Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council: A missing page in Ukraine’s history?

An old man with a cane walked into the Ukrainian News Agency’s conference room and took a seat at the table. This was Yevhen Stakhiv, a surviving member of the Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council (UHVR) and head of the OUN’s underground network in the Donbas during the Second World War, later a ranking member of the UHVR abroad, as a US resident, a Democrat, and an active champion of the Ukrainian idea. He visited Ukraine, aged 91, in conjunction with the UHVR’s 65th anniversary.

Many people today would run a search in their memory and knowledge of Ukrainian history only to draw blank on what the UHVR was. Ukraine has now set course on comprehensive studies and analysis of the activities of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) and the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), considering that it is hard to overstate the impact they produced on Ukraine’s state-building process. There is limited data available with regard to the UHVR—the overall impression is that it never existed. Whereas the UPA was a military organization and the OUN ranked as a political party, the UHVR was a body meant to consolidate all Ukrainian forces in an armed underground struggle against the Germans and the Bolsheviks. In addition, the UHVR functioned as an underground legislative body during the Second World War.

The UHVR was formed on Aug. 12, 1944, and included 24 persons, including President Kyrylo Osmak of Kyiv (he died in the Vladimir Prison in Russia) and General Secretary, UPA Commander Roman Shukhevych. In 1944, part of the UHVR emigrated and formed the External Representation of the Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council (ZP UHVR) headed by General Secretary Mykola Lebed, who was the external liaison officer and director of its information bureau. In this breakthrough to the West he was assisted by Yevhen Stakhiv.

How come an important page in our history is unknown to the Ukrainian people? Very few documents and eyewitness accounts of that horrid period have been preserved, so that present-day historians have practically no reliable information sources. Fortunately, there are surviving eyewitnesses like Yevhen Stakhiv. Their accounts are priceless and we have no right to ignore them. Stakhiv spoke about unknown events in history, about Ukraine and its government, about his life, Ukraine’s prospects, and the way Ukraine is seen abroad. He spoke in an honest, straightforward, and democratic manner, proving that age is no obstacle to thought and action.

Ukraine needed a democratic political regime the way man needs to breathe, but it took time to realize this necessity. When asked by comrades in arms about the political course adopted by Ukraine at the outset, Stakhiv would reply that it was a totalitarian regime. With time, he realized that even nationalist totalitarianism couldn’t meet the increasingly manifest needs of society. Strange as it may seem, the activities of the Ukrainian nationalists was not based on a concept of the kind of state, regime, and authorities they would like to have. One thing was clear: they were resolutely opposed to both the Bolsheviks and the Nazis.

When queried by journalists, Stakhiv stressed the need to simplify the bureaucratic procedures providing access to classified KGB archives to researchers, so that a researcher would not have to endure the SBU red tape. Other postsocialist countries, such as Poland, have allowed public access to such archives, considering that these kinds of information sources must be kept under control by historians, as well as politicians.

“It’s a shame that the Ukrainian state keeps secret the way the Bolsheviks oppressed the Ukrainians,” declared Stakhiv. His statement appears especially topical now, considering President Yushchenko’s edict (January 2009) allowing public access the top secret KGB archives and the ongoing declassification process.

With regard to religion, those who took part in the roundtable mentioned Moscow Patriarch Kirill’s visit to Ukraine on July 27, 2009. Stakhiv said that every country has its church: “The Polish Church is the basis of Polish patriotism; why should Ukraine recognize a church that belongs to another country?” This statement is topical in light of the ongoing squabbles between the Kyiv and Moscow Patriarchates, involving acts of physical violence and Moscow’s undisguised non-recognition of the Kyiv Patriarchate. Obviously, not all branches of power are interested in putting an end to such interconfessional feud. After all, high status affects political as well as religious figures.

Stakhiv commented on Ukraine’s current political situation. US President Barack Obama could have visited Kyiv first and Moscow next. Stakhiv’s explanation of why it did not happen so was simple. He asked this rhetorical question: “Who would Obama come to meet if Ukraine has practically no political power?”

The world is closely following events in Ukraine. A foreigner who can appreciate Ukraine’s historical and cultural achievements is bound to ask: “What makes Ukrainians live the way they do, having such potential in terms of intellect, natural resources, and science?”

Stakhiv said in a bitter, sad, and pained way that the situation in Ukraine was not the way he would be happy to see it, and for which he has fought all his life. Even though he is now an American citizen, Ukraine remains for him the land of his forefathers, part of his heart and soul, not just a hospitable country: “A lot of Ukrainians believe that their independence came out of the blue. This isn’t true because thousands of Ukrainians laid down their lives fighting for it.”

The Day asked Dr. Stanislav Kulchytsky, Ph.D. in History, Deputy Director for Research, National Ukrainian Academy’s Institute of History of Ukraine, a noted expert on latter-day history, to comment on the UHVR. He had this to say:

“Ukrainians know little about the UHVR, perhaps because it is not mentioned in the school textbooks. The college course in the history of Ukraine does not trace the history of the UHVR. This is our mistake dictated by a nearly complete lack of sources. We have to trace the entire UNR–UHV chain, including the attempts of underground organizations in Ukraine after WWII, until the crucial events of 1989–91.

“It is necessary to realize that in 1917 the Ukrainian National Republic was established on absolutely undemocratic principles and that was the cause of its collapse. Starting in 1921, while in emigration, former Ukrainian liberation fighters set up a military organization first, then the OUN, and later the UPA.

“As UPA units were being sent to eastern Ukraine, it became obvious that the local situation was entirely different, compared to that in western Ukraine, and that the whole strategy had to be changed. Also, the Soviet Union had an alliance with democratic countries, unlike Germany and its allies. And so Germany’s defeat was evident even before [the Battle of] Stalingrad. The OUN ideology in the 1920s and 1930s was basically totalitarian, and it proved ineffective in their further struggle. This was the reason behind the formation of the UHVR.”

The Day's FACTFILE

Yevhen Stakhiv was born in Przemy l on Jan. 15, 1918 into the family of artilleryman Pavlo Stakhiv. He went underground in 1934, took part in Ukraine’s school and youth organizations in Galicia (Halychyna), and later joined the OUN. In 1938 he found himself in Subcarpathian Ruthenia and joined the Karpatska Sich (Carpathian Sich). In March 1939, after the liquidation of Transcarpatian Ukraine, he was captured but managed to escape to Slovakia via Austria. Starting in 1941, he headed the OUN branch in Donetsk oblast. He emigrated to the United States in 1949, where he still resides as head of ZP UHVR abroad. He has three children and three grandchildren who know Ukrainian and respect ethnic traditions. Yevhen Stakhiv was decorated with the Orders of Yaroslav the Wise — of the 5th Class in 2008 and of the 4th Class in 2009.