Did you know that during WW2 some Ukrainians
served in the Waffen-SS? And did you know that in smaller Ukrainian circles today these men are being
celebrated? Why is that? We've talked about Ukrainian WW2 collaboration before and now we're
gonna zoom in on a specific unit: the Ukrainian Waffen-SS Divsion Galicia. Keep watching.
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The region where the Ukrainian volunteers of the SS Galicia Division came from
Eastern Galicia, experienced a troublesome history during the 20th century. Till the First World War it was part
of Austria-Hungary. When World War One broke out the Russian Army invaded the region and
occupied the region after their successful offensive. However in mid-1915 after
the German-Austrianthe Gorlice–Tarnów Offensive, te Russian Imperial forces
were driven out. Eventually the Russian Empire would collapse
after the Russian Revolutions in 1917. After World War One was over the region was claimed by both
Poland and Ukrainian nationalists. It was fought over during the Polish-Ukrainian War (1919) and
Poland proclaimed vistory. Thus the region was incorporated into the Second Polish Republic.
In August 1939 Germany and the USSR signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, a non-agression pact
where spheres of influence were decided. Eastern Poland (as well as other regions) where for Stalin
to take. On 1 September 1939 Germany invaded Poland and this started WW2. Did you know that the Germans actually made it
to Eastern Galicia and laid siege to its capital: Lwów (now known as Lviv). The Germans
undertook several attacks on the city which were repulsed by the Polish defenders. The
German attackers were led by Ferdinand Schörner who demanded surrender. An attack would be
undertaken on 21 September. However, by that time the Soviets had made their way in the country.
On the 17th the Soviets invaded Poland from the east. Their excuse was that they
wanted to protect non-Polish people. Well, this was nonsense it is true that
Eastern Poland during the interwar years was populated by many not only Poles but also Ukrainians looking at Eastern Galicia.
Since they bulk of the Polish army was fighting against the German onslaught, the Soviets advanced
quick. Hitler ordered the Germans to withdraw from the city and leave it for the Soviets to
take. Soon after Polish forces surrendered seeing the overall situation was hopeless. Meanwhile,
many Ukrainian conscripts in the Polish army had deserted. As the Soviets seized control over
Eastern Poland annexations soon followed and Eastern Galicia was incorporated into the Ukrainian SSR, which was part of the USSR.
“Prisons were emptied, and political prisoners,
usually communists, were put in charge of local government. Soviet agitators urged
peasants to take revenge on landlords. Though most people resisted the call to criminality,
chaos reigned as thousands did not. Mass murders with axes were suddenly frequent.”
However, for the Ukrainians there was no room
for Ukrainian nationalism as countless of them
were arrested, tortured and executed or deported by the Soviet authorities.
But not only Ukrainians, but also Poles fell victim to Stalin's terror. Notorious was the Katyn Massacre where in the Spring of 1940 22,000
members of the Polish military and intelligentsia were mass murdered by the NKVD on Stalin's orders.
Other Ukrainian nationalists came to live in the General Government that was part of German-occupied Poland. Here Ukrainian
collaboration with the Germans started by members from the ultranationalist Organization
of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN). A split in this organization occured and from that moment
there was the more moderate wing: the OUN-M led by Andrei Melnik and the radical wing: the OUN-B led
by Stepan Bandera. In German-occupied Poland both OUN factions collaborated
with the Germans and two pro-German units were set up: the Nachtigall Battalion and the Roland
Battalion. These took part in the German invasion of the USSR that kicked off in June
1941. When OUN-B leader Stepan Bandera proclaimed Ukraine's independence In Lviv the Germans
However, the Germans weren't having it. They arrested Bandera who spent most of the war incarcerated.
Many OUN members were hunted down by the Germans and executed. From that moment the Germans and the OUN
were in conflict with one another. In August 1941 both the Nachtigall Battalion and the Roland Battalion were withdrawn
and reorganized into the Schutzmannschaft
Battalion 201. Other Ukrainians served in police battalions where they had to perform
police tasks and guard duties. Some units had to take part in rooting out partisans.
Some of the pro-German Ukrainian units took part in hunting down Jews. While the bulk
of Ukraine was placed under Erich Koch as Reichskommissariat Ukraine the region
of Eastern Galicia was incorporated in the General-Government (e.g. German-occupied Poland).
So Germans having Ukrainians serving for them is one thing, but how come the Germans set
up a Ukrainian Waffen-SS unit? Weren't the Ukrainians seen als Slavic inferior people by them?
“The Division’s official title was the 14th Waffen-Grenadier Division
of the SS, Halychyna No. 1, and it later became the 1st Ukrainian Division
of the Ukrainian National Army. It was formed as the Germans belatedly tried to solicit
the help of Soviet nationalities after the failure at the Battle of Stalingrad. […] The
title “Halychyna” (Galicia) was used either because the Germans wished to avoid direct
use of the more inflammatory “Ukrainian” or to ensure tighter German control.”
Pragmatism trumped ideology. After the Stalingrad disaster the Germans took a more
pragmatic approach and now Soviet nationalities were recruited on a large scale. It already happened before with
Hiwis, Security Units and like I mentioned the Nachtigall and Roland battalions,
but now the Germans stepped this up. Formed in 1943 through negotiations between the Germans
and the Ukrainian Central Committee in Kraków a Ukrainian Waffen-SS unit was set up. Governor of Galicia,
Otto von Waechter worked together with the Ukrainian Central Committee
(which was a non-political auxiliary organization and quasi-representative body of Ukrainians founded
in 1940) and its chairman Volodymyr Kubiiovych. Kubiiovych had several demands:
“[T]he most important were: freedom of religious practice—Ukrainian chaplains would be admitted
into the division to provide religious services; the division would be utilized
strictly on the eastern front against communist forces; the division would not be utilized for
any of Germany’s internal security needs (for example guarding factories, war plants, POW camps,
concentration camps, etc.); Ukrainian officers would be appointed to division command posts;
the soldiers and their families would be awarded benefits similar to those received
by German soldiers serving in the Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS; and at least a portion of the
Ukrainians held in prisons and concentrations camps would be released. As acknowledged by
Kubiiovych in the aftermath of World War II, the Ukrainian demands were largely met.”
The idea was that Galician Ukrainians (from the west) who in the past had been loyal to
the Habsburg Emperor and were of
Greek Catholic faith could serve in this unit. Not those living in central or eastern Ukraine who were mostly of orthodox faith. Although some Ukrainians from
outside Galicia also joined this division. Reason for many to join was that they saw the Germans
as a lesser evil. Ukrainians in Eastern Galicia had endured almost two years of harsh Soviet rule.
They believed that by joining the Germans they might be securing Ukraine's independence.
A great deal of naivity here since the Germans made clear from the getgo they would not recognize an independent
Ukraine. Not to mention the atrocities the Germans carried out. Many joined under duress,
because they faced slave labour in Germany if they did not join. Many thousands “volunteered” and at
the end the unit had around 18,000 men serving in its ranks with three regiments of infantry,
one of artillery, and one of training reserves. These men wore German Waffen-SS uniforms and
had German weaponry. They had a distinctive Galician lion on their right collar patch.
The official name of the unit changed several times. I have an overview of it right here. Pause the screen if you wanna study the details.
Training took place in either occupied Poland or Germany. Political lectures
were held by the company commander once a week lasting for two hours.
These were mostly about the situation at the front and how Hitler would solve it all.
In the Summer of 1944 the Ukrainian Waffen-SS unit went to the front attached to the
German 13th Army Corps. Near Brody the unit was encircled by Soviet troops.
“The division was initially wiped out in the area of Brody, suffering 60 per cent casualties against
the vastly superior Soviet forces. The ‘Galicia’ Division had deployed 11,000 men at Brody,
of whom 2,807 survivors were registered after the battle.”
Those captured by the Soviets were either shot or sent to a concentration camp near Moscow. Others managed
to join the UPA (Ukrainian Insurgent Army). In August 1944 Himmler decided to create a
new ‘Galicia’ Division out of the remnants of the destroyed one with additional recruits.
In the autumn of 1944 they were sent to Slovakia to assist the Germans in crushing
the Slovak National Uprising. In January they were sent to Austria and Slovenia.
As a part of the Ukrainian National Army (UNA) they fought last ditch battles before
the armistice of 8 May 1945 came into effect as they surrendered to the western Allies.
Back to 16 May 1944, Himmler spoke to the unit and said the following:
‘Your homeland has become so much more beautiful since you have lost—on our initiative, I must
say—the residents who were so often a dirty blemish on Galicia’s good name, namely the Jews.’
Some historians believed that Himmler implied that the Galician unit cleansed the area
of Jewish people, but since he mentions 'our initiative' it is clear that he takes
responsibility for it. Yet, the Ukrainian Waffen-SS men did take part in atrocities
against the Polish population of several villages such as Huta Pieniacka, Pidkamin and Palikrowy.
The killing of Polish civilians happened on a large scale in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia and
an estimated 50,000 to 100,000 Poles have been slaughtered. This happened in very brutal ways by the Ukrainians.
According to historian Timothy Snyder most Poles were not killed by members of the Galicia Division but by
members of the UPA, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army.
I do want to point out Ukrainians served in another Waffen-SS unit: the 30th Waffen
Grenadier Division of the SS which consisted of Russians, Bellorussians and Ukrainians. This unit
mutinied in occupied France and elements of it joined the French resistance.
After the war many settled in Canada and the US, as most of them were not forcefullt repatriated to the USSR since this only applied to
those living under Soviet rule before 1 September 1939. In Canada monuments dedicated
to these men have been erected, leading to controversy. Also in Ukraine there are such
memorials. In the years after the fall of the USSR and independence of Ukraine
members of the pro-German Ukrainian units from WW2 are being celebrated by Ukrainian natonalists.
On images like these you see what I mean. In some cases it was done by neo Nazis,
but not all Ukrainians that celebrate these men are neo Nazis because they view this unit differently than Western historians do.
“[M]any books have been written by veterans of the [...] Waffen-SS Galizien, some of whom became
professors at Western universities. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the apologetic
and selective narrative initiated by these historians and other writers was taken over
mostly by young Ukrainian patriotic historians and activists based in western Ukraine.”
Many of these historians claim the Ukrainian Waffen-SS soldiers fought
what they perceived as the lesser of two evils. A great deal of them joined the UPA, but the UPA was fighting
against both the Soviets and the Nazis. But as one Ukrainian historian stated:
you can't fight everyone, that's why it was better to stay on the German side. In some cases, it is claimed, these volunteers did
save Ukrainian peasants from German reprisals. Their prime motivation was an independent Ukraine
and they fought for. In English there is this saying: stuck
between a rock and a hard place. That's definitively the case here.
But, on the flipside, to praise these men as 'heroes' and erect monuments that's a bit too far if you ask me.
And don't get me wrong. There are also many Ukrainians who agree with this. In Kyiv in 1993, there was a campaign to ban celebrations of
the 50th anniversary of the Waffen-SS unit. So it surely is
not the case all Ukrainians hail these Waffen-SS men. Perhaps with the recent developments in
Ukraine some real heroes can stand up who can be praised some day the future. Time will tell.