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Women in Arms: from the Russian Empire to Post-Soviet States - Articles (5)

Illegitimate sexual practices in the OUN underground and UPA in Western Ukraine in the 1940s and 1950s

Marta Havryshko

Abstract

This article is an introduction to the “intimate history” of the OUN and UPA, which has not yet received much attention from academics and researchers – partly due to a lack of sources. This attempt to articulate the problem of sexuality within the gender relations system of the Ukrainian liberation movement shows the gap between the official discourse and the everyday practices of underground members and insurgents. It tackles the issue of sexuality as a “national capital” and examines the attitude of the Ukrainian nationalists to the female body as a symbol of nation. It shows the double standard of sexual morality within OUN and UPA and underlines their different manifestations (unequal sanctions for women and men, sexual harassment of women by UPA commanders and OUN leaders). These sexual norms, military culture and hegemonic masculinity resulted in extreme sexual violence in the OUN and UPA upon those women whom they considered as their “own” (members of the underground and civilians) as well as against “others”. Finally, it presents how specific conditions in the Ukrainian underground encouraged sexual intercourse outside of marriage and how adultery (another form of “illegitimate” sexual relations) acquired a half, implicit legitimation.

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  • 1 J. Burds, “Gender and Policing in Soviet West Ukraine, 1944–1948”, Cahiers du monde russe. Vol. 42, (...)
  • 2 This research will analyze only one faction of OUN, led by Stepan Bandera (known as OUN(B). The Org (...)

1The everyday and private lives of the members of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) has not yet received much attention from academics and researchers. Several gender issues have been raised in the works of Jeffrey Burds, Tetiana Antonova, Olena Petrenko and Oksana Kis1. But many OUN and UPA researchers draw a veil over “inconvenient moments”, trying not to contradict the heroic national narrative. Thus, the problems of physicality, reproductive behaviour, personal hygiene, sexuality and romantic relations has not become the object of full-fledged studies2.

  • 3 Secret police organs, such as the NKVD, NKGB, MVD and MGB played a key role in the struggle of the (...)

2It is rather difficult to break the silence on the private lives of the OUN and UPA due to a lack of sources and the fragmentary and selective nature of the information they contain. Memoirs mention the topic rather superficially, picturing a romanticized version of relationships and avoiding the descriptions of intimate relations, especially in their embarrassing or compromising aspects. Nevertheless, the collation of narratives (oral and written) and OUN, UPA and Soviet3 documents allows us to draw a picture of personal relations in the underground. There is even less information about the sexual violence in the OUN and UPA, since there is a general silence in the collective memory. However, the liberalization of KGB archives (since 2008) by Ukrainian authorities makes it possible to study such material. Most of them are preserved in the Security Service of Ukraine State Archive (Haluzevyi derzhavnyi arkhiv Sluzhby bezpeky Ukrainy (HDA SBU) and in its regional offices.

3This article is an introduction to the “intimate history” of the OUN and UPA, which we, as researchers, know very little about. It is my first attempt to articulate the problem of sexuality within the gender relations system of the Ukrainian liberation movement. The main objective of my article is to show the gap (or the dissonance) between the official discourse and the political sexuality in the OUN and UPA within everyday practices of underground members and insurgents. To this end, I will show the causes, nature and methods of sexual behavior control, as well as the criteria that defined authorized sexuality and its illegitimate forms in the OUN and UPA underground in 1940s and 1950s. The Ukrainian Nationalists had two main criteria for legitimate sexual relations – matrimonial status and heterosexuality. Therefore, all sexual relationships before and outside of a heterosexual marriage were considered illegitimate. Exceptions could be made for couples who publicly announced their engagement. However, a relationship with those considered as “others”, could also be coined “illegitimate”, even when it dealt with marriage. At various times throughout the existence of the OUN and UPA, this concept of “others” was assigned to the representatives of the occupying powers on Ukrainian territory (Nazi, Soviet) as well as to Poles or Jews.

4Firstly, I will focus on issues of sexuality that were considered political matters to the Ukrainian Nationalist movement - questions related to power. Sexuality became a “national capital” and was considered within this context for the public good. This led to the active intervention of the OUN and UPA command into the private lives of its members, planting sexual norms and regulating sexual behaviour. Also, in the first part of this article, the attempt of the OUN and UPA to deprive sexuality from its movements were displayed as objective factors caused by the conditions of the various oppositional forces, especially the Nazi and Soviet regimes.

5In the second part of this article, I will examine the attitude of the Ukrainian nationalists to the female body as a symbol of nation and how the construction of femininity and masculinity became the cause of a double standard of sexual morality in the OUN and UPA. It had different manifestations: stigmatization and punishment of more women than men for any sexual activity outside of the heterosexual marriage (especially when it was sex with the enemy), prostitution, sexual harassment and sexual exploitation of women by senior and medium level UPA commanders and OUN leaders.

6Furthermore, I will demonstrate how these sexual norms, military culture and hegemonic masculinity became factors for the extreme sexual violence in the OUN and UPA upon those women whom they considered as their “own”: members of the underground and civilians. In this section, I will raise the issues of rape as a weapon of war. This part of my study examines the judicial system, investigations and prosecutions of sexual assault in the OUN and UPA.

7The last section of my article is devoted to another form of sexual relations considered as illegitimate – adultery. It presents how specific conditions in the Ukrainian underground encouraged sexual intercourse outside of marriage and how adultery acquired a half, implicit legitimation.

Repressive sexuality

  • 4 Y. Hrytsak, “Peredmova”. Nezvychaini doli zvychainykh zhinok. Usna istoriia XX stolittia, Lviv, Vyd (...)
  • 5 The whole territory of OUN activity was divided into the following administrative units: stanytsia (...)
  • 6 Hereinafter in inverted commas, actively used code names of the underground members of the OUN and (...)
  • 7 Archives of the Liberation Movement Research Center (Arkhiv Tsentru doslidzhen vyzvolnoho rukhu – A (...)

8The official attitude of the OUN and UPA to the intimate sphere was defined mainly by national ideology, religious views, and traditional Ukrainian culture. Before World War II, Western Ukrainian society kept a conservative morale – not only discussions, but even references to sexual topics were considered a scandal4. The war reality only slightly loosened sexual morality but did not change it completely. The bride of the SB (Sluzhba bezpeky) chief of the Ternopilska okruha (Ternopil county)5 - Vasyl Magdiy (“Zhar”)6 - Mykhailyna, refused to spend the winter with him in his hideout (kryivka) and became a secretary for another member of the underground (“Misha”): “I was ashamed to go to his hideout as his bride. What would have the others thought about me then. I went as a registry officer to Misha and this could not compromise me”7. Social approval was given only to reproduction-oriented sexual behavior, and the heterosexual family was considered as its only legitimate sphere of expression.

  • 8 State Archive of Rivne Oblast (Derzhavnyi arkhiv Rivnenskoi oblasti - DARO), f. R-30, op. 2, spr. 3 (...)

9All pre- and post-marital sexual relations were condemned and persecuted. This was especially the case with “non-traditional” ways of getting sexual satisfaction: homosexuality, masturbation, etc. One of the OUN leaders in the Rivnensk region “Ptashka” in his report from 28 October - 9 November 1943 wrote about the mistakes in his underground work: “The Red Cross Guard [Medical Service of the OUN and UPA, Ukrainskyi Chervonyi Khrest, UChKh – M. H.] is lazy and does nothing, they indulge in excessive sexual appetites and together with it in masturbation”8. Such conservative views on sexuality fully coincided with the worldview of Ukrainian nationalists which demanded maximum obedience of the person to the interests of society. The relations between a man and a woman were considered only in the context of the regeneration of the “Genofond” of the Ukrainian nation (in the ethnic and not the political sense of a nation) that was destroyed by revolution, two World Wars and resistance to the Soviet totalitarian regime during the after-war period.

  • 9 I. Patryliak, “Vstan i borys! Slukhai i vir…”: ukrainske natsionalistychne pidpillia ta povstanskyi (...)

10Thus, even limited sexual freedom within family frameworks was out of reach for a majority of the members of the Ukrainian Nationalist movement. The difficult conditions of the underground forced the postponement of marriage plans until “peace time”. (Half)-secret sexual relations were the most common form of relationships during this period. Their tacit acceptance can be explained by the young age of a majority of the underground members of the OUN and UPA (18-28 years)9, the high probability of arrest and death that prompted them to “live life to the fullest” and the liberal views of some leaders and commanding officers.

  • 10 State Archive of the Secret Services of Ukraine (Haluzevyi derzhavnyi arkhiv Sluzhby bezpeky Ukrain (...)
  • 11 ATsDVR, f. 9, t. 12, od. zb. 29, ark. 25.

11Unofficial sexual relations were also all the more frequent because marriages in the underground were not encouraged. There were several reasons for that. First, the presence of a partner could negatively influence the effectiveness of the insurgents’ work and make them emotionally dependable upon their family. An anonymous member of the OUN with the code name “Romb” wrote in March 1947 about his subordinate in the following manner: “When everything indicated that it would be a difficult and very cold winter, “X” left the territory and went to his village. It is obvious that the revolution is better if one is near one’s wife”10. There were cases when men were not able to stand parting with their families and escaped from the underground to hide out with their wives11.

  • 12 HDA SBU, f. 6, spr. 75175-FP, t. 1, ark. 77-78.

12Secondly, married insurgents and members of the underground inevitably put their families in danger from Nazi or Soviet repressions. In the spring of 1943, the German police arrested the parents of Olha Kostiv, the wife of the UPA division commander Stepan Koval, “Kotlovyna”. She managed to escape and became a medical assistant in the UPA12.

  • 13 T. Vronska, Upokorennia strakhom: simeine zaruchnytstvo u karalnii praktytsi radianskoi vlady (1917 (...)
  • 14 I. Andrusiak, Spohady, Lviv: Vydavnytstvo LNU im. I. Franka, 2001, p. 50.
  • 15 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 78, ark. 46.

13The arrest of families became a widely used practice during the Soviet regime’s anti-Ukrainian underground activities in 1944-1953. During that period, 187 893 family members of the OUN and UPA were deported from Ukraine to the Northern and Eastern regions of the Soviet Union13. The arrests of wives and young children were used as methods of blackmail: in order to make insurgents confess fully and cooperate further with authorities. Ievhenia Andrusiak remembered that during the investigation of her case, the MGB officers constantly played with her maternal feelings: “What they wanted most was to break me, to blackmail me using my child. They wanted me to witness against my husband and the whole OUN and UPA organization. Then they promised to give my child back and also give me an apartment in Kyiv or where ever I wanted”14. After officers of the MGB arrested Nadia Kulchytska in July 1951, her husband, Roman Tuchak (“Klym”), the Kolomyia okruha SB chief, agreed to cooperate with authorities. As a result, approximately 200 members of the underground were killed15.

  • 16 Archives of the Secret Services of Ukraine in the Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast (Arkhiv upravlinnia sluzhb (...)

14Next, the fact that underground and resistance movement members had families caused additional material difficulties for the OUN. After Vasyl Andrusiak’s death in February 1946, the OUN fully supported his wife Yevhenia and son Vasyl (until her arrest on the 7th of August 1947)16. On the 18th of December 1946, the insurgent “Skala” wrote to his commander:

  • 17 HDA SBU, f. 65. spr. S-9079, t. 57. ark. 93.

My wife is in a difficult financial situation. She lives alone with our child. I asked our friend “Ingul” to help my wife at least with shoes. Leader “I” promised to send my wife some materials for shoes or money… I asked the leader “Vilshanyi” to help my wife as she lives in his territory.17

  • 18 K. Havryliv, “Z chystoiu sovistiu” in M. Borys, Neskorena Dolynshchyna, vol. 2, Ivano-Frankivsk, No (...)

15All aforementioned factors explain the harsh control of insurgents’ family status. To change it implied a difficult procedure. Men took the initiative for getting married and had to apply for special permission to their commanding officer. He, in turn, checked individually or with the help of the SB, the history of the “applicants” and their family status. Sometimes such procedures started without the bride being aware of it. Kateryna Havryliv remembered: “After my courses, I went to the village Derzhiv, where my associate “Halychanka” met me and she told me that on the 11th of March I will be married with the leader “Roman”. It was a real surprise to me”18.

  • 19 For further details see: V. Kovalchuk, “Dokumentuvannia shliubiv v OUN ta UPA”, Ukrainskyi arkheohr (...)

16When political authorities approved of the wedding, there was supposed to be a church blessing and at least two witnesses to certify it. Due to the conditions of the underground, to officially register a marriage in government institutions was complicated since many insurgents did not have identification documents once the Soviet regime came into force. Not all those who had fake documents wanted to deal with the government as they did not want to put themselves in danger of arrest. In most cases, married couples made their marriage certificates by themselves. The couples generally used their code names19.

17Thus, the strictest control was placed on the unmarried. It was mostly due to pragmatic views on security rather than ideological factors. It anticipated a whole set of problems connected with the life and the activity of each OUN member, particularly, the security of the separate structures operating in the Ukrainian Nationalist’s movement in general.

  • 20 ATsDVR, f. 9, t.12, spr. 62, ark. 1.

18The intimate life of the insurgents influenced their psychological and physical health, and sometimes could even endanger their lives. One of the key problems in this context was venereal disease. In spite of the UChKh, the lack of qualified medical workers and medications was evident. “Any available means” were used to cure diseases. Ivan Bohuslavskyi (“Spivak”), the medical assistant of the sotnia (company) “Bira” remembered that he had shots made from hot cow milk for 10 days to give to venereal patients along with a drink of half-vodka and half-sunflower oil, and suggested they eat sour cabbage. He also recommended patients to drink a lot of water20.

  • 21 Litopys UPA. New Series. Volyn i Polissia: UPA ta zapillia. Dokumenty i materialy, vol. 2, Kyiv/Tor (...)

19One of the preventive methods against venereal diseases was educative campaigns through so-called “disciplinary conversations”21. But not everyone gained equally from this knowledge. Very often infected people self-medicated themselves using “traditional methods”. The insurgent Ivan Lyko (“Skala”) remembered:

  • 22 I. Lyko, “Na hrani mrii i diisnosty: Spohady pidpilnyka. Na hrani dvokh svitiv. 1945-1955” in Litop (...)

There were some men who, despite their incompetence in the sphere of medicine, used as precautionary means something they invented or had heard from others and that they thought were effective before physical contact with a girl. One washed his penis with urine after sexual contact, others used such medicines as prontozil or cibazol, without knowing what their effects were.22

  • 23 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 20, ark. 27.
  • 24 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376, t. 29, ark. 322.
  • 25 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376, t. 54, ark. 41.
  • 26 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 20, ark. 27.

20In case of an epidemic of venereal diseases, the underground and OUN authorities used severe measures. Such cases were announced and patients were isolated, and under the fear of death, were forbidden to have any sexual relations23. Incurably ill OUN and UPA patients, or those who were in the rear area (zapillia) controlled by them, were shot dead regardless of their sex24. In the attachment to the interrogation protocol of the OUN SB in the Lviv region of UChKh nurse Oksana Pozniak from the 26th of October 1945, it mentions: “This medical assistant was liquidated because she was infected, and hiding herself from the Bolsheviks among the men, she behaved amorally, in a way that spread the illness”25. Exceptions were made only for women who were infected because they had been raped in Soviet prisons26.

  • 27 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 80, ark. 117.
  • 28 S. Frasuliak, Remeslo povstantsia: zb. prats pidpolkovnyka UPA Stepana Frasuliaka-Khmelia (reprinte (...)

21The underground also lost experienced members due to several cases of suicide linked to love. Hryhorii Hyshka (“Marko”), the Buchach nadraion commander shoot himself on the grave of his beloved Volodymyra Dudiak (“Tyrsa”), who died in a hideout during an attack of the MGB27. Stepan Frasuliak (“Khmel”), lieutenant colonel of the UPA remembered that the “Opryshky” sotnia commander, Volodymyr Deputat (“Dovbush”), “was so ashamed he wanted to shoot himself, but his insurgents - who loved their commander - persuaded him not to” after he got the information that his beloved medical assistant “Olenka” was a MGB agent28.

  • 29 Borotba z agenturoiu: Protokoly dopytiv Sluzhby Bezpeky OUN v Ternopilshchyni 1946-1948, Book 1, vo (...)

22It was also believed that the romantic relations of some underground or UPA members had a negative impact on their comrades who were not able to satisfy their emotional and physical needs. Iaroslav Holubovych (“Misko”) remembered: “Those days ‘Peremozhets’ told me that he had an affair with Kara Emilia. He told me plainly that ‘Iaryi’ wanted him to be shot by the Bolsheviks so that he could date her, because he also loves her”29.

  • 30 Litopys UPA, vol. 44, p. 918.
  • 31 I. Lyko, Na hrani mrii i diisnosty: spohady pidpilnyka. 1945-1955, p. 115.
  • 32 Litopys UPA, vol. 43, book 1, p. 117.

23The OUN fighter Petro Punda (“Osyka”) remembered the reaction of his comrades to the romantic relations of their commander with the nurse Stepania Zablotska (“Bohdana”): “Fighters treated her badly, because she is too tender to Bohdan and he, in turn, cares less about the boys”30. Jealousy was also the reason for some crimes which added to the negative attitude towards intimate relations in the underground. “Zorych”, in order to get rid of his competitor and win the heart of the nurse “Areta”, blamed “Hoverlia” for failing to perform orders, “disregard of duties”, misuse of financial funds and preparing for desertion. During the arrest, “Zorych” gravely wounded “Hoverlia” and said that he was trying to escape31. In another case reported by the insurgent Iaroslav Komara, insurgent “Obriy” and his fiancé Olha Motylivska were killed during an NKVD attack on their hideout because of the girl whom “Obriy” left. Seeking revenge, she told Soviet authorities about the location of the hideout in Zaruddia village (Zbrazk district, Ternopil region)32.

  • 33 Interview with Liuba Los, 4.03.1995, Archive of the Institute of Historical Research from the Ivan (...)
  • 34 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376, t. 29, ark. 378.

24After the German forces left Western Ukraine in 1944, the Soviet regime started its harsh policy against the Ukrainian underground movement. The Soviet authority formed a wide network of informers and agents, many of whom were former members of the OUN, as well as their relatives, friends and lovers33. In the OUN instructions for unit organizations from March 1950, it was mentioned: “In order to find out information about an insurgent, the MGB collects precise intelligence about all the girls who have any relations with the insurgents (in the MGB there are descriptions of girls who have sexual relations with insurgent, who are married to them or have children with them)”.34

  • 35 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376, t. 53, ark. 33.

25There were multiple cases of arrests of fiancés or lovers of insurgents, who were used as agents and informers for the MGB in order to force their lovers to cooperate with state special services or to reveal the location of the insurgents. Some of the women, understanding their complete dependence on the Soviet punitive bodies and their small chance of an effective confrontation with it, had to accept their offers. During the interrogation of Anna Hladiuk between the 2nd and the 5th of November 1945, the NKGB investigator offered her a way out of being imprisoned if she told him about “Potap”, an OUN SB informer for the Brody district in the Lviv region, with whom she had sexual relations with since the spring of 1945, and she agreed to this deal35.

  • 36 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 52, ark. 154.

26There were cases of Soviet special services forcing the agent to have multiple sexual contacts with different men, especially when she was not able to get the necessary information after a long time. According to Olha Palamarchuk, a liaison agent with the OUN, who was arrested by NKVD bodies on the 1st of December 1944, she was ordered to “make love with Roman as much as possible and to reveal where he’s hiding so as to hand him over to the NKVD later”.36 “Roman” during that time, was one of the underground commanders in the Torchyn district of Volyn.

  • 37 Litopys UPA, vol. 44, Book. 2, p. 140.
  • 38 HDA SBU, spr. 372, t. 54, ark. 280.

27During the proceedings on the case of the 23 year old Ievhenia Skushka, an OUN courier and secret informer for the MGB –, the special service officer stressed that: “You should agree to anything with him [“Iar”. – author’s note M. H.], even sexual contact. You are a young girl; this won’t harm you”37. Another liaison officer, Anna Mudar (“Motria”, “Zirka”), testified during her OUN SB interrogations, that the NKGB officer Pavlo Zavarehin assured her: “There are boys and men among the leaders whom you may have sexual contact with, you will get more information. You should remember that our girls died on the battlefield fighting for you, and you must do even this”38.

28During her training as an agent for the NKGB, she was told in detail about the methods of getting positive behavior from men. MGB agency detective “Buria” ordered her on March 1950:

  • 39 Litopys UPA. New Series, Zolochivska okruha OUN, vol. 23, Kyiv/Toronto, Litopys UPA, 2013, p. 519.

You need to live with Burian in good relations, have compassion for him, when he will come back from somewhere look after him and while tending to him ask about everything that is necessary. Ask him how he feels, how his health is; find out if he belongs to the ideologists. Everything should be closely bound with love scenes, not to give him the possibility to overthink and analyze the questions you ask him. 39

Gender aspects of sexual morality

29Thousands of women joined armed nationalist underground movements during and after WWII motivated by love, hate, patriotism, fear, and/or opportunity. Women served as nurses, messengers, couriers, secretaries, bodyguards, scouts, and soldiers. Some of them became military instructors, junior officers, spies, investigators and even SB leaders of the lower ranks. But even this move beyond the traditional female roles did not change the balance of power between men and women in the OUN and UPA. An important issue was the limited access that women had to decision making in the Ukrainian underground and the UPA: they were the objects of power but not its source. Women were largely absent in the higher hierarchy and rarely occupied powerful positions. Men’s dominance in paramilitary organizations gave them access to political decision making and a more direct role in the control of communities. Thus, the gender roles in the underground resulted from an automatic transfer of gender norms and models of the patriarchal family, characteristic of western Ukrainian society of the 1940s and 1950s. Like the majority of nationalist organizations, the OUN was a categorical supporter of the heterosexual family with its “traditional” division of functions, where the man is the warrior, protector, “hunter”, communicator with the external world, and the woman – the keeper of house and home, mother and beloved wife. In all matters, the woman should obey her husband, who controlled her intimate life.

  • 40 HDA SBU, spr. 376, t. 48. ark. 12.

30Following this logic, the “perfect” sexuality of a woman was presented as a passive one, subordinated to an active man. In the public narrative, it was propagandized as the cult of the women’s pre-marriage virginity. In one of the ideological articles of the OUN “On the question of appointing Ukrainian women” by M. Rak, it stresses the necessity to “destroy the literature about sexual life and to fight against so-called sexual knowledge” that “spoiled the question of love and caused a lack of restraint without which love is called lechery”40.

  • 41 Litopys UPA. New Series, Voienna okruha UPA “Lysonia” 1943-1952, vol. 20, Kyiv/Toronto, 2012, p. 32 (...)
  • 42 HDA SBU, spr. 372, t. 17, ark. 138.
  • 43 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 20, ark. 23.

31“Morality” was an obligation for women in the underground or in the UPA. This criterion worked as an additional argument when they classified for a post among the insurgents41. The “Organizational orders” to OUN members from 1950 indicated a different attitude towards sexual behavior for men and women, and mentioned: “The secretaries and propagandists should be checked more often on their honesty and moral steadiness. A man demoralized by woman will be punished and lowered in rank”42. The referents of the Ukrainian Red Cross (UChKh) were responsible for scrutinizing women’s private lives and were obliged to “take care of protecting the morality among nurses and other underground women”43.

32The OUN and UPA medical service workers were considered a separate “risk group” for sexual behavior among the soldiers. The report of “Kameniar”, one of the Military county “Buh” inspectors from the 25th of July 1945 indicated that:

  • 44 Litopys UPA, New Series, Voienna okruha UPA «Buh»: Dokumenty i materialy. 1943-1952. Book 1, vol. 1 (...)

There were several cases recorded of immoral behavior of nurses with wounded soldiers during their shifts. It would be preferable if senior officers of the sanitary services paid attention to it, they probably do not know the details of the behavior of their reporting nurses with injured insurgents. Since such improper behavior of nurses completely destroys the combat value of the fighter and makes him dependable on medical treatment even if he is completely healthy, it also undermines the authority of the whole medical service and demoralizes the population.44

  • 45 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 66, ark. 266.
  • 46 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 80, ark. 2.
  • 47 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372. t. 89. ark. 67.
  • 48 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 77, ark. 273.

33Commanding officers and mentors from different levels who were in power had more possibilities for sexual relationships. The majority used these possibilities. For example, one of the lovers of the propaganda section of the OUN Provid commander Petro Fedun (“Poltava”) was his secretary, Nadia Yakymovych (“Nadia”)45. Secretary Maria Seremulia (“Nadia”) had relationships with Stefan Kurytsia (“Ruslan”), the Kremenets nadraion SB chief46. Maria Roieva, a courier, was the lover of Petro Tykholaz (“Vuiko”), chief of OUN in the Drohobych region47. The leader’s active sexual behavior was not always considered an extraordinary phenomena among the insurgents. The letter of the Kalush nadraion chief, MGB agent “Ivan Havrylovych” to his MGB supervisors from 20 November 1951 is a proof of this. In this letter, he asked to send him a new nurse who would act as a liaison agent among them: “The girl should be young and nice looking in order to start relations with and not only manage the underground duties. In this case, it would be good for everyone to understand why I visit her so often”.48 Some OUN commanders did not hide the fact that professional qualities of their subordinate women were not the most important criteria for them. Underground member “Larysa” wrote on the 30th of April 1944:

  • 49 DARO, f. R-30, op. 2, spr. 37, ark. 42.

My friend Pryimak! You cannot choose women assistants by yourself, but you have to work with those who are appointed. I was informed that you decided, of your own free will, to conserve the woman you keep and to fire those who are not. This is wrong as you will work with that person whom the county chief has appointed to you.49

  • 50 R. Petrenko, Za Ukrainu, za yii voliu. Spohady, Toronto/Lviv, Litopys UPA, vol. 27, 1997, p. 169.

34Ievhen Tatura (“Omelko”) remembered that in the underground “Sich” community, in the Svynarne forests in Volyn, the kurin officer, Porfyr Antoniuk (“Sosenko”), was responsible for “comfort women” and expelled those who had any “improper behavior” from the “Sich”50. Nevertheless, he did not respect those regulations himself. One of the “Sich” intelligence officer – Halyna Kokhanska (“Orysia”) remembered:

  • 51 H. Kokhanska, «Z Ukrainoiu u sertsi». Spomyny, Lviv, Litopys UPA. “Biographical” Series, vol. 9, 20 (...)

Once he asked me to accept in the intelligence division a “Maryna”, who would be among my subordinates but work in his headquarters. I wanted to see her and to talk with her. She was a very dirty, stupid and spoiled person. She was not a member of any youth or women’s division. “Sosenko” spoke highly of her, but for our work she was no good and I refused to enroll her in my division. Later, it turned out that she was his new lover and he simply wanted to find her a proper cover.51

  • 52 “Iak poboriuie NKVD i NKHB t.zv. kontrrevoliutsiiu v SRSR (korotkyi vyklad)” in ATsDVR. – Fond refe (...)
  • 53 ATsDVR, k. 30, f. 33 (SMERCH materials – military intelligence agency in the USSR – Sub-Carpathian (...)

35As we see, most of the mistresses of the commanders and leaders of various levels were mostly their direct subordinates, which points to some overuse of their position. Men required sexual services in exchange for protection and access to resources. Women had difficulties in resisting such attempts, in particular, when their commanders held high power positions. There were instructions that anyone who spread information about the intimate life of the OUN leadership and commanders were considered Soviet agents and subject to liquidation52. For the victims of sexual harassment, it was also difficult and dangerous to leave the underground. Firstly because the legitimate underground members would become Soviet targets and secondly, the OUN leadership did not want to lose any skilled workers. Everyone, who ran away from the underground without authorization or who left the UPA were considered traitors53 and punished (often by death).

36The punishments for “immoral behavior”, which depended on the sex of the offender, clearly showed a dual sexual morality. Public types of punishment (humiliations) were mostly used for women. – their hair was cut off or their faults were announced publicly.

  • 54 HDA SBU, f. 60, spr. 27688, t. 13, ark. 47.
  • 55 Litopys UPA, Nova seriia, T. 23, p. 531.

37Volodymyr Kasarab (“Andriy”), Zhovkva nadraion chief, found out about the intimate relations of a married insurgent with code nameD-mwith another insurgent “Katrusia”, and had an “educational conversation” with them. He wrote in his diary about the punishment for the adulterer: “Then I started a conversation with “M” [Maria ]about women and their moral ideas, I talked in such way to make Katrusia hear us”54. The insurgent Iryna Sloboda (“Olia”) in the autumn 1950 said during her SB interrogations of the following: “The leader Pidkova organised a meeting and said that I and Mariyka behaved in a wrong way, he also said that he will not allow us to play in love games. I understood that he said that because he saw me flirting with Bohdan”55. In such a way, “Pidkova” got rid of his competitor and later on had intimate relations with “Olia”.

38In many cases, women were primarily blamed for these illegitimate sexual relations. In some cases, death sentences were carried out and justified by the “attractive” and “harmful” “nature” of women. In autumn 1943, the SB liquidated the nurse Ira, who was the lover of sotnia commander Maksym Skorupskyi (“Maks”). In his memoirs, he described his conversation with the commanding officer “Chernyk” about the reasons of Ira’s execution:

  • 56 M. Skorupskyi, U nastupakh i vidstupakh, Vydannia Ukrainsko-Amerykanskoi vydavnychoi spilky, 1961, (...)

I mentioned Ira: ‘You know, she is like other girls. You were not there. After some time you will forget, besides, there are better ones’… And to my question – [who did she sleep with]?, ‘Chernyk’ shrugged: ‘some of the commanding officers’.56

  • 57 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 26, ark.183.

39The hypocrisy of such moral standards was underlined by one of the leading member of the OUN, Vasyl Kuk (“Lemish”) in a letter to the OUN chief in the North-West Ukrainian territories Vasyl Halasa (“Orlan”) on September 1950: “You write about ‘the demoralizing influence of woman’ – this can be interpreted in different ways, and under this pretext you may execute any woman. Why then not execute a man for the same influence”57?

  • 58 I. Lyko, Na hrani mrii i diisnosty: Spohady pidpilnyka, p. 116.
  • 59 Ia. Hrytsai, P. Hrytsai, A rany ne hoilysia. Spomyny «Chornoty», Toronto/Lviv, Litopys UPA, “Biogra (...)

40Susan Brownmiller in her work Against our Will (1975) called these gender norms part of the culture of rape, when women are accused of giving men ambiguous signals, flirt with them, entice them and are therefore responsible for the abuse of men who are “struggling” with temptation. Sexist jokes against women can be considered another aspect of this culture. Ivan Lyko (“Skala”) remembered “Nastia,” who cooked for the insurgents, in his memoirs. The girl returned from compulsory work in Nazi Germany and talked inappropriately about coming from “under a German”. It prompted the insurgents to make jokes with sexual connotations, such as: “Was it better to be ‘under the German’ or ‘under the insurgent’”58? Some commanders tried to deal with obscene jokes toward women in their divisions. For example, the commanding officer Iaroslav Hrytsay (“Chornota”), collected the rii (squad) commanders and said: “I don’t want to see you walking by our nurse without saluting her anymore. Through our behavior we have to make others respect and cherish her in a proper way”59.

  • 60 A village in the Bohorodchany region of Ivano-Frankivsk province.
  • 61 HDA SBU, f. 2, op. 110, spr. 2, t. 5, ark. 223 zv.
  • 62 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372. t. 89. ark. 124.

41This major sexual asymmetry in punishments for equal “sexual crimes” was also due to the military conditions in which the underground OUN and insurgents acted. Men had more military experience and knowledge and performed the main administrative functions at different levels. Hence, they were more often able to avoid punishments for illegitimate sexual relations. On the 15th of July 1949, MGB agent “Kruk” informed about the OUN Stanislav okruha SB chief Iurii Yanyshyn (“Shakha”): “His weak point is his great interest in women. His secretary ‘Oksana’ is his lover. Besides her, he visited other women in villages or in Maniava60 from time to time. He treated his lover very badly”61. The situation did not change in the following years: insurgent Olha Chemerys (“Dniprova”) called “Shakha” a “lover boy” during her MGB interrogations on the 28th of March 195062.

Men, women and rape

  • 63 For example, I. Revaniuk, Pravda pro tak zvanu UPA, Kyiv, 1961, pp. 57-58; V. Halasa, I. Bysaha, Za (...)

42The Ukrainian Nationalist movement was the largest anti-communism movement on the territory of the Soviet Union. Thus, to erase any memory about it the Soviet authorities mobilized all available resources. One of these was a massive ideological campaign, orchestrated by special services in order to defame the idea of fighting for Ukrainian national independence. One central component, especially after the winding up of destalinization and the increased harassment of opponents in the 1960s was the “penance memories” of former underground members of the OUN and UPA. Those publications described in details the “brutalities” of the Ukrainian Nationalists, and in particular the sexual crimes that were said to be performed with special cruelty63.

  • 64 ATsDVR, f. 9, t.12.

43On the contrary, in the memoirs of the underground members that were published abroad or after the dissolution of the USSR, an “agreement of silence” was observed about the sexual violence in the OUN and UPA. For example, the UPA commanding officer - Stepan Stebelskyi (“Khrin”) in his memoir Winter in the underground shelter (first published in Munich in 1950), wrote in detail about the secretary of the UPA tactic sector “Makivka” - Anna Chereshniovska (“Tania”), whom he had deep feelings for. But he does not even utter a word about the fact that lieutenant “Myron” raped her – while the memoirs of his former subordinate indicate clearly that he knew about it64. In men’s memoirs, the insurgents are usually shown as having a respectful attitude towards women whom they were working and fighting with, which in many cases is far from the truth. As for women, they do not mention the sexual violence exerted against them because it was felt as a humiliation. They were also afraid to talk about their leaders who in the national narrative and collective memory are regarded as heroes and fighters for Ukrainian statehood.

  • 65 “’Klishch’ interrogation protocol from 3.09.1945” in ATsDVR, f. 72 (Arkhiv SB OUN Kozivskoho raionu (...)

44In the legal system of the nationalist underground, rape was considered a severe criminal offense, which was even punishable by death. However, individual punishment took different forms based on each specific case and depended on the decision of the commander or the court. To avoid punishment, criminals sought to hide their actions. At the beginning of September 1949, the Berezhany nadraion SB chief - “Poet” arrested underground member Halyna Osadko (“Konvalia”) for suspicion of cooperation with the MVD. In the process of the investigation, “Poet” tried to persuade the arrestee to have sexual intercourse with him but after she refused, he raped her in front of his guards “Karp”, “Dub”, “As” and “Pidkova”. Being afraid of being caught, “Poet” forged the protocol of “Konvalia’s” interrogation and added a fake “confession” about cooperation with Soviet authorities. For this, she incurred physical liquidation. He ordered his bodyguard “Klishch”65 to execute the decision. Nevertheless, “Konvalia” complained to her security guards about what “Poet” did to her. Afraid of the consequences, he tried to commit suicide, but failed; then according to “Konvalia”:

  • 66 “Konvalia” interrogation protocol as of 7.09.1945”, ATsDVR, f. 72 (Arkhiv SB OUN Kozivskoho raionu (...)

He started to beg me not to tell anyone, because if headquarters got to know about it, he – ‘Poet’ - would be shot for it. He promised to marry me, and if I told anything to anyone, then he - ‘Poet’ - if he stayed alive, would try to kill me and all my family.66

  • 67 Litopys UPA, v. 44, p. 374.

45After further investigation, “Poet” was found guilty and sentenced to death67. The highest punishment was enforced here because the crime had received wide publicity and there were several witnesses to it (“Poet”’s guards). They promised him to keep quiet about what they saw and actually become co-conspirators.

  • 68 See more: M. Morris, “Rape, war and Military culture” in A. Barstow (ed), War’s dirty secret. Rape, (...)

46As we will see below, OUN and UPA documents indicate numerous cases of sexual violence against civilians from their members. Violence was facilitated by the military culture of the Ukrainian underground, in which small groups of militants (3-5 people) could for some time act without any connection to higher command, who could not punish them for violating discipline ; this created a sense of anonymity and lack of control. Hegemonic masculinity did not play a small role as part of the elite culture, with its cult of physical strength, aggression, desire and gender stereotypes that wanted total domination over the women68.

  • 69 R. Seifert, “Rape : the Female Body as a Symbol and a Sign” in I. Taipale (ed.), War or Health? A R (...)

47Furthermore, according to R. Seifert, in many cultures the female body embodied the nation as a whole. Biologically and culturally, women were seen as mothers having an essential role in the survival of the nation and in the maintenance and reproduction of the established social order69. The sexuality of women had strong political significance and became a national property. Also among the Ukrainian Nationalists, woman represented the symbolic system of the group. The cleanliness of the female body was associated with the purity of the nation and the honour of its defenders (the men). Therefore, it was important to control a woman’s body.

  • 70 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376. t. 56, ark. 36.

48Cutting off hair was a popular way of punishing civilian women, especially for a personal relationship with the enemy It was believed that these women did not only violate sexual norms but also social ones and were traitors to the Ukrainian people. The punishment for “horizontal collaboration” for women was made public in order to warn other women. It became a powerful political signal for the whole community. This is shown by the SB interrogations of Kateryna Iatskiv and her conversation with a girl named Katia who had a romantic relationship with the garrison chief of NKVD internal troops in the village of Mylne, Zboriv region in Ternopil province: “It’s not worth beginning anything with them [the underground – M.H.], they are very smart, and for having been with a Muscovite, at the very least, they will beat and shave you70

  • 71 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372. t. 20, ark. 227.
  • 72 “Komunikat v spravi rozstrilu sanitarky UChKh” in ATsDVR, f. 30, k. 62 (Arkhiv OUN z sela Pistyn Ko (...)

49In instructions to the SB leaders, seized during the liquidation of the leader of the SB troops for the Kalush region, “Stepan” on the 27th of May 1945 in the village of Nehivtsi, among other things it was stated: “Do not shave women’s hair, rather shoot them”71. In other OUN documents, one sees that the death penalty for “horizontal collaboration” for women was seen a legitimate punishment. On the 16th of June 1948 by a decision of the OUN okruzhna provid, Richka, a former underground member, was shot because after she left the underground and lived legally (under orders from Provid of the OUN) in the spring of 1947, she compromised the Organization with extremely amoral behaviour through an immoral personal love affair, even with a member of an NKVD”72.

50Rape then became a part of the political domination and an extreme way to express power, in a context where weapons were in the hands of the underground and insurgent members and where the civilian population was particularly vulnerable (especially women, most of whom remained at home during the war without any men).

  • 73 DARO, f. R-30, op. 2, spr. 16, ark. 255.
  • 74 DARO, f. R-30, op. 2, spr. 33, ark. 232.

51From the OUN judicial materials, it can be seen that rapists were rarely executed. Normally, the highest form of punishment was only used for multiple offenses (committed repeatedly, even after warnings), which included looting, failure to comply with orders, drunkenness and desertion. For example, on the 22nd of January 1944, a military court of the Bohun Division sentenced the insurgent Mykola Savchuk (“Doroshenko”) to death for “violence against one girl in the village of Zaiachychi; shooting in some house and shooting the dogs; shooting a calf; stealing weapons, physical intimidations of one fighter, because he was jealous of his girl, and escape from custody”73. On the 28th of September 1943 the underground member “Kozak” was executed for pillage, drinking and the rape of a village woman74.

  • 75 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376, t. 51, ark. 193.
  • 76 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376, t. 49, ark. 378.

52The main criteria for determining the guilt of the suspect was usually the damage done to the OUN, UPA or their authority among the population. UPA command or OUN leaders often had to respond to complaints from the local population of crimes of underground and insurgent members which gained a lot of publicity. For example, the underground member “Maksym” received 25 lashes (with a beating stick) for the attempted rape of a rural girl while intoxicated which was witnessed by his colleagues and the participants of St. Andrew’s Eve – a traditional holiday that is attended by many rural youth75. On the 6th of September 1949 the territorial organizational OUN court sentenced “Hroma”, an underground member, to death. The accused was charged, among other things, with numerous rapes of women and girls in various villages throughout recent years which happened in front of relatives and friends of the victims. The leadership knew about this but did not take the necessary measures until the rape victims raised the issue with the OUN leadership76.

  • 77 HDA SBU, f. 13, Spr. 376, t. 54, ark. 203.

53The fact that the UPA acted without any external assistance (political, military, and financial) certainly prompted the leadership to take measures against those responsible for sexual violence. For example, in the summer of 1945, underground member “Peremozhets” was expelled from the SB units in the Zalozetskyj region because he raped a woman in the village of Ratyschakh (Zboriv region in the Ternopil province)77. Indeed, the main source of its support was the local Ukrainian population. Sexual violence in this situation could weaken support for the underground and encourage the population to cooperate with Soviet authorities and inform on them, thus putting the very existence of the OUN and UPA under risk.

54However, in many cases, the rapists were punished only with “strict warnings”, a decrease in capacity or a transfer to another district, where the population did not know about the crimes of the accused. For example, the OUN communication officer Hryhorii Syzoniuk (“Dibrova”) got asevere warningfor the following:

  • 78 DARO, f. R-30, op. 2, spr. 113, ark. 17-18.

On the 25th of August 1946, being drunk, he threatened Nadia Brutska from the village of Rechenia with a weapon in order her to have sexual relations with him and after her final denial, beat her very hard… In the winter…Dibrova beat the hostess of the bowery near the village of Rudnia (where he stayed), and tried to rape her daughter. When his friend Kropyva was trying to calm him down, he shot him with a gun.78

  • 79 D. Viedienieiev, H. Bystrukhin Dvobii bez kompromisiv. Protyborstvo spetspidrozdiliv OUN ta radians (...)

55The disclosure of sexual offenses by insurgents or underground members often affected solely their career. Thus, the deputy head of the SB in the Drohobych OUN provid, “Chernyk” was demoted due to an allegation of rape79. We can say with a high probability that these soft forms of punishing rapists were often a forced move, of symbolic value, but with low efficiency. This kind of sanction for rapists can be explained by their position as loyal leaders or commanders, who considered rape a “side effect” of war with its chaos and extreme violence.

  • 80 It is more likely that “Kos” gave up the idea of the robbery of the cooperative because he and his (...)
  • 81 HDA SBU, f. 376, spr. 372, t. 18, ark. 91.

56Men, who managed to hide their sexual crimes from the public and negotiated with their victims were able to avoid responsibility. “Kos”, the OUN Kovel okruha SB chief, in his diary from the 24th of April 1950 wrote: “On our way to the cooperative, the girls visited and fed us but because of some indelicacy80 from our side, we had to leave the place, and could not achieve the robbery of the cooperative”81. The MGB officers killed the author of this diary on the 8th of November 1951. Until that time, he remained in his position and in the confiscated personal records there is no information about an investigation of the episode described above.

  • 82 Ia. Antoniuk “Borotba SB OUN (b) z ‘dykymy hrupamy’ na terytorii Volyni ta Polissia (1944–1951 rr.) (...)

57Some high-level commanders managed to avoid being punished for rape due to a biased investigation. For example, in 1947 the OUN leader of the Lutsk okruh, Mikhailo Bodnarchuk “Stemyd”, forced Anna Kovalchuk, a rural girl, to go underground; she was placed in his bunker, raped and infected with syphilis. Outraged by “Stemyd’s” behaviour, Kovalchuk wrote a complaint to “Dub” (UPA-North commander Ivan Lytvynchyk) and instructed the latter to verify it with “Hordej”, “Stemyd’s” brother. As a result of the investigation, Anna Kovalchuk was the one who was found guilty and shot82.

  • 83 During the Ukrainian-Polish military confrontation of 1942-1947, rape was used by both parties of t (...)
  • 84 R. Niedzielko (ed.), Kresowa ksiegd sprawiedliwych. 1939-1945: O Ukraińcach ratujących Polaków podd (...)

58Besides, the OUN sometimes used rape as a weapon of war83. This was especially true for their own women who were suspected of collaborating with the enemy. A female resident in the Chortkiv region in Ternopil province, in the village of Stara Iamelnytsia, Veronika Iastshebska recalled the story of her neighbour Kovalchyk – a Pole who was married to Olesia, a Ukrainian woman. One day in March 1944, late at night, armed men entered their home, asking for the husband. He, being warned about the attack on the village, was hiding in the attic. “They started to beat her, and when that didn’t work they gang raped her, then strangled her and hung her on a hook in her house.” During this time, Kovalchyk ran to Iastshebskyi84.

  • 85 С. Card, “Rape as a Weapon of War”, in Hypatia, Vol. 11, # 4, November 1996, p. 10.
  • 86 This expression refers of course to J. Horne and A. Kramer’s German Atrocities, 1914: A History of (...)

59Rape and sexual violence was also used against those women perceived as others during the Polish-Ukrainian ethnic conflict. Martial rape is a practice defined by unwritten rules (for example, the rules that only females are “fair game”, that age does not matter, that soldiers who rape “enemy women” are not to be reported on, that anonymous publicity of it may be desirable)85. In this case, sexual violence can be seen as a way of male-male communication, when by raping women men also humiliated and demoralized their enemies who cannot protect them. This issue has yet to become the focus of attention for researchers and needs further analysis. The level of involvement of the OUN and UPA leadership and their troops as well as the extent of “Ukrainian atrocities”86 is still the object of research.

  • 87 These instructions among others appeared after the Soviet occupation of Western Ukraine in 1944, as (...)
  • 88 G. Motyka, Ukraińska partyzantka. 1942-1960, Warsaw, Wyd. Instytut Studiów Politycznych PAN, Wyd. R (...)
  • 89 ATsDVR, к. 30, f. 33 (SMERCH materials– military intelligence agency in the USSR – Subcarpathian mi (...)
  • 90 In many cases, it is difficult to identify these crimes and the actual involvement of the OUN and U (...)
  • 91 W. Siemaszko, E. Siemaszko, Ludobójstwo dokonane przez nacjonalistów ukraińskich na ludności polski (...)
  • 92 V. Shchehliuk "...Iak rosa na sontsi". Politychnyi roman-khronika, napysanyi na osnovi spohadiv kol (...)
  • 93 P. Boiarchuk, Bii pid stinamy khramu, Lutsk, 2005, p. 44.

60In the sources I use, there is no information about mass rapes during the attacks on Polish people, nor is there obviously any instructions or orders for rape during combat operations. What was written are orders which prohibit murder, mutilation of women and children or the deformation of their bodies87. On the 10th of July 1944, UPA commander in Galicia, Vasyl Sydor “Shelest” gave an order which forbade the killing of women, children and elders88. According to the directives of the political executive of the OUN provid, Iaroslav Lytvyn “Karat” from 14th of May 1945, the perpetrators of these categories were punished by death89. However, to control the execution of these orders was difficult and there are numerous Poles witness accounts of cases of sexual violence by Ukrainian nationalists90, multiple and gang rape, sometimes in front of relatives, when the victims were killed afterwards. In his memoirs former resident of the Polish settlement Avhustivka in Volyn (located 17 km far from town of Volodymyr-Volynskyi) Wladyslav Malinovski tells the fate of Polish-German Romanovski family, who lived 300 meters from this place. In July 1943 the Ukrainians attacked their house and killed four children and father. Ms. Romanowski saw from the shelter that her 18 and 29 years old daughters were raped before being murdered91. During the attack on the town Vyshnivets (Zbarazh region in Ternopil province) on the 20th of February 1944 SB OUN members took with them two young Polish women. UPA commander Luka Pavlyshyn mentioned that they “cried and begged to spare them”92. Evidences of criminal prosecutions of OUN rapists of Polish women are very few. One insurgent, Andryj Burachynskyj recalled that two insurgents from his unit acting in Volyn in 1944 were shot in front of their unit for, instead of following orders to kill a Polish woman as a spy, they had raped her93.

Peculiarities of marital infidelity

  • 94 “Homin» (real name Mykhailo Diachenko) was married to Maria Savchuk. Before his joining the undergr (...)
  • 95 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372. t. 89. ark. 87.

61Extramarital sexual relations in the Ukrainian Nationalist movement were not just morally condemned, but also criminalized. For that reason, such cases were kept secret. Olha Chemerys (“Dniprova”) testified during her MGB interrogations: “Homin94 and I were secret lovers, and no one knows about it, even the fighters of his unit”95. It became more difficult to keep relations secret after Chemerys got pregnant in August 1948 as Olha explained on the 19th of January 1950 during another interrogation:

  • 96 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372. t. 89. ark. 67.

Being afraid of the publicity about my pregnancy ‘Homin’ asked me many times for an abortion but I disagreed; after, he decided to leave me, not wanting to let anyone from the OUN underground know about the baby.96

  • 97 “Notice of revolution OUN court on judgement of OUN member Ivan Ponchko. January 10, 1948”, ATsDVR, (...)
  • 98 DARO, f. r-30, op. 2, spr. 33, ark. 267.

62Adultery was sometimes listed as an additional item on the list of charges against insurgents who were judged by the so-called organizational (revolutionary) courts of the OUN. On the 28th of October 1947, a member of one OUN combat division Ivan Ponchka (“Vanka”) was executed. Among his crimes, it was mentioned: “For immoral behavior and for having broken the promise made under religious law to be faithful to his wife”97. During the death penalty, one of the Rivne region SB chiefs on the 28th of September 1943 additionally announced the following: “defendant Chaika, being on vacation at home, was drunk and visited other women”98.

  • 99 Litopys UPA. New Series. Volyn i Polissia u nevidomii epistoliarnii spadshchyni OUN i UPA. 1944-195 (...)
  • 100 Ibid, p. 210

63When cases of adultery had to do with distinguished commanders of the underground, the UPA either tried to keep them secret and separate the lovers, or to get them married since the publicity of these affairs could cause great damage to their prestige. Writing to Vasyl Halasa (“Orlan”) in September 1951, the OUN Chief of the Ostroh raion Iakiv Kovzhuk (“Taras”) informed him of an investigation about the sexual relations of his own wife, the secretary “Palazhka”, and an underground member “Arkada”. He asked Halasa to give her a divorce without making it public and allow the lovers to live outside of marriage, which they refused to do99. Halasa stressed the following: “It is forbidden to make divorces public. Today, when there is nothing more important than the life or death in the OUN, such things are not allowed. It has a killing effect on people”100.

  • 101 I. Dmytryk, “U lisakh Lemkivshchyny”, Vydavnytstvo «Suchasnist», 1977, p. 42.
  • 102 Litopys UPA. Arkhitektura rezystansu: kryivky i bunkery UPA v radianskykh dokumentakh, vol. 38, Tor (...)

64However, the everyday life of participants of the Ukrainian liberation movement did not always favour respect for fidelity. Married members of the OUN and UPA could not live a full family life. When women consciously followed their husbands, the insurgent commanders of divisions often tried to send them home, considering them lumber for the army. Vasyl Mizernyi (“Ren”), the battalion’s commander, expelled approximately 50 women (some of them with children) from a military camp in Bukovyi Berdi in the Carpathian Mountains and demoted one master sergeant for his refusal to “get rid” of his wife101. Only a small number of couples, where both were working in the underground, could be together under certain conditions. Those conditions were rather specific, as husband and wife had virtually no opportunity to be alone. Only a few leaders, and only for a short time, could have a separate room in one of the hideouts. For example, OUN leader of the Carpathian region Iaroslav Melnyk (“Robert”) and his wife Antonina Korol had one102.

  • 103 Litopys UPA. New Series, vol. 23, p. 1093.

65The impossibility of being alone and the constant contact with other men could, in some cases, lead to adultery. SB investigator “Kholodnyi”, in the materials on a case of an OUN member Petro Salo (“Zahirskyi”), wrote about his wife: “Woman, who came into the underground and met many more intelligent and smarter insurgents, very often acted in the wrong way – having affairs with others”103.

66The underground conditions were unsuitable for whole families. The cold, hunger and lack of medicines were constant problems for underground members. After several months staying in damp underground hideouts without any daylight significantly worsened the insurgents’ health. Cardiovascular and gastrointestinal diseases were common, as well as problems with vision. Iaroslava Romanyna-Levkovych recalled the female hygiene in the hideout:

  • 104 Ia. Romanyna-Levkovych, Zhyttia pidpilnytsi, Toronto/Lviv, Litopys UPA. “Biography” Series, vol. 4 (...)

They gave women one glass of water to do whatever you wanted with it – wash yourself, drink, but you cannot get more. Even to wash yourself was possible only with cotton and alcohol to clean the face and neck; to feel fresh a little, and water was used for other more important things… Sometimes we melted snow to cook.104

  • 105 M. Dzhuriak, OUN i UPA na Bukovyni: spohady, svidchennia i materialy pro vyzvolnu borotbu, Chernivt (...)
  • 106 Audio record of interview with Yulia Hanyshchak. 3.04.1995 in Arkhiv instytutu istorychnykh doslidz (...)
  • 107 HDA SBU, f. 5, spr. 67418, t. 3, ark. 14-15, 68, 73, 121.

67Bohdana Pylypchuk (“Krytsia”) remembered that she very often slept in her clothes, in case of a raid, in order to rapidly escape taking only necessary belongings105. Women also suffered from the discrepancy between the contemporary aesthetic notions of female beauty and the conspiracy requirements, which compelled them to wear dark clothing. Iulia Hanyshchak (“Halychanka”) remembered her outfit in the underground: “No bras, no silk, like a rural woman. Barefoot with wounded feet…”106. Moreover, the underground life particularly limited reproductive rights of the underground women. Very often they had to give birth to their children in close and dark earthen hideout. Thus, right after delivery, the OUN authorities persistently wanted them to immediately return to their duties. There were cases when children died in the underground due to improper sanitary conditions107.

68Taking into consideration the number of difficulties connected with membership in the underground movement, many wives of the OUN and UPA members refused to share this “forest life” with their husbands, especially in the presence of children. In most cases, these women lived without their husbands legally or semi-legally (using fake documents and fictitious names) and hid from Soviet authorities.

  • 108 HDA SBU, f. 65. spr. S-9079, t. 53, ark. 50.
  • 109 DARO, f. R-30, op. 2, spr. 28, ark. 5.

69Married couples who lived separately, could meet with varying frequency, sometimes they were not able to see each other for several months or even years. The time and place of such meetings was regulated by corresponding instructions, for the violation of which they could be judged. One OUN order to members from September 1946 indicated: “Every insurgent is bound to respect the organizational-military-underground discipline. No insurgent is allowed to meet with a civilian (mother, brother, father, sister, wife, girlfriend, etc.). In case of emergency, a meeting is allowed once a month, but only in the presence of another person”108. Two privates of the UPA Kolodzinskyi Division in the Rivne region, “Vykhryk” and “Ohirok”, were punished with 100 pushups because they tried to organize meetings with their wives without the commanders’ knowledge109.

  • 110 ATsDVR, f. 8, t. 2, spr. 3, ark. 80.
  • 111 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372. t. 22. ark. 491.

70Prolonged separation of married partners and the inability to meet their mutual spiritual, emotional and physical needs led to fading feelings and the estrangement between them. Mykhailyna Kostiv (“Linka”), an insurgent from the Berezhan region, remembered during her SB OUN interrogations on the 27th of January 1948: “Dolia said that Aliosha’s wife was arrested, heavily beaten and then released. Aliosha does not care about it because he has other women”110. “Andriy” the nadraion leader of the OUN, flirted with his colleague Maria Panochko (“Mariika”), answering her questions about his marriage status: “Still married but without a wife”. He explained that he “has not lived” with her for a long time111.

  • 112 HDA SBU, f. 5, spr. 67826, ark. 38-42.
  • 113 O. Ishchuk Zhyttia ta dolia Mykhaila Diachenka –«Marka Boieslava», Toronto/Lviv, Litopys UPA, «Podi (...)

71A separate life led to the possibility of parallel intimate relations. Most often (semi)secret relations appeared between people who worked together and often saw each other or stayed in hideouts for a long time. Common ideas, tasks, living conditions created an atmosphere of emotional closeness between people. At the end of 1944, once joining the underground, Mykhailo Diachenko (“Homin”) actually lost the possibility to see his wife Maria and son Sviatoslav who lived in the Rivne region. He was always in the forests of Ivano-Frankivsk. Almost a year after, he started a sexual relationship with his secretary Olha Chemerys (“Dniprova”) that lasted four years (until her arrest by the MGB on the 31st of December 1949). This relationship was not simple hedonic flirting and “Homin” did not just write poems to his new lover but also got into serious conflict with commanding officers over her. After her arrest by the MGB in the Lviv region in 1948, “Dniprova” signed an agreement to cooperate with the MGB. That is why coming back to the underground and talking about what happened, she had to be thoroughly checked by the SB OUN. “Homin” was afraid that she would be liquidated as a Soviet special services agent, so he interfered in the investigations and hid his lover112. He lost his high position and became the OUN Stanislavivsk regional provid member. During this whole period of having “two families”, Diachenko financially supported his son and legal wife. The latter, after several years of separation with her husband found a new partner, and lived with him in an unregistered marriage in Dubno, Lviv region113.

  • 114 HDA SBU, f.6, spr. 72068FP, ark. 3.
  • 115 AUSBU u Ivano-Frankivskii oblasti, spr. 32603, t. 9, ark. 38.

72The marriages of underground members or UPA insurgents were also broken because of the arrest of their wives. Most of them got from 10 to 25 years of corrective labor camp. Intimate relations between county referent of the SB OUN in North-Western Ukrainian territories Mykola Kozak (“Smok”) and the OUN member Liudmyla Foia possibly started after his wife Nina Belichenko (“Anichenko”) was arrested at the beginning of August 1945114. OUN member Anna Popovych (“Ruzha”) had sexual relations with Luka Hrynishak (“Dovbush”) after the arrest of his wife Anna in 1945115.

  • 116 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 20, ark. 199.

73There were other specific reasons for adultery in the underground. Conspiracy, which was a basic condition for the functioning of underground structures, had a destructive impact on marital fidelity. Most of the members of the OUN military underground and the UPA insurgents did not even know the real names of the people with whom they worked and they used code names. Asking information of a private character could attract the attention of the SB and made you suspect of cooperation with the enemy (Soviet authorities). In the instructional materials for OUN members, their private lives were taboo topics116.

  • 117 HDA SBU, f. 2, op. 110, spr. 2, t.5, ark. 170.

74This illusion of anonymity created the possibility for abuse. It was especially the case for the descendants of eastern regions of Ukraine or Russia who worked in the OUN and UPA. Mykola Kozhukhivskyi (“Bezridnyi”), a native of the Kuibyshev region (RSFSR) joined the OUN underground in 1944 and after three years asked an underground woman to marry him. Though, at that time he was married and had a 12 year old son who lived in Soviet Russia117.

  • 118 N. Nikolaieva, Uliana Kriuchenko-«Oksana», (Toronto/Lviv: Litopys UPA. «Podii i liudy» Series, Book (...)
  • 119 Litopys UPA. New Series, vol. 16, p. 267.

75Vasyl Kuk, one of the major activists in the OUN, later the last UPA commander, started intimate relations with Halyna Skaskiv (“Uliana”) several months after his marriage in 1944118. During that time, no one in the underground knew about the change of his marital status. He kept this secret until 1949 when the MGB arrested his wife Uliana Kriuchenko and he had to inform the UPA commanders about it119.

Conclusions

76Deprivation of privacy can be called, without exaggeration, an official policy of the OUN and UPA underground. The nationalist ideology, the strict conditions of Nazi armed confrontations, and later the Soviet totalitarian regime, the underground nature of the Ukrainian liberation movement structure demanded from its member’s complete self-devotion and sacrifice. In the process of recruitment to the UPA or OUN underground, people had to weigh their feelings of love and attachment to relatives with the commitment to ideas of fighting for Ukrainian statehood. New life priorities, where there was almost no place for personal desires and romantic experiences, were imposed on people. Encouraging this unconditional choice in favor of Ukrainian statehood, the OUN and UPA attempted to direct sexual energy in a useful public course.

77The most effective way of controlling sexuality was to maintain it within the framework of marriage and family relations. Therefore, any forms of pre- and extra-marital sexual life was considered illegitimate, and as such were under harassment, persecution and criminalization. But sexual practices were very different to official discourse. Different types of unsanctioned sexual relationships were also widespread. While some underground members and insurgents were actually married, the most common of these relations were short affairs, flirtations, single sexual contacts . Their acceptation depended on the degree of secrecy, the leaders’ attitude, the level of damage to the common cause and the status of the offender in the hierarchy of power. If he was in a high position, then the accused could manage to escape responsibility.

78A wide range of penalties were used against offenders: from warnings (admonition) to the death penalty. The qualification of crimes, the peculiarities of justice and the types of penalties practiced indicate an unequal attitude to sexuality of both sexes in the underground and the UPA. The female body was seen as a social body and was involved in the power struggle between the OUN and their opponents. The loss of control over the body was seen as losing the battle. Control was in the hands of the men as defenders of the nation and representatives of power in terms of the patriarchal-gender order. Gender norms required total subordination of women to men and men often tried to exploit womens sexuality. The result was sexual harassment, expectation of sexual favours from women, the exploitation of women’s sexuality when “revolutionary expediency” demanded it - for example in order to collect information or in the interests of conspiracy. An extreme way of expressing this domination of men over women in the OUN and UPA was the rape of their own women. Military culture, sexual and gender norms and the liberal position of the OUN leadership which did not properly investigate and punish offenders contributed to this. Rape of other women became a part of military tactics with the aim to terrorize, demoralize and humiliate the enemy. All of these forms of sexual violence were officially banned but were practiced by different groups at different times – when it suited their needs.

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Notes

1 J. Burds, “Gender and Policing in Soviet West Ukraine, 1944–1948”, Cahiers du monde russe. Vol. 42, # 2-4, 2001, pp. 279-320; T. Antonova, “Zhinka ta yii ‘myrni’, ‘napivmyrni’ ta voienni roli v borotbi OUN i UPA”, Ukrainskyi vyzvolnyi rukh, Zb. 9, Lviv, 2007, pp. 138-144; O. Petrenko, “Anatomy of the Unsaid: Along the Taboo Lines of Female Participation in the Ukrainian Nationalistic Underground”, in R. Leiserowitz, M. Röger (Eds), Dynamization of Gender Roles in Wartime, Warsaw, German Historical Institute, 2012, pp. 241-262; O. Kis, “Mizh osobystym i politychnym: Genderni osoblyvosti dosvidu zhinok-uchasnyts natsionalno-vyzvolnykh zmahan na zakhidnoukrainskykh zemliakh u 1940-1950-kh rokakh”, Narodoznavchi zoshyty, # 4, 2013, pp. 591-599.

2 This research will analyze only one faction of OUN, led by Stepan Bandera (known as OUN(B). The Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists was founded in 1929 and acted mainly in Western Ukraine (Galicia and Volyn), which at the time was part of interwar Poland. In 1939-1941 when Western Ukraine was annexed by the USSR, more than 15 000 OUN members were arrested and executed. In 1940, the OUN split into two parts: one led by Andrii Mel’nyk (OUN(M)) and the other led by Stepan Bandera (OUN(B)). Both groups hoped that Nazi Germany would create a Ukrainian state. But after the 30 June 1941 Declaration of Ukrainian State Act in Lviv (which was under the control of Nazi Germany), the Gestapo arrested many OUN leaders.

In 1942 in the Volyn region of western Ukraine, the OUN began to form armed units (later known as the Ukrainian Insurgent Army – Ukrainska Povstanska armiia – UPA). In subsequent years, the UPA spread its struggle to Galicia and the Transcurzon region (today in Poland). The UPA was formally subordinated to the Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council that was organized in July 1944 as a coalition of several political groups, including the OUN(B). But in practice, the OUN(B) controlled the UPA, imposing its ideology and organizing a civilian infrastructure for the insurgents. Many of the UPA commanders were OUN leaders.

When the Soviets returned to Western Ukraine in 1944, the UPA and the OUN started an anti-Soviet resistance. In Volyn, Polissia and Galicia, there were heavy clashes between the UPA and the NKVD, which used tanks and air forces. The Soviet regime also used special military units - secret service battle unit (known as Ahenturno-boiovi hrupy, ABH) that included NKVD officers and ex-members of the OUN and UPA who were captured and agreed to cooperated under NKVD pressure. ABH sometimes acted as false OUN or UPA divisions so as to discredit them among the population. Such Soviet methods spread mistrust within the OUN environment, and caused massive cleansing among its members by the OUN Security Branch (Sluzhba Bezpeky – SB). Ukrainian civilians suspected of collaboration with the Soviets, or being in open disagreement with OUN practices, were targeted and the principle of collective responsibility was often used (liquidation of families).

Thousands of the Polish inhabitants were killed in the Volyn and Galicia region in 1943-1944 during Ukrainian-Polish conflict as a result of ethnic cleaning orchestrated by the OUN and UPA (See more: T. Snyder, “The Causes of Ukrainian-Polish Ethnic Cleansing 1943”, Past and Present, 2003, #179, pp. 197-234; G. Motyka, Od rzezi wołyńskiej do akcji “Wisła”: konflikt polsko-ukraiński 1943-1947, Kraków, Wydawnictwo Literackie, 2011, 520 p.; V.  Viatrovych, Druha polsko-ukrainska viina. 1942-1947, Kyiv, 2012, 288 p.).

The OUN, UPA, their ideology and their action especially during World War II are currently the subject of heated historical debate, and it is not the purpose of this article to present a state of the historiographical debate, which focuses in particular on the political nature of the OUN (fascism vs “revolutionary integral nationalism” according to Oleksandr Zaitsev (Ukrainian Integral Nationalism (1920s-1930s): Studies in Intellectual History, Kyiv, 2013, 488 p.) and on the participation of OUN/UPA as organizations and/or of their members in the Holocaust (See more: Ray Brandon and Wendy Lower (Eds), The Shoah in Ukraine: History, Testimony, Memorialization, Bloomington, Indiana University Press in association with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 2008, 365 p.; P. Friedman “Ukrainian-Jewish Relations during the Nazi Occupation” in Roads to Extinction: Essays on the Holocaust, New York, 1980, pp. 176-208; S. Spector, The Holocaust of Volhynian Jews, 1941-1944, Jerusalem, 1990, 383 p).

In 1945, the UPA reorganized its forces – formed smaller units, some insurgents were allowed to go home or were absorbed into the regional OUN network. Over the next years, the UPA suffered heavy losses: its last units ceased to exist in 1949. Since then and almost until the middle of 1950’s, anti-Soviet actions (diversions, individual terror, acts of sabotage and propaganda) were carried out by small armed groups (boyivkas). The last Supreme UPA Commander, Vasyl Kuk, was captured in 1954. As a result of the Soviet counterinsurgency measures from 1944 to 1952, nearly 153 000 members and supporters of the Ukrainian underground were killed, 134 000 were arrested and 203.000 were deported to special settlements outside of USSR (A. N. Iakovleva (ed), Lavrentii Beriia. 1953. Stenogramma iulskogo plenuma TsK KPSS i drugie dokumenty, Moscow, MFD, 1999, p. 47.)

3 Secret police organs, such as the NKVD, NKGB, MVD and MGB played a key role in the struggle of the Soviet regime with Ukrainian Nationalist underground. After the second Soviet annexation of Western Ukraine in 1944, Soviet special services created a wide network of informers and agents. They reported about relatives, friends and lovers, children, characteristics, habits of OUN and UPA members. Soviet special services added hundreds of investigative, control-supervisory, and secret service cases on underground members and insurgents to these reports. However, such documents should be read with prudence as they may contain false information about some figures of the OUN and UPA, because of the very nature of these documents and the high secrecy of the Ukrainian nationalist underground. Extensive information about the private life of OUN members and insurgents is contained in the documents of the OUN and UPA – instructions, reports, court materials and documents of the SB (Sluzhba Bezpeky). This Security Branch was created in 1940 to protect the Ukrainian underground movement from Soviet agents. The SB had investigative and punitive functions. During interrogations, the SB paid particular attention to the private life of the people they questioned as well as to whom they mentioned in their interrogation.

4 Y. Hrytsak, “Peredmova”. Nezvychaini doli zvychainykh zhinok. Usna istoriia XX stolittia, Lviv, Vydavnytstvo Lvivskoi politekhniky, 2013, p. 22.

5 The whole territory of OUN activity was divided into the following administrative units: stanytsia – kushch – raion – nadraion – okruh ‑ krai. Each of these units had its own provid (leadership). It regulated the work of executive officers (referent) of different sectors (medical, security service, economical, propagandist, mobilization, etc.). The Provid OUN was the main authority of the OUN.

6 Hereinafter in inverted commas, actively used code names of the underground members of the OUN and UPA will be indicated. In some cases identifying people is rather problematic, that is why the real names of some mentioned personalities are not always indicated in the article.

7 Archives of the Liberation Movement Research Center (Arkhiv Tsentru doslidzhen vyzvolnoho rukhu – ATsDVR), Fond 8, Tom 2, Sprava 13, Arkush 79.

8 State Archive of Rivne Oblast (Derzhavnyi arkhiv Rivnenskoi oblasti - DARO), f. R-30, op. 2, spr. 33, ark. 78.

9 I. Patryliak, “Vstan i borys! Slukhai i vir…”: ukrainske natsionalistychne pidpillia ta povstanskyi rukh (1939—1960 rr)”, Lviv, Chasopys, 2012, p. 265.

10 State Archive of the Secret Services of Ukraine (Haluzevyi derzhavnyi arkhiv Sluzhby bezpeky Ukrainy - HDA SBU), f. 65. spr. s-9079, t. 50, ark. 178. The territory refers to the location of the rebels/underground members. Revolution is used in the meaning of National revolution – the struggle for the creation of an independent Ukrainian state.

11 ATsDVR, f. 9, t. 12, od. zb. 29, ark. 25.

12 HDA SBU, f. 6, spr. 75175-FP, t. 1, ark. 77-78.

13 T. Vronska, Upokorennia strakhom: simeine zaruchnytstvo u karalnii praktytsi radianskoi vlady (1917-1953 rr.), Kyiv, Tempora, 2013, p. 431.

14 I. Andrusiak, Spohady, Lviv: Vydavnytstvo LNU im. I. Franka, 2001, p. 50.

15 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 78, ark. 46.

16 Archives of the Secret Services of Ukraine in the Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast (Arkhiv upravlinnia sluzhby bezpeky ukrainy u Ivano-Frankivskii oblasti - AUSBU u Ivano-Frankivskii oblasti), spr. 70750-P, ark. 51.

17 HDA SBU, f. 65. spr. S-9079, t. 57. ark. 93.

18 K. Havryliv, “Z chystoiu sovistiu” in M. Borys, Neskorena Dolynshchyna, vol. 2, Ivano-Frankivsk, Nova Zoria, 2008, p. 315.

19 For further details see: V. Kovalchuk, “Dokumentuvannia shliubiv v OUN ta UPA”, Ukrainskyi arkheohrafichnyi shchorichnyk, vol. 15, Kyiv, 2010, pp. 692-697.

20 ATsDVR, f. 9, t.12, spr. 62, ark. 1.

21 Litopys UPA. New Series. Volyn i Polissia: UPA ta zapillia. Dokumenty i materialy, vol. 2, Kyiv/Toronto, 1999, p. 63.

22 I. Lyko, “Na hrani mrii i diisnosty: Spohady pidpilnyka. Na hrani dvokh svitiv. 1945-1955” in Litopys UPA, vol. 37, Toronto/Lviv, Litopys UPA, 2002, p. 153.

23 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 20, ark. 27.

24 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376, t. 29, ark. 322.

25 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376, t. 54, ark. 41.

26 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 20, ark. 27.

27 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 80, ark. 117.

28 S. Frasuliak, Remeslo povstantsia: zb. prats pidpolkovnyka UPA Stepana Frasuliaka-Khmelia (reprinted by R. Zabilyi), Lviv, 2007, p. 116.

29 Borotba z agenturoiu: Protokoly dopytiv Sluzhby Bezpeky OUN v Ternopilshchyni 1946-1948, Book 1, vol. 43, Toronto/Lviv: Litopys UPA, 2006, p. 1048.

30 Litopys UPA, vol. 44, p. 918.

31 I. Lyko, Na hrani mrii i diisnosty: spohady pidpilnyka. 1945-1955, p. 115.

32 Litopys UPA, vol. 43, book 1, p. 117.

33 Interview with Liuba Los, 4.03.1995, Archive of the Institute of Historical Research from the Ivan Franko National University in Lviv (Arkhiv Instytutu istorychnykh doslidzhen Lvivskoho natsionalnoho universytetu imeni Ivana Franka).

34 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376, t. 29, ark. 378.

35 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376, t. 53, ark. 33.

36 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 52, ark. 154.

37 Litopys UPA, vol. 44, Book. 2, p. 140.

38 HDA SBU, spr. 372, t. 54, ark. 280.

39 Litopys UPA. New Series, Zolochivska okruha OUN, vol. 23, Kyiv/Toronto, Litopys UPA, 2013, p. 519.

40 HDA SBU, spr. 376, t. 48. ark. 12.

41 Litopys UPA. New Series, Voienna okruha UPA “Lysonia” 1943-1952, vol. 20, Kyiv/Toronto, 2012, p. 325.

42 HDA SBU, spr. 372, t. 17, ark. 138.

43 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 20, ark. 23.

44 Litopys UPA, New Series, Voienna okruha UPA «Buh»: Dokumenty i materialy. 1943-1952. Book 1, vol. 12, Kyiv/Toronto, 2009, p. 295.

45 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 66, ark. 266.

46 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 80, ark. 2.

47 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372. t. 89. ark. 67.

48 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 77, ark. 273.

49 DARO, f. R-30, op. 2, spr. 37, ark. 42.

50 R. Petrenko, Za Ukrainu, za yii voliu. Spohady, Toronto/Lviv, Litopys UPA, vol. 27, 1997, p. 169.

51 H. Kokhanska, «Z Ukrainoiu u sertsi». Spomyny, Lviv, Litopys UPA. “Biographical” Series, vol. 9, 2008, p. 78.

52 “Iak poboriuie NKVD i NKHB t.zv. kontrrevoliutsiiu v SRSR (korotkyi vyklad)” in ATsDVR. – Fond referentury SB OUN Berezhanskyj nadraionu, not compiled.

53 ATsDVR, k. 30, f. 33 (SMERCH materials – military intelligence agency in the USSR – Sub-Carpathian Military District)

54 HDA SBU, f. 60, spr. 27688, t. 13, ark. 47.

55 Litopys UPA, Nova seriia, T. 23, p. 531.

56 M. Skorupskyi, U nastupakh i vidstupakh, Vydannia Ukrainsko-Amerykanskoi vydavnychoi spilky, 1961, p. 211.

57 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 26, ark.183.

58 I. Lyko, Na hrani mrii i diisnosty: Spohady pidpilnyka, p. 116.

59 Ia. Hrytsai, P. Hrytsai, A rany ne hoilysia. Spomyny «Chornoty», Toronto/Lviv, Litopys UPA, “Biography” Series”, vol. 3, 2001, p. 48.

60 A village in the Bohorodchany region of Ivano-Frankivsk province.

61 HDA SBU, f. 2, op. 110, spr. 2, t. 5, ark. 223 zv.

62 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372. t. 89. ark. 124.

63 For example, I. Revaniuk, Pravda pro tak zvanu UPA, Kyiv, 1961, pp. 57-58; V. Halasa, I. Bysaha, Za velinniam sovisti, Kyiv, 1963, p. 18.

64 ATsDVR, f. 9, t.12.

65 “’Klishch’ interrogation protocol from 3.09.1945” in ATsDVR, f. 72 (Arkhiv SB OUN Kozivskoho raionu Ivano-Frankivskoi oblasti)

66 “Konvalia” interrogation protocol as of 7.09.1945”, ATsDVR, f. 72 (Arkhiv SB OUN Kozivskoho raionu Ivano-Frankivskoi oblasti)

67 Litopys UPA, v. 44, p. 374.

68 See more: M. Morris, “Rape, war and Military culture” in A. Barstow (ed), War’s dirty secret. Rape, prostitution and other crimes against women, Cleveland, Pilgrim Pr., 2002, p. 182; R.W. Connel, Masculinities, Cambridge, UK, Polity Press, 1995; J. Nagel, Race, Ethnicity and Sexuality, New York, Oxford University Press, 2003, etc.

69 R. Seifert, “Rape : the Female Body as a Symbol and a Sign” in I. Taipale (ed.), War or Health? A Reader, London, 2002.

70 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376. t. 56, ark. 36.

71 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372. t. 20, ark. 227.

72 “Komunikat v spravi rozstrilu sanitarky UChKh” in ATsDVR, f. 30, k. 62 (Arkhiv OUN z sela Pistyn Kosivskoho raionu Ivano-Frankivskoi oblasti, not compiled).

73 DARO, f. R-30, op. 2, spr. 16, ark. 255.

74 DARO, f. R-30, op. 2, spr. 33, ark. 232.

75 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376, t. 51, ark. 193.

76 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 376, t. 49, ark. 378.

77 HDA SBU, f. 13, Spr. 376, t. 54, ark. 203.

78 DARO, f. R-30, op. 2, spr. 113, ark. 17-18.

79 D. Viedienieiev, H. Bystrukhin Dvobii bez kompromisiv. Protyborstvo spetspidrozdiliv OUN ta radianskykh syl spetsoperatsii. 1945-1980-ti roky, Kyiv, K.I.S, 2007, p.78.

80 It is more likely that “Kos” gave up the idea of the robbery of the cooperative because he and his colleagues were afraid to be denounced for forcing the abovementioned girls to have sexual intercourse.

81 HDA SBU, f. 376, spr. 372, t. 18, ark. 91.

82 Ia. Antoniuk “Borotba SB OUN (b) z ‘dykymy hrupamy’ na terytorii Volyni ta Polissia (1944–1951 rr.)”, http://bandera.lviv.ua/?p=3230 (last accessed 20/01/2016)

83 During the Ukrainian-Polish military confrontation of 1942-1947, rape was used by both parties of the conflict. Cases of Poles raping Ukrainian women and killing them afterwards are reported in V. Viatrovych (ed.) Polsko-ukrainski stosunky v 1942-1947 rokakh v dokumentakh OUN ta UPA, vol. 1, Lviv, 2011, pp. 327, 337, 416, 417, 432; D. Shumuk, Perezhyte i peredumane, Kyiv, Vydavnytstvo imeni Telihy, 1998, p. 132; ATsDVR, f. 9; t. 5, doc. 18; t.6, doc.3; HDA SBU, f. 376, spr. 376, t. 34, ark. 248.

84 R. Niedzielko (ed.), Kresowa ksiegd sprawiedliwych. 1939-1945: O Ukraińcach ratujących Polaków poddanych eksterminacji przez OUN i UPA, vol. 12, Warsaw, 2007, p. 134.

85 С. Card, “Rape as a Weapon of War”, in Hypatia, Vol. 11, # 4, November 1996, p. 10.

86 This expression refers of course to J. Horne and A. Kramer’s German Atrocities, 1914: A History of Denial, Yale University Press, 2001. Horne and Kramer show to what extent report about atrocities are used by different sides, and how precise and meticulous historical work allows establishing the veracity of these reports or dismissing the rumours. In the Polish case, there are indeed numerous reports about «plunged out eyes, pulled out tongues, breasts cut off» as well as women with their breasts cut of or their womb open (See Adam Rolinski (ed.) Antypolska akcja nacjonalistów ukraińskich w Małopolsce Wschodniej i na Wołyniu w świetle dokumentów Rady Głównej Opiekuńczej, opr. Lucyna Kulińska, Kraków, Wydawnictwo Księgarnia Akademicka, 2012, p. 227, p. 345 and R. Niedzielko (ed.), op. cit. vol. 12, p. 99.)

87 These instructions among others appeared after the Soviet occupation of Western Ukraine in 1944, as there were attempts at a Polish-Ukrainian agreement. The OUN leadership wanted to attract the Poles in their anti-Bolshevik front.

88 G. Motyka, Ukraińska partyzantka. 1942-1960, Warsaw, Wyd. Instytut Studiów Politycznych PAN, Wyd. Rytm, 2006, p.378.

89 ATsDVR, к. 30, f. 33 (SMERCH materials– military intelligence agency in the USSR – Subcarpathian military district)

90 In many cases, it is difficult to identify these crimes and the actual involvement of the OUN and UPA members. The “Ukrainian” crimes against the civilian population during the Second Warld War were perpetrated not only by the OUN and UPA but also by members of others paramilitary formation (for example“Polisian Sish”), by those Ukrainians who deserted from the local police force or by men who were hiding from forced labour in Germany or from the mobilization of both the Red Army and the UPA.

91 W. Siemaszko, E. Siemaszko, Ludobójstwo dokonane przez nacjonalistów ukraińskich na ludności polskiej Wołynia, vol. 2., Warszawa, 2002, p. 1237. For other cases see: W. Siemaszko, E. Siemaszko, Ludobójstwo dokonane przez nacjonalistów ukraińskich na ludności polskiej Wołynia, vol.1., Warszawa, 2002, pp. 56, 149, 322. 568, 727, 959.

92 V. Shchehliuk "...Iak rosa na sontsi". Politychnyi roman-khronika, napysanyi na osnovi spohadiv kolyshnoho diiacha OUN-UPA L.S. Pavlyshyna. Lviv, 1999, p. 130.

93 P. Boiarchuk, Bii pid stinamy khramu, Lutsk, 2005, p. 44.

94 “Homin» (real name Mykhailo Diachenko) was married to Maria Savchuk. Before his joining the underground in November 1944, he and his wife were raising their 3 year old son Sviatoslav.

95 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372. t. 89. ark. 87.

96 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372. t. 89. ark. 67.

97 “Notice of revolution OUN court on judgement of OUN member Ivan Ponchko. January 10, 1948”, ATsDVR, f. 72 (SB OUN Archives from Kozivskoho regions, not compiled).

98 DARO, f. r-30, op. 2, spr. 33, ark. 267.

99 Litopys UPA. New Series. Volyn i Polissia u nevidomii epistoliarnii spadshchyni OUN i UPA. 1944-1954, vol. 16, (Kyiv/Toronto: 2011), p. 389.

100 Ibid, p. 210

101 I. Dmytryk, “U lisakh Lemkivshchyny”, Vydavnytstvo «Suchasnist», 1977, p. 42.

102 Litopys UPA. Arkhitektura rezystansu: kryivky i bunkery UPA v radianskykh dokumentakh, vol. 38, Toronto/Lviv, 2002, p. 256.

103 Litopys UPA. New Series, vol. 23, p. 1093.

104 Ia. Romanyna-Levkovych, Zhyttia pidpilnytsi, Toronto/Lviv, Litopys UPA. “Biography” Series, vol. 4 (Spohady voiakiv UPA ta uchasnykiv zbroinoho pidpillia Lvivshchyny ta Liubachivshchyny), 2003.

105 M. Dzhuriak, OUN i UPA na Bukovyni: spohady, svidchennia i materialy pro vyzvolnu borotbu, Chernivtsi, «Zoloti lytavry», 2010, p. 618.

106 Audio record of interview with Yulia Hanyshchak. 3.04.1995 in Arkhiv instytutu istorychnykh doslidzhen Lvivskoho natsionalnoho universytetu imeni Ivana Franka.

107 HDA SBU, f. 5, spr. 67418, t. 3, ark. 14-15, 68, 73, 121.

108 HDA SBU, f. 65. spr. S-9079, t. 53, ark. 50.

109 DARO, f. R-30, op. 2, spr. 28, ark. 5.

110 ATsDVR, f. 8, t. 2, spr. 3, ark. 80.

111 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372. t. 22. ark. 491.

112 HDA SBU, f. 5, spr. 67826, ark. 38-42.

113 O. Ishchuk Zhyttia ta dolia Mykhaila Diachenka –«Marka Boieslava», Toronto/Lviv, Litopys UPA, «Podii i liudy» Series, vol. 9, 2010, p. 70.

114 HDA SBU, f.6, spr. 72068FP, ark. 3.

115 AUSBU u Ivano-Frankivskii oblasti, spr. 32603, t. 9, ark. 38.

116 HDA SBU, f. 13, spr. 372, t. 20, ark. 199.

117 HDA SBU, f. 2, op. 110, spr. 2, t.5, ark. 170.

118 N. Nikolaieva, Uliana Kriuchenko-«Oksana», (Toronto/Lviv: Litopys UPA. «Podii i liudy» Series, Book. 23, 2013), p. 32.

119 Litopys UPA. New Series, vol. 16, p. 267.

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References

Electronic reference

Marta Havryshko, Illegitimate sexual practices in the OUN underground and UPA in Western Ukraine in the 1940s and 1950sThe Journal of Power Institutions in Post-Soviet Societies [Online], Issue 17 | 2016, Online since 05 April 2016, connection on 28 March 2024. URL: http://journals.openedition.org/pipss/4214; DOI: https://doi.org/10.4000/pipss.4214

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About the author

Marta Havryshko

Ivan Krypyakevych Institute of Ukrainian Studies of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Lviv

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