Terror i represje sowieckie wobec zachodnich Ukraińców w latach 1943–1945 z jugosłowiańskimi kontekstami w tle

Abstrakt

The aim of this article is to show the relationship between Soviet partisans and the Ukrainian population in the western regions of Ukraine. It also aims to demonstrate how the attitude toward the armed troops of the Ukrainian national and nationalist underground, which operated in the area between 1942 and 1944, changed under the influence of the war on the Eastern Front and internal factors. All this led to the outbreak of an open armed conflict and terror of the red partisans against the Ukrainian peasants, most of whom supported national and nationalist partisans. These events are presented against the background of political, social and military conditions for the operation and development of the Soviet partisan movement in the area of Volhynia and Eastern Galicia. This article also describes how the Soviet security police and army fought the OUN-B and UPA in this area and repressed members of the anti-communist underground and its civilian supporters during the re-establishment of the communist authorities after 1944. It also attempts to show the similarities and differences between the events in Western Ukraine (1943–1945) and the Civil War in Yugoslavia (1941–1945), including the local communists’ fight for power in the country.