Historians claim that the prerequisites for the tragedy in Guta Penyatskaya began in the 1920s and 1930s. In 1920, Petliurists and members of ZUNR who were in exile in Europe united in the so-called Ukrainian military organization. Nine years later, a former officer of the Austro-Hungarian army, Yevgeny Konovalets, created the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) at its base. After the Nazis came to power in Germany, the Abwehr began to pin great hopes on the Ukrainian nationalists.
Root of collaborationism
In 1938, as a result of a special operation of the NKVD, Yevgeny Konovalets, the leader of the OUN, was liquidated. The organization began a fierce internal struggle for leadership and the opportunity to receive Hitler's funding. As a result, the movement split into two main factions. One of them, the OUN (b) was led by the leader of the underground in the Poles under the control of the underground, Stepan Bandera, the other, by the OUN (m) - a relative of Konovalets Andrei Melnik. Bandera was at that time an agent of the Abwehr, and Melnik was at the same time an Abwehr and the General Directorate of Imperial Security (RSHA) competing with him.
“Back in 1938, the document entitled“ Military Doctrine of Ukrainian Nationalists ”recorded the intention to conduct ethnic cleansing on the territory of Ukraine against Poles, Russians and Jews. According to the testimony given by the Abwehr officers after the war, the destruction of Poles and Jews by members of the OUN was planned for 1939, but in fact it began only in the summer of 1941, when Melnikov and Bandera staged Jewish pogroms in Western Ukraine, ”the director told in an interview with RT of the Historical Memory Foundation, research fellow at the Institute of Russian History of the Russian Academy of Sciences Alexander Dyukov.
Shortly after the start of the war, Stepan Bandera lost the confidence of the Hitlerite command and was arrested. He appropriated a large sum of money given to him by the Abwehr for the needs of the OUN, and moreover, his associates, without the consent of Berlin, tried to proclaim the Ukrainian state in Lviv under the protectorate of the Third Reich. The members of the OUN were sent to serve in the auxiliary police, which was charged with carrying out punitive actions against the civilian population of the occupied territories, as well as the massive destruction of the Jewish population under the leadership of the Einsatzgroup of the security police and the SD. The Ukrainian national special forces that had previously submitted to the Abwehr, Roland and Nachtigall, also had to be disbanded. Their personnel, including the closest assistant to Bandera Roman Shukhevych, became the basis for the formation of the 201st security police battalion, which carried out punitive operations in Belarus.
- Ukrainian collaborators with Wehrmacht officers
- © Deutsches Bundesarchiv
In October 1942, the military wing of the OUN (b) - the Ukrainian Insurgent Army was formed. In 1943, Dmitry Klyachkivsky became its commander-in-chief, and later Roman Shukhevych.
At the same time, in the spring of 1943, the formation of Ukrainian national formations began as part of the SS troops. On April 28, in Lviv, the creation of a separate SS division in Galicia was solemnly announced. Volunteers from the staff of battalions of the auxiliary police and members of the organizations of Ukrainian nationalists began to enroll in it en masse. Taking into account the fact that over 80 thousand Galicians wished to serve in the SS - more than it was supposed to be in the state of one division - of these, the German command decided to additionally form five separate police regiments who received numbers from the 4th to the 8th, as well as the 204th battalion of police and SD.
"The single root for the UPA and the SS division" Galicia "was the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists," said Dyukov.
Separate Galician SS regiments in 1943 were sent to training in Western Europe, where they carried out punitive operations against partisans and members of the resistance movement. In February 1944, the 4th and 5th police volunteer regiments were returned to Galicia.
Volyn Massacre
Since 1942, Ukrainian nationalist detachments operating in Volyn, began to commit separate killings of Polish settlers. In the spring of 1943, this process took on an avalanche-like character - events that historians call the Volyn Massacre began.
On July 11, 1943, OUN-UPA forces simultaneously attacked 150 Polish settlements. According to the memoirs of the survivors and the testimony of the detainees later by the Soviet OUN bodies, the Ukrainian militants killed Poles, regardless of age and gender. The documents preserved cold-blooded confessions, as the UPA fighters asked the commanders to give them extra ammunition to destroy the children who had not yet finished, how they used to beat the old men with sticks, how jammed the machine guns from which they were shooting at the people running. The killings were accompanied by torture, robbery and rape.
- Victims of the Volyn Massacre
- © Wikimedia
Not only Poles became victims of Ukrainian nationalists, but also compatriots — for example, members of mixed families who refused to betray their loved ones.
“Ukrainian nationalists punished local residents for their attempts to help ethnic Poles, even for warning about the attack. According to the Polish Institute of National Remembrance, at least 384 people were officially executed by Ukrainian nationalists for helping their Polish neighbors, ”said Sergei Belov, secretary of the Victory Museum, in an interview with RT.
According to historians, the total number of victims of the Volyn Massacre is unlikely to be established precisely. Estimates range from 60 to 200 thousand people.
Murder in Guta Penyatskaya
“What happened in the village of Guta Penyatskaya is often referred to as the Volyn Massacre, but I still think that this is a separate crime,” said Alexander Dyukov.
Guta Penyatskaya village, located near the town of Brody, in the 1930s had approximately 760 inhabitants. During the war, the population first declined and then sharply increased. The village was located in Galicia, away from the epicenter of the Volyn Massacre, and refugees rushed in there, counting on the help of their compatriots. As a result, at the end of 1943, more than a thousand people lived in Guta Penyatskaya.
In the winter of 1943-1944, UPA militants attempted to attack Polish settlements in the northern part of Galicia, but at first they were repulsed. First, local residents managed to create small self-defense detachments, and second, they maintained relations with Soviet partisans.
On February 23, 1944, the reconnaissance detachment of the 4th Galician Police Regiment moved to Guta Penyatska, who was supposed to verify information about the appearance of Soviet partisans in the village. The Poles from the Ukrainian-speaking SS did not expect anything good and gave the squad a battle. Died two punishers. The losses could have been more, but the Ukrainian SS officers came to the aid of their "twin brothers" from the hundreds of UPA passing by.
It should be noted that several hundred partisans actually entered Guta Penyatskaya, but left her on February 21 or 22. Local residents sheltered two wounded Soviet soldiers.
On the night of February 27-28, the intelligence service of the Home Army handed over to Guta Penyatskaya’s self-defense that forces of the 4th SS police regiment moved to the village. Local fighters were instructed to hide weapons and, if possible, leave the village. The AK leadership hoped that the German command would limit itself to inspecting the village and, without finding armed men in it, would leave the local population alone. However, apparently, the Ukrainian SS men received permission from the German commanders to conduct the punitive operation.
Sergei Belov considers the death of two SS men only a formal reason for the attack.
“As a result of the successes of the Soviet troops during the Korsun-Shevchenko and Rivne-Lutsk operations, the situation of the occupying forces in Western Ukraine and southern Poland was threatened. They needed to secure a solid rear on the eve of the expected advance of the Red Army. This implied, among other things, the liquidation of the “Kraiova” self-defense points in the countryside. One of such centers of resistance was located just in Guta Penyatskaya, ”the expert noted.
Early in the morning of February 28, Guta Penyatskaya was surrounded by an SS detachment of about 500–600 people. They were accompanied by a group of UPA militants (Dmitri Karpenko’s hundred, alias Yastreb). The punishers did not even try to establish contact with the villagers and immediately opened fire with mortars and automatic weapons.
Then the SS men moved to the center of Guta Penyatskaya, driving her residents to the school and church. UPA militants, meanwhile, were robbed and set fire to houses. The people who tried to escape were shot on the spot.
A pregnant woman from the village was also driven into the church along with a midwife who was about to give birth to her. In the end, they killed both the child and two women. Elderly polka, who did not have time for the guards, was stabbed with a bayonet.
Right next to the church, the SS conducted interrogations, finding out the facts concerning the activities of the partisans. People were cruelly tortured. One of the leaders of the local self-defense was doused with gasoline and burned alive. So did the villager who treated the partisans. The wounded themselves were shot dead on the spot.
Then the inhabitants of Guta Penyatskaya were announced that they were going to be sent to work in Germany. People were divided into groups of several dozen people in each and locked in wooden household buildings, after which the buildings were set on fire.
- After the burning of Guta Penyatskaya SS "Galicia" buries two dead fighters
- © buzina.org
Taking into account the fact that residents of the nearest farmsteads were also driven into Guta Penyatskaya, the total number of victims of the massacre varies in different sources from 850 to 1.5 thousand people. Only about 150 local residents were saved from the punishers. They were sheltered by residents of neighboring villages. They then buried the dead and assisted the wounded. The village Guta Penyatskaya after the incident ceased to exist.
“This crime was not isolated. Then another 5–6 Polish villages were destroyed in the district, ”Dyukov stressed.
"An example of cooperation between the UPA and the SS"
In April 1944, separate police regiments were attached to the “Galichina” division and sent to the front. Several hundred SS fighters involved in the destruction of Guta Penyatskaya were captured by Soviet troops. After the investigation and trial, they were shot. Some criminals managed to hide in Canada and thus avoid retaliation.
In 1944, a commission to investigate crimes against the Polish people began an investigation into the massacre in Guta Penyatska. She managed to prove her involvement in the tragedy of the soldiers of the 4th police regiment of the SS, UPA and volunteers from among the Ukrainian nationalists who lived in neighboring villages. The names of more than 400 victims of the massacre were also identified.
- The consequences of a vandal attack on a memorial in Guta Penyatskaya
- © Frame: YouTube video
A memorial was erected at the site of the village, which in our day has been repeatedly attacked by vandals from among the Ukrainian radicals. Representatives of the official Kiev, despite the huge amount of evidence, called the participation of Ukrainian collaborators in the crime "not sufficiently proven." They refer, in particular, to the fact that no regular units of “Galicia” were operating in the area. However, this is just a trick - the 4th regiment at that time formally functioned, directly subordinate to the local SS leadership, but three months later it was still included in the division.
“This crime proves coordination between the state Nazi structures and the UPA. These people even at the grassroots level knew each other through joint service in the battalions of the auxiliary police. The murder in Guta Penyatska is a typical example of cooperation between the UPA and the SS, ”Dyukov said.
According to Sergei Belov, the crime in Guta Penyatskaya should be considered in the general context of the policy pursued by the occupation authorities and collaborators.
“This tragedy has become only part of a wider campaign of terror,” the expert concluded.
* “Ukrainian Insurgent Army” (UPA) is a Ukrainian organization recognized as extremist and banned in Russia (decision of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation dated 11/17/2014).