Ukraine collapsed after his death." Pavel and Anatolii Sudoplatov, Special Tasks (New York: Little, Brown and Co., 1994-1995), 256.
105. The complete file of the case, including transcripts of NKGB interrogations of the agents as well as the transcripts of the underground's interrogation, are preserved in GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 643, ll. 237-311. On the request of archivists, and out of respect for the rights of individuals (in accordance with the Russian Federation's law on state secrets dated August 1993, which restricts such material for seventy-five years), I have released only the field pseudonyms (klichki) of key collaborators. Apparently, the NKGB mistakenly identified a corpse at the scene as Chuprynka. In fact, Roman Shukevych, the supreme commander of the UPA - alias Taras Chuprynka - was killed outside of L'viv on 5 March 1950. See Armstrong, Ukrainian Nationalism, 223. According to Pavel A. Sudoplatov, the chief of the NKVD section devoted to diversion and sabotage who ran the operation which liquidated Shukevych, "The organized guerilla resistance in Western Ukraine collapsed after his death." Pavel and Anatolii Sudoplatov, Special Tasks (New York: Little, Brown and Co., 1994-1995), 256.
106. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 643, ll. 307-11. On the enormous success of Ukrainian rebels in compromising the security of Soviet operations, see the numerous complaints of raion NKVD-NKGB officials: DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 191, ll. 9-10. In a top secret communication to Khrushchev, dated 13 July 1946, MVD-Ukraine Kruglov complained of the failure of raikom and obkom leaders in West Ukraine to respect clandestimty of agentura operations. TsDAHO, f. 1. op. 23, d. 2966, ll. 78-79.
107. From a top secret report of A. A. Stoiantsev to Khrushchev, dated 8 August 1946. TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 2966, l. 73.
108. From a top secret report of A. A. Stoiantsev to Khrushchev, dated 14 September 1946. TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 2966, ll. 23-34.
109. Ibid., l. 30.
110. From a top secret report of A. A. Stoiantsev to Khrushchev, dated 8 August 1946 TsDAHO f. 1, op. 23, d. 2966, ll. 73-74.
111. TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 2971, l. 11.
112. Ukrainian underground nationalist rebel Bohun to 3ov, dated September 1946, from a package of captured materials sent by Drohobych obkom secretary Horobets to Khrushchev, 15 October 1946. DALO, f. 5001, op. 7, d. 220, l. 142.
113. Top secret. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 755, ll. 51-52.
114. GARF, f. R-9478, op. 1, d. 521, ll. 87-88.
115. See the full typed transcript of the meeting in DALO, f. 3, op. 2, d. 90, ll. 1-98.
116. In the absence of concrete information, historians have generally accepted Khrushchev's own erroneous assertion that he was removed because of Stalin's resentment of his alleged proUkrainian sympathies. In fact, Khrushchev's temporary fall from grace was clearly a repudiation of his policy of using mass terror to squeeze the underground. Three years of Khrushchev's management had not only left the leadership and main infrastructure of the Ukrainian rebel underground intact, but it had actually generated greater active support for anti-Soviet opposition among the local population. The new policy from 1947 would focus on clandestine surgical operations aimed directly against the rebel underground and consensus-building policies to win the sympathies of the general population. For a more detailed discussion, see the author's unpublished paper, "Khrushchev Remembers? New Evidence from West Ukraine." For a summary of the debate surrounding Khrushchev's temporary removal from office, see David R. Marples, Stalinism in Ukraine in the 1940s (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1992), 82-96.
117. In the absence of concrete information, historians have generally accepted Khrushchev's own erroneous assertion that he was removed because of Stalin's resentment of his alleged proUkrainian sympathies. In fact, Khrushchev's temporary fall from grace was clearly a repudiation of his policy of using mass terror to squeeze the underground. Three years of Khrushchev's management had not only left the leadership and main infrastructure of the Ukrainian rebel underground intact, but it had actually generated greater active support for anti-Soviet opposition among the local population. The new policy from 1947 would focus on clandestine surgical operations aimed directly against the rebel underground and consensus-building policies to win the sympathies of the general population. For a more detailed discussion, see the author's unpublished paper, "Khrushchev Remembers? New Evidence from West Ukraine." For a summary of the debate surrounding Khrushchev's temporary removal from office, see David R. Marples, Stalinism in Ukraine in the 1940s (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1992), 82-96.
118. DALO, f. 3, op. 2, d. 456, l. 190.
119. DALO, f. 3, op. 2s, d. 467, ll. 92-93. See also the top secret report of Grushetskii to Khrushchev, dated 27 November 1948, TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 5047, ll. 5-9. Unfortunately, the cache of documents of this key agent of the Ukrainian nationalist underground's counterintelligence unit in L'viv, Drohobych, and Stanislav oblasti were destroyed when the rebels soaked the archive with phosphoric acid, thereby managing to burn or otherwise ruin nearly all of it.
120. See the summary in a War Crimes Trial investigative file of V. I. Lukasevych in DALO, f. R-239, op. 2, d. 8, ll. 1-45. Along with D'iakon, three other rebel fugitives were killed in the raid in 1948: Bohdan Prokof'iv (Stepan), Mykhailo Kovalyk (Stalevyi), and Vasyl' Sokhan' (Dovbach). There are numerous indications to suggest that Myron was the author of the primer mentioned at the start of this paper: "Agentura NKVD-NKGB v deistvii."
121. TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 5047, ll. 3-4.
122. Myron's biography offers fascinating insight into the making of a chief officer of Ukrainian rebel counterintelligence. Born a peasant in 1912 in village Deviatniki, Novi-Strilyshcha raion, Drohobych oblast, he worked until 1941 as a teacher in the nearby village of Iushkivtsi. In 1941, he was appointed burgomaster or chief magistrate of Bibrka raion in L'viv oblast, and later became chief of police of Bibrka until the end of the German occupation. TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 5047, ll. 3-4. As Bibrka's chief of police, Diakon oversaw, in April 1943, a brutal annihilation of local Jews carried out by a combined unit of German soldiers and Ukrainian nationalists. DALO, f. 3, op. 2s, d. 467, l. 94.
123. DALO, f. 3, op. 2s, d. 467, ll. 92-93.
124. DALO, f. 3, op. 2s, d. 467, ll. 43-45. In contrast, see the transcripts of Khrushchev's meeting in May 1945 with NKVD and Party regional chiefs where he repeatedly called for an escalation of the use of violence. DALO, f. 3, op. 1, d. 196, ll. 1-73.
125. TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 5174, ll. 86-104.
126. Emphasis added. TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 16, d. 68, ll. 10-17. I am grateful to Iurii I. Shapoval for bringing this extraordinary document to my attention. The full Russian text appears in his Liudyna i systema (Shtrykhy do portretu totalitarnoi doby v Ukraini) (Kiev: 1994), 52-61. The account, and numerous others like it, suggests that Norman Naimark was hasty in his fascinating study of rape perpetrated by the Red Army during the postwar years of occupation, concluding that "in general, . . . . Slavic women . . . were not subject to the same depredations by Soviets as non-Slavs -Germans and Hungarians. " Norman Naimark, The Russians in Germany: A History of the Soviet Zone of Occupation, 1945-1949 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1995), 107; see also Alfred-Maurice de Zayas, A Terrible Revenge: The Ethnic Cleansing of the East European Germans, 1944-1950 (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994), 34-63.
127. Emphasis added. TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 16, d. 68, ll. 10-17. I am grateful to Iurii I. Shapoval for bringing this extraordinary document to my attention. The full Russian text appears in his Liudyna i systema (Shtrykhy do portretu totalitarnoi doby v Ukraini) (Kiev: 1994), 52-61. The account, and numerous others like it, suggests that Norman Naimark was hasty in his fascinating study of rape perpetrated by the Red Army during the postwar years of occupation, concluding that "in general, . . . . Slavic women . . . were not subject to the same depredations by Soviets as non-Slavs - Germans and Hungarians. " Norman Naimark, The Russians in Germany: A History of the Soviet Zone of Occupation, 1945-1949 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1995), 107; see also Alfred-Maurice de Zayas, A Terrible Revenge: The Ethnic Cleansing of the East European Germans, 1944-1950 (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994), 34-63.
128. Emphasis added. TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 16, d. 68, ll. 10-17. I am grateful to Iurii I. Shapoval for bringing this extraordinary document to my attention. The full Russian text appears in his Liudyna i systema (Shtrykhy do portretu totalitarnoi doby v Ukraini) (Kiev: 1994), 52-61. The account, and numerous others like it, suggests that Norman Naimark was hasty in his fascinating study of rape perpetrated by the Red Army during the postwar years of occupation, concluding that "in general, . . . . Slavic women . . . were not subject to the same depredations by Soviets as non-Slavs - Germans and Hungarians. " Norman Naimark, The Russians in Germany: A History of the Soviet Zone of Occupation, 1945-1949 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1995), 107; see also Alfred-Maurice de Zayas, A Terrible Revenge: The Ethnic Cleansing of the East European Germans, 1944-1950 (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994), 34-63.