Special unit "Nachtigall" (German: Nachtigall - nightingale), "North" group of squads of Ukrainian Nationalists, "Ukrainian Legion named after. S. Bandera ", the Nachtigal battalion - an armed detachment, consisting mainly of members and supporters of the OUN (b), formed and trained by the Abwehr to act as part of the Brandenburg 800 sabotage unit (German: Lehrregiment "Brandenburg" zbV 800) in operation "Barbarossa" on the territory of the Ukrainian SSR.
According to the official version of the OUN (b), along with the Roland unit, it was supposed to become the basis of the future army of Ukraine under the control of the OUN (b) - allied to the Wehrmacht. The creation of the unit was authorized on February 25, 1941 by V. Canaris. Sabotage units were transferred to the territory of the Ukrainian SSR before the start of the war, the main part of the battalion crossed the border of the USSR on June 22, 1941 and acted together with German troops along the route Przemysl - Lviv - Ternopil - Proskurov - Zhmerinka - Vinnitsa. In October, the unit was transferred to Frankfurt an der Oder, where it was combined with the Roland personnel and sent for training as a security unit. Since the end of 1941, it will be reorganized into the 201st security police battalion.
background
The UVO, and then the OUN, actively cooperated with German military intelligence from the mid-20s of the 20th century. Since the spring of 1930, the intelligence department of the UVO was headed by a new "referent of intelligence and communications" Richard Yary, who was also responsible for the passage of funding for the OUN and the UVO on the territory of the Polish Republic and the activities of the OUN center in the "free city of Danzig" and communication with the Berlin bureau of the OUN. Military courses for OUN military instructors were organized in Danzig, courses for OUN telegraph operators were held in Berlin, and a laboratory for making bombs for UVO-OUN militants operated in Krakow. With the coming to power of Hitler, the connections between German intelligence and the OUN continued to expand. Since 1938, the Abwehr II has been training members and supporters of the OUN in the Chiemsee region (Bavaria), many of whom would later become part of the Nachtigal unit. According to the Institute of History of the Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Roman Shukhevych is also studying in Germany this year.
Second World War and preparing an attack on the USSR
Since the spring of 1939, the Abwehr has been actively training and educating OUN militants in order to use them in the Polish campaign. The rapid advance of the German troops in September 1939 reduced their actions to separate episodic actions. On September 12, 1939 (shortly before the fall of Warsaw), questions regarding Poland and the ethnic Ukrainian population of Poland were discussed at a special meeting on Hitler's train. According to Hitler's plans, on the border with the USSR it was necessary to create "buffer states" between "Asia" and the "West" - loyal to the Third Reich Ukraine (on the territory of Galicia and Volhynia) and Lithuania. Based on the political instructions of Ribbentrop, Keitel formulated the task for Canaris: "You, Canaris, must organize an uprising with the help of Ukrainian organizations working with you and having the same goals, namely Poles and Jews." Ribbentrop, specifying the forms of the uprising, specifically pointed out the need to exterminate the Poles and Jews. Under the "Ukrainian organizations" meant the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists. The result of these instructions is the so-called "Memorandum of Canaris of September 12, 1939", presented in the materials of the Nuremberg Tribunal as document 3047-ps).
At the same time, an unspoken split was actually taking place in the OUN, which occurred after the release from prison of the regional leader of the OUN, S. Bandera. A number of sources point to the significant role of Riko Yaroy in the long-awaited event to separate the conservatives from the old guard of the UVO-OUN and the radical and active young cadres who saw every legal action as a sign of “betrayal of the nation”.
According to Lev Rebet's version, Bandera's supporters found their support from some German military circles, while Melnik's group had connections with the political elite of Nazi Germany. In November 1939, about 400 Ukrainian nationalists began training in the Abwehr camps in Zakopane, Komarna, Kirchendorf and Gakeshtein.
Already in December, Bandera sent a courier to Soviet territory with the task of starting preparations for an armed uprising. The courier was intercepted by the NKVD, which managed to capture a number of OUN leaders. In connection with significant losses in the underground network, the Central Leadership of the OUN (Andrey Melnik) gives an order in early January 1940 to refrain from active operations and go into deep underground. Despite these instructions, the Krakow branch of the OUN, led by Bandera, continues to prepare an armed uprising, sending armed "shock" groups from the General Government to the territory controlled by the USSR.
Since February 1940, S. Bandera has been creating his own leadership of the OUN - having left the subordination of Melnik and formally depriving him of his powers - he, in turn, accuses him of treason. Formally, the division of the OUN into recognizing Melnik and controlled by Bandera is completed by the beginning of the fall of 1940.
At the same time, in the territory of the General Government and Germany, starting from the end of spring 1940, there was an active military and sabotage and reconnaissance training of OUN-R personnel. Among the examiners were R. Shukhevych and J. Stetsko, for the most "promising" there were staff and special courses in Krakow. With the support of the Abwehr, tactical exercises with live firing were carried out.
On the territory of the Ukrainian SSR, members of the OUN-R collected information about the location of military units and warehouses of the Red Army, as well as detailed information about the command staff of the Red Army. Information received in August 1940 by the NKVD from an intercepted OUN-R liaison from Krakow again thwarted the uprising planned for the fall. In the winter of 1940-41, the training of members of the OUN-R on the territory of the General Government continued for another larger volume. Special training in sabotage work in the Abwehr camps of Zakopane, Krynytsia, Comanche was held by several hundred Bandera.
History of creation
The creation of "Nachtigal" was the result of the implementation of the policy of the OUN (b), aimed at training their own military personnel. Agreements on the formation of the Ukrainian legion in the German army were reached in negotiations with military intelligence - the Abwehr in February 1941. Mobilization in the legion was carried out by the leaders of the OUN, who formed it from members of their organization who lived at that time in German-occupied Poland. The mobilized OUN members were divided into two parts, which appear in Ukrainian documents as squads of Ukrainian nationalists (groups "North" and "South"), in the documents of the Abwehr they received the code names "Special Department" Nachtigall "and" Organization Roland ".
Education
Recruitment to the "Nachtigal" passed through Krakow, where the "legionnaires" underwent basic training. Recruitment took place in accordance with the directives and instructions of the OUN. Specialized training was already taking place in various camps both on the territory of the governor-general (Kamancha, Barvinok, Krynytsya, Dukla, Zakopane) and in Germany (Brandenburg) - where those who were supposed to undergo sabotage training were initially sent. In the camps on the territory of the General Government, the "legionnaires" were disguised as representatives of the Labor Service ("Arbeitsdinst").
According to the information given in the work of the Institute of History of the Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, there were about 50 “cadets” in the Barvinok camp, about 100 in Krinitsy, more than 100 people were sent to Brandenburg to train in sabotage. Saboteurs were trained in minecraft, sabotage in transport and communications. Their training was completed earlier than the main group.
After training in the camps, the main part of the Nachtigal was transferred to Brandenburg, where he began to undergo combat coordination and training in joint operations with the 1st battalion of the Brandenburg 800 regiment, under whose leadership he was to operate on the territory of the USSR. Major Friedrich Wilhelm Heinz (German Friedrich Wilhelm Heinz) exercised general leadership as commander of the 1st battalion of the Brandenburg 800 regiment, Lieutenant Hans-Albrecht Herzner (German Hans Albrecht Herzner) was the direct German commander, the highest Ukrainian commander was Roman Shukhevych (in the sources of the OUN, his position is indicated as “political educator”), coordination between the Ukrainian unit and the German leadership lay with Lieutenant Theodore Oberlander. By the beginning of the summer of 1941, Nachtigal was trained and equipped command staff, which was almost entirely represented by the Germans. The uniform was standard for parts of the Wehrmacht.
Operation Barbarossa
The sabotage detachments of the "Ukrainian Legion" who graduated by the end of May were transferred to the territory of the USSR by mid-June 1941. They were tasked with mining military installations, sabotage in transport, damage to means and communication lines. The main part of the battalion, which was subordinate to the 1st battalion of the Brandenburg-800 regiment, was transferred to the offensive line in the Przemysl region by June 21, 1941, it was to carry out sabotage and combat operations in the forward echelon of the 1st Mountain Division XXXXIV Army Corps 6 -th Army of the Army Group "South". On June 22, 1941, at 3 o'clock in the morning, the 1st battalion and Nachtigal crossed the border onto the river. San and began actions to overcome the border UR, in which the Nachtigall itself was not involved. After breaking through the Soviet defense line, the unit advanced in the direction of Lvov. On June 28, the “Combat Unit Heinz” (German: Kampfgruppe Heinz) is 10 kilometers from the defense line of Lvov, where the Ukrainian part of the unit receives information about executions in Lvov prisons (according to the head of the prison department of the NKVD of the Ukrainian SSR, before leaving Lvov by the NKVD 2464 prisoners were shot in prisons, convicted mainly on political charges.). city of Lviv was abandoned Soviet troops June 26, 1941. The date of entry of the combat group into Lvov itself is indicated by the commander of the 1st battalion, Heinz, as "the night of June 29" - while in various publications of the post-war OUN, the date of entry is indicated on June 30 - although even J. Stetsko himself indicates that he and S .Bandera were in Lvov already on June 29 and the radio station was already busy.
In Lvov, the soldiers of both units guarded the key points of the city - a power station, a railway station, a radio station, water towers and other objects. At the same time, an advanced marching group of the OUN (b) headed by Y. Stetsko appeared in Lvov, which on June 30 proclaimed the creation of the “Ukrainian State of the allied Great Germany, headed by the leader S. Bandera”. With the assistance of the fighters of the battalion, who guarded the Lviv radio, the text of the "Act of the Proclamation of the Ukrainian State" was read twice on the air.
The events that took place between the entrance of the "Nachtigal" in Lviv and its relocation to Ternopil on July 7-9, in different sources have a different image. According to some sources (which coincides with the position of the OUN), from July 1, the Nachtigall fighters received a week's leave and were engaged in personal affairs while the XXXXIV Army Corps itself continued to advance with battles to the East.
July 7 "Nachtigal" began redeployment from Lviv to Ternopil - the first company departed, and 8 and 9 left the city and the remaining two. On July 9, the main part of the battalion entered Ternopil. On July 13, the battalion crossed the old Soviet-Polish border and reached Proskurov on July 14. Further through Zhmerinka, by July 16, they reached Vinnitsa.
One of the Ukrainian members of the "Nachtigal" in his autobiography, written for the Security Council of the OUN (b), indicates the events that accompanied the passage of the detachment through the territory of the Ukrainian SSR:
During our march, we saw traces of the Jewish-Bolshevik terror, this strengthened our hatred of the Jews so much that in two villages we shot all the Jews we met.
Similar events took place in several villages of the Vinnitsa region.
During a two-week vacation in the town of Yuzvin, the battalion servicemen, together with OUN marching groups, carried out active nationalist propaganda and organized a local administration. There they also learned about the arrests of OUN(b) leaders. In this situation, Shukhevych sent to the Supreme Command armed forces Wehrmacht letter in which he indicated that "as a result of the arrest of our government and leader, the legion can no longer be under the command of the German army"
On August 13, 1941, the Nachtigal received an order to relocate to Zhmerynka, where the soldiers were disarmed at the railway station (the weapons were returned at the end of September), while leaving personal weapons to the officers. After that, under the protection of the German gendarmerie, they were transported to Krakow, and then to Neuhammer (modern Sventoszow in Poland), where the battalion arrived on August 27. At the same time, according to information from the protocol of interrogation (dated December 23, 1948) of translator Yakov Kravchuk, at the beginning of September 1941, field post 11333 in the city of Zhytomyr, at the location of Sonderkommada, Shukhevych was negotiating with her boss, Captain Ferbek, about sending Nachtigal to the rear of the Soviet troops. At the end of September, these negotiations continue in Kyiv, but the Germans do not agree with such a proposal.
On October 21, 1941, the Ukrainian personnel of the Nachtigal were merged with the personnel of the Roland. The soldiers of this joint unit were asked to conclude a contract for a period of one year (from December 1, 1941 to December 1, 1942) to serve in the security police. Only 15 people refused to sign the contract, after which they were sent to labor camps. The signatories of the contract made up the 201st security police battalion and conducted anti-partisan operations on the territory of Belarus. On December 1, 1942, the one-year contract of the battalion servicemen expired, however, none of them agreed to sign a new contract. After that, the unit was disbanded, and its former soldiers and officers began to be transferred in parts to Lvov.
To My WorldLast spring, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine was submitted to a draft law on the establishment of a new national holiday in the country - the Day of the Restoration of Ukrainian Statehood, scheduled for June 30. On this day, in 1941, in Lvov, which had just been occupied by the Ukrainian Wehrmacht battalion "Nachtigal", an independent Ukrainian state was proclaimed by the activists of the "Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists" (OUN). On the same day in Lviv, Ukrainian legionnaires and OUN militants began mass executions of Jews, Poles, Russians, communists and Soviet workers. It seems that it will not be useless for both Ukrainian and Russian readers to be reminded of the events of those days.
Ukrainian nationalism as an organized ideological and political movement took shape in the lands of Poland populated by Ukrainians, as well as among Ukrainian emigration scattered all over the world, in the 1920s-1930s. In Poland, Ukrainian nationalists were most radical and did not shun terrorist methods of struggle. Back in 1923, contacts were established, which were no longer interrupted, with the intelligence services, first of Weimar, and then of Nazi Germany, from which they received comprehensive methodological and material assistance. In 1929, the "Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists" (OUN) was created. In 1939, after the capture of part of Poland by the German troops, active work was carried out on this territory to put together a military wing of the OUN. The formation of the so-called "marching groups" began - the core of the future Ukrainian national army. In cooperation with the Nazis, these detachments were soon deployed in the "Squads of Ukrainian nationalists." It was these squads that served as a mobilization base for the further formation of special battalions of the Wehrmacht intelligence service "Abwehr", staffed by Ukrainians.
“At the beginning of 1941, it became possible to make a school for two Ukrainian units, with an approximate number of up to a kuren, under the German army,” - so in the late 1950s. the leader of the Ukrainian nationalists Stepan Bandera recalled the birth of the Abwehr special battalions. The battalion, codenamed Spezialgruppe Nachtigall, staffed by OUN volunteers, was formed between March and April 1941 in the Polish city of Krynica, and then went through combat and special training in the German Neuhammer. At the same time, since April 1941, the Abwehr battalion Roland (Organization Rolland), also staffed by Ukrainians, was formed in Vienna.
The word "Nachtigall" in German means a harmless nightingale. In modern Ukrainian historiography, there is an idyllic legend that German officers gave this name, imbued with sad melodic Ukrainian songs that the soldiers of the training camp sang in the evenings. It should be noted that the “OUN” themselves were reluctant to use the German names of their formations, preferring their own term “Squads of Ukrainian Nationalists” (DUN). The same battalion "Nachtigal" in the documents of the OUN was called "Northern Kuren DUN". The leader of the Ukrainian nationalists S. Bandera never mentions a German name in his long essay on the OUN-UPA military organization and its leader R. Shukhevych. The “innate” ambivalence of the Ukrainian formations of the Wehrmacht is fully present in the modern scientific and journalistic field in Ukraine, terminologically, as it were, dissociating Ukrainian nationalists from the crimes of Nazism.
There were 330 people in the Nachtigal battalion. consisting of four companies. Almost immediately, the new formation was included in the regiment special purpose Brandenburg-800, which was under the jurisdiction of the 2nd department (organization of sabotage) of the Abwehr. At the head of the battalion was a kind of triumvirate. Lieutenant Albrecht Herzner was appointed German commander, Captain Roman Shukhevych, a close ally of S. Bandera, a member of the Revolutionary Wire of the OUN (b), was appointed commander from the Ukrainian side. Bandera himself after the war called Shukhevych "one of the most significant figures in the entire history of the nationalist revolutionary liberation movement." Finally, a no less “wonderful” character became the political leader of the battalion, which will be discussed below - a specialist in Eastern Europe, Theodor Oberländer. Forming the Ukrainian national units, the Germans expected to use them, first of all, as saboteurs and scouts. In addition, the undoubted propaganda effect on the Western Ukrainian population of participation in the fight against the Red Army of the Ukrainian military personnel of the Wehrmacht was taken into account. Legionnaires were dressed in field uniform Wehrmacht, but had some distinctive features, for example, blue and yellow piping on shoulder straps and a bird silhouette on cars (due to which they were remembered by many witnesses). So, "Nachtigal" was a personnel unit of the Wehrmacht, was maintained and subordinated to the German authorities.
As part of the 1st battalion of the Brandenburg-800 special purpose regiment, on June 18, 1941, the Nachtigal and Roland battalions were transferred to the Soviet-Polish border in the city of Radymno. Before that, in a solemn ceremony, they swore allegiance to the leader of the Third Reich, vowing to fight for him "to the blood." Among the first units of the Wehrmacht, early in the morning of June 22, Nachtigal crossed the Soviet border and headed for the city of Przemysl, then crossed the San River with the task of advancing on Lvov. However, in the first days of the war, Nachtigal moved in the second echelon, remaining in the operational reserve of the German troops.
The offensive of the Wehrmacht in Western Ukraine in the summer of 1941 developed rapidly. Lutsk was taken on June 25, Rivne on June 28, Lvov on June 30, Ternopil on July 2, and Stanislav (now Ivano-Frankivsk) was taken by the Hungarian troops. By July 7-9, the Wehrmacht was already on the old Soviet border.
On the night of June 29-30, 1941, the commander of the Brandenburg-800 regiment set the task of occupying Lvov to subordinate units. The Nachtigal battalion entered the city early in the morning on June 30, without encountering resistance from the Red Army, which had already left the city. Ukrainian legionnaires, ahead of the columns of German troops by several hours, occupied some important objects, including the town hall and radio stations. The battalion divided into hundreds and fifty, established control over the main central streets of the city. At the Cathedral of St. George, the Nachtigall fighters were warmly welcomed by Metropolitan Andrei Sheptytsky, the head of the Greek Catholic (Uniate) Church.
In Ukrainian nationalist discourse, the place of “Natkhigal” is especially important due to the fact that immediately after the battalion occupied Lviv and the Lviv radio center in the building of the Lviv “Prosvita”, the creation of an independent Ukrainian state was announced. In a solemn ceremony, this was announced by the representative of the leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists - OUN (b) Stepan Bandera, Professor of Lviv University Ya. Stetsko - one of Bandera's closest supporters and a member of the supreme body of the Bandera wing of the OUN - the Revolutionary Wire, created by the latter in 1940. To a “storm of applause and tears of joy” from those present, Stetsko read out the “sacred act of proclaiming Ukrainian statehood” (“Act of the Voting of the Ukrainian State”), authored by S. Bandera.
At the same time, the composition of the Ukrainian government was announced, headed by Stetsko himself. The relevant proclamation was read out over the radio and is said to have caused a "great upsurge" among Ukrainians. On July 1, Metropolitan Sheptytsky blessed the proclaimed Ukrainian state. He hailed the German army as a liberating army.
Meanwhile, the top political leadership of the Third Reich and the command of the Wehrmacht were not aware of such an independent act of Ukrainian nationalists. The “High Assembly” limited itself to a cordial greeting from the “creator and leader of Greater Germany” Adolf Hitler. A few days later, the newly-minted Prime Minister Stetsko turned to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Nazi Germany, informing him of the accomplished "will of the Ukrainian people" and at the same time offering his services to "Greater Germany".
The Banderaites understood their relationship with Nazi Germany as a temporary and, moreover, an equal alliance to overthrow the "Bolshevik yoke" and counted on the fact that Hitler would allow them to create a more or less independent national state like Slovakia or Croatia. Ukrainian nationalists did not hide their plans to use Nazi Germany for their own purposes, primarily for the expulsion of the Bolsheviks from Ukraine. The meaning of this political action in the late 1950s. S. Bandera explained grandiloquently, trying to "slip" between two totalitarianisms - Soviet and Nazi: "When in 1941 a war broke out between two predatory, totalitarian imperialisms on Ukrainian land and for its possession, then the OUN, remembering the conclusions of Yevgeny Konovalets from the events of 1917 - 1918, gave rise to the current framework for the active performance of the Ukrainian nation in the historical arena.
The proclamation of the revival of the Ukrainian State in June 1941 and the construction of an independent public life it is evidenced that the Ukrainian people under no circumstances will renounce their rights as a master on their own land, and only respect for these sovereign rights of Ukraine by other peoples and states can serve as a platform for friendship with them.” Specifically, about the Ukrainian battalions, Bandera wrote: “By sending a detachment of the DUN to study in the German army, the OUN set its own conditions, which were accepted by those German military officials who organized the case.”
But the naive calculation of the nationalists that, by putting the Germans before the fact of creating a Ukrainian state, they would be able to achieve recognition of their rights, turned out to be a calculation. To German patrons who had long nurtured Ukrainian nationalism and planned to use it for their own purposes in the war against Soviet Union, did not like such self-will.
Stetsko was soon arrested in Lvov, and the guide (leader) of the OUN Bandera was arrested in Krakow. The latter soon ended up in the Nazi concentration camp Sachsenhausen, where he spent until September 1944, and the newly appeared Ukrainian state was abolished after only two days.
All the more valuable for modern Ukrainian historians and nationalist politicians is that brief moment when national statehood existed at least formally. Local historians are making a lot of efforts, proving that this act of independence was not a declaration and an empty phrase.
It is alleged, for example, that in June 1941, in Galicia and Volyn, which the Soviet troops and the Soviet authorities left virtually without a fight, representatives of the OUN “became almost complete masters of the majority settlements the whole region." In this sense, “Natkhigal”, who went “with fire and sword” through a number of cities in Western Ukraine, which we will discuss below, becomes, as it were, at the “pedestal” of the Ukrainian state tradition, the heir of which the current Kyiv authorities consider themselves to be. "Nathigal" is understood as a kind of advanced armed detachment of Ukrainian patriots, carrying (or at least symbolizing) the liberation of the Ukrainian people from the "Bolshevik yoke".
At the same time, it remains in the shadows or is categorically swept aside dark side the history of this unit, its function as a punitive tool, a faithful assistant to the German fascist conquerors who entered Soviet soil not at all with peaceful plans.
It is difficult to deny the documented facts that will be given below, but interpretations come into play.
The Ukrainian side, often without denying the very participation of "Nahigal" in punitive actions, justifies them with understandable motives: they say, the legionnaires took revenge on them for a million (according to Ukrainian historians and publicists), allegedly killed or deported by the Bolsheviks Western Ukrainians in 1939 - 1941. “Thousands” of prisoners from the prisons of Galicia and Lvov, whom the NKVD officers allegedly “shot and threw grenades” right in front of German occupation. The confrontation of historians has long gone beyond the scope of an academic dispute and it has quite specific victims: for example, in 1999, the well-known historian Professor V. Maslovsky, who had recently published a book on this topic, was killed in the entrance of his own house.
Whatever ideals the Ukrainian nationalists were guided by, in reality their embodiment turned into loyal service to the occupiers and active complicity in numerous crimes against the civilian population and the party and Soviet activists of Western Ukrainian cities. The most famous of them was the Lvov pogrom, which took place in late June - early July 1941. This crime against humanity, in which the Nachtigall fighters took an active part, was one of the first acts of mass extermination of civilians in the occupied territory of the Soviet Union.
While in the building of the Lviv "Prosvita" there were impromptu celebrations of the independence of Ukraine, in parallel with them and, as if illustrating the nature of the new state, terrible and bloody events took place. The “Nachtigal” fighters, together with OUN activists (“Ukrainian militia”) who came out of the underground and detachments of auxiliary police hastily created by the Germans, and simply residents of Lviv, began an unprecedented cruelty cleansing of the city from Jews, Soviet activists and representatives of the Polish intelligentsia, taking revenge on the innocent people for the corpses of Ukrainian activists found in the abandoned prisons of the NKVD. Collective responsibility for the executions was assigned to Lvov Jews who had nothing to do with them. In a few days - from June 30 to July 2 - only about 4 thousand Jews were killed in Lvov. In addition, it was killed big number citizens of Russian and Polish nationalities.
The issue of the Holocaust is an international issue and it is impossible to simply silence it. In modern Ukraine, politicians and historians have long chosen the path of complete denial of everything that can link the OUN movement and the Holocaust. At one time, many Israelis were struck by the statement of President of Ukraine V. Yushchenko that today not a single document has been found proving the participation of Ukrainian nationalists in the extermination of Jews. At best, compromising materials in Ukraine are called "fabricated by the KGB" The current Ukrainian nationalists continue this tradition.
Meanwhile, the recollections of witnesses, primarily the victims of the pogroms in Lvov in the summer of 1941, are more than enough to formulate an accusation of crimes that do not have a statute of limitations.
According to a resident of Lviv, T. Sulim, who witnessed the massacres, "there was no street in the city where the corpses of people would not lie." “Inhuman screams,” recalled one of the surviving Jews, “broken heads, disfigured bodies and beaten faces, covered in blood mixed with dirt, aroused the bloodthirsty instincts of the mob, which howled with pleasure. Women and old people, who were lying on the ground almost breathless, were poked with sticks and dragged along the ground.
The Lvov prison Brigidki became the epicenter of the extermination of Jews. According to Kurt Levin, a former resident of Lvov, he and his father, Rabbi Ezekiel Levin, were driven to Brigidki, where Ukrainians and Germans brutally beat Jews. K. Levin especially remembered one Ukrainian. He beat the Jews with an iron stick. “With each blow, pieces of skin flew up into the air, sometimes an ear or an eye. When the stick broke, he found a huge charred club and broke the skull of the first Jew who came under his arm with it. The brains scattered in all directions and fell on Levin's face and his clothes ...
The pogroms were accompanied by cruel abuse of defenseless people. Many recalled the so-called "knee marches" when Jews were forced to crawl to a prison or place of execution. Washing pavements and entrances with tongues was also widespread. The women were stripped naked and driven through the streets. In such bullying, one can see not a very high flight of fancy, but an extreme degree of bitterness of the executioners. Numerous photographic evidence of these abuses have survived to this day.
Although the pogroms in Lvov these days have taken on a massive character, there is a lot of evidence of the active and organized participation in them of the legionnaires of Natkhigal. Immediately after the arrival of the Nachtigal battalion in Lviv, about 80 Ukrainian legionnaires were allocated from its composition. As the former battalion fighter G. Melnik recalled, a few days later they returned to the location of the unit and said that they had arrested and shot many local residents. Two of the legionnaires, by the name of Lushchik and Pankiv, personally told Melnik that they had taken Polish scientists to the Vuletskaya Gora in Lvov and shot them. Another former legionnaire, J. Spital, recalled how indoors at home on the street. Drohomanov (former Mokhnatsky), 22 housed a kind of "detention house", in which the soldiers of "Nachtigal" shot people of different nationalities every night. One night, a large group of detainees were thrown from the balcony of the second floor, and then shot to death.
Witness Makarukha, who had been a Soviet worker before the war, was arrested, taken to the police building, stripped naked, and subjected to severe torture. The commander of the battalion, Shukhevych, personally participated in his interrogation, demanding that Makarukha extradite the communists. These days, while in prison, Makarukha saw daily how Ukrainian nationalists in German uniforms, with a trident on their chests and
yellow-blue stripes on shoulder straps, and the Germans selected groups of 10-15 people in prison, who were then shot. He was also shot, but, wounded, he was able to get out of the pit with corpses and hide. One of the following days, he saw a soldier in a German uniform grab a small Jewish child by the legs, hit his head against the wall of the house, and in this way killed him.
Witness Hübner, who was a serviceman of the construction battalion of the Air Force stationed at that time in Lvov, observed from the window of the washroom of his unit the carnage in the fire station. About 30 people, aged from 17 to 51, were driven individually through the Nazis in the direction of the tower of this depot. At the same time, they were so cruelly tortured that most of them did not reach the door of the tower, but fell to the ground dead. The few who made it to the tower were then thrown out of the top windows of the tower. In those cases when even after the fall they remained alive, they were finished off. The fact that the killers were servicemen of the Nachtigall unit, the witness learned from the fact that in the unit only commands were given in German, and they spoke Ukrainian among themselves.
Having “successfully” completed the task in Lvov, on July 7, 1941, the Nachtigal battalion moved to Ternopil and Grimailov. Then he spent two weeks in Vinnitsa. After that, a special team of legionnaires took part in executions in the city of Satanov, then in Yuzvin. For some time, teams from the battalion guarded Soviet prisoners of war, identifying commissars and Jews from among them along the way and shooting them. At the same time, both in Lvov and in Satanov, and other places, the leadership of the battalion (T. Oberlender, R. Shukhevych) had in advance lists of persons to be destroyed, not only adults, but also children.
A couple of times the legionnaires had to face in battle with the regular units of the Red Army. So, near the city of Brailov, "Nakhtigal" was seriously battered by Soviet troops. However, his main "front" was far from the front line.
It should be especially emphasized that the Jewish pogroms in Lvov were not an accidental phenomenon, an "excess of perpetrators", as they say now. Anti-Semitism is one of the pillars of the OUN ideology, deeply rooted and ideologically substantiated by emigre figures of Ukrainian nationalism in the 1920s and 1930s. The same Yaroslav Stetsko, elected head of the Ukrainian government in Lvov, in 1939, wrote in one of his articles in the Canadian journal Novy Put: Ukrainians were “the first in Europe to understand the corrupting activity of the Jews,” and dissociated themselves from the Jews centuries ago, preserving “ purity of their spirituality and culture. Nationalists considered Jewry and Bolshevism to be representatives of a single Jewish communist conspiracy. And in the 17th paragraph of the resolution of the 2nd Great Council of the OUN, held on the eve of the Great Patriotic War, in April 1941, directly stated: "The Jews in the USSR are the most devoted support of the ruling Bolshevik regime and the vanguard of Moscow imperialism in Ukraine." Therefore, they were declared "enemies of the Ukrainian nation." And in early July 1941, the OUN published an appeal with the words: “People! Know! Moscow, Poland, Magyars, Jews are your enemies. Destroy them. Poles, Jews, Communists - destroy without mercy.
The position of the local churches regarding the mass extermination of the Jews should be emphasized. Although in some places the priests tried to stop the pogroms that had already begun, and later hid the Jews - in their homes or in church institutions - most of the clergy came out in support of the Nazi "Final Solution". One priest of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Church addressed the flock with the following sermon: “I beg you: do not give a single piece of bread to a Jew! Don't give him a drop of water! Don't give him shelter! Anyone who knows what
a Jew is hiding somewhere, he is obliged to find him and hand him over to the Germans. There must be no trace left of the Jews. We must wipe them off the face of the earth. Only when the last Jew disappears will we win the war!”
In modern Ukrainian literature, the events in Lvov are rather evasive: they say that Ukrainian battalions really ruled the city for some time, pogroms and massacres of Jews and Poles took place, but Ukrainian independence did not last long at all and the responsibility for this lies with the German administration, which replaced the Ukrainian one. “And in general,” writes R. Chastiy, one of Bandera’s apologists, “it is possible that the Lviv pogroms were initiated by the Germans themselves. It is also possible that no Ukrainian military took part in them. And the legend about their participation was created by the Nazis themselves at a time when relations with Ukrainian nationalists finally deteriorated ... ". It turns out that the Nazis “invented” numerous witnesses who, even decades later, shudderedly recalled those days, and numerous volunteer assistants to the executioners with yellow-blue and white bandages on their sleeves - Ukrainian “policemen” and “OUN” members.
Although in Lvov and other Western Ukrainian cities, the Ukrainian legionnaires of the Nachtigall and Nazi German invaders they did what is called a common cause, after the dissolution of the Ukrainian government, the Nazis did not dare to keep the Ukrainian battalions staffed by OUN activists for a long time. As one of the leaders of the Abwehr, P. Leverkün, recalled, “there was a gradual change in the mood of his soldiers and officers ... were forced to disband. Already on August 10, 1941, Roland was disbanded. And on August 13, Nachtigal was also recalled to the rear. It was sent to the Neuhammer camps for "additional training" but was soon disbanded. The personnel were invited to join the new police battalion without any “independent frivolities”, So in Frankfurt an der Oder the 201st police battalion was formed (commander E. Pobigushchiy, his deputy R. Shukhevych, who was thrown into the fight against unfolding partisan movement in Belarus, and there he more than once “distinguished himself” like the Lvov “exploits” ...
On the whole, Ukrainian nationalist historians are pleased with the “combat experience” gained by the fighters of the Nachtigall and Roland, and then the police battalion in the cities and forests of Western Ukraine and Belarus: later, many of them joined the ranks of the Ukrainian rebel army(UPA), bringing with him "knowledge of the organization, strategy and tactics of guerrilla warfare." The 201st battalion accounted for dozens of burned Belarusian farms and villages, as well as the Volyn village of Kortelisy, where 2.8 thousand inhabitants were shot, accused of having links with partisans. It is known that the commander of the battalion Pobigushchiy and his deputy Shukhevych were marked for their activities with "iron crosses".
Battalions "Nachtigal" and "Roland", as well as their reincarnation - the 201st police battalion - became only the first swallows in a huge list of Ukrainian police and auxiliary units created by the Nazis from Ukrainian collaborators. It is known, for example, that by the end of 1943 almost 45 Ukrainian auxiliary police battalions were formed on the territory of the Reichskommissariat "Ukraine". In other occupied territories of the USSR, another 13 battalions of Ukrainians were created, and on the territory of the Polish Governor General - another 8. Their "combat activity", mainly in Belarus and Ukraine, is a chain of war crimes, including the tragically famous Khatyn . As you know, there were dozens, if not hundreds, of such Khatyns.
The history of "Nachtigal" and the pogroms in Lvov was not known to the general public for a long time. More precisely, it is known, but not all. Already in the first months of the Great Patriotic War, the atrocities of the invaders in Lviv were made public to the whole world. The note of the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs dated January 6, 1942, which later became an official document of the prosecution at the Nuremberg trials, said: “On June 30, the Nazi bandits entered the city of Lvov and the next day staged a massacre under the slogan “beat the Jews and Poles.” After killing hundreds of people, the Nazi bandits staged an "exhibition" of the dead in the building of the passage. Mutilated corpses, mostly women, were piled against the walls of houses.
In the first place of this horrific "exhibition" was placed the corpse of a woman, to whom her child was nailed with a bayonet. However, for a long time, the Soviet authorities did not have the details of who exactly committed these massive crimes against humanity. The note of the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs mentions "Hitler bandits", "Gestapo". Perhaps the role of Ukrainian nationalists in this massacre would have remained in the shadows if big politics had not intervened in the matter after the war.
The fact is that in post-war West Germany, the former political leader of the Nachtigal Battalion, Theodor Oberländer, occupied a prominent place on the political scene. In 1953 - 1960. he held an important position at that time in the government of K. Adenauer - Minister for Refugees, Displaced Persons and War Victims. It is clear that among his wards, which included, first of all, people living in the territories seized from Germany, there were few people who sympathized with the Soviet Union. The Oberländer Ministry has become a stronghold of the ultra-right and revanchist forces in the FRG.
In the late 1950s in the neighboring GDR, an investigation was initiated in absentia into the facts of war crimes committed by Oberländer personally and by military units subordinate to him. In 1959, a trial in absentia took place over him, which sentenced former leader"Nathigal" to life imprisonment. He was charged with, among other things, just the execution of several thousand Jews and Poles after the occupation of Lvov in July 1941. There is evidence that later (after the disbandment of Nachtigall, his career in the Wehrmacht went up) Oberländer personally took part in torture and executions, in particular, he personally killed 15 people in a prison in Pyatigorsk in 1942. In Germany, in response, a pre-trial check began, which, as expected, did not find corpus delicti in Oberländer's actions, just as the facts did not impress the investigators, made public by witnesses and former servicemen of the battalion at a press conference held in Moscow on April 5, 1960 in Moscow about the atrocities of the Natkhigal battalion in Lvov and its environs (the Ukrainian cities of Zolochiv, Satanov, Yuzvin, etc.)
Nevertheless, political career Oberlander came to an end and he was forced to submit his resignation.
The Oberländer case gave rise to a wide discussion in both Germany and in the USSR and forced the public to recall his past "merits". Oberländer came to the position of the head of Nathigal from the university department: in 1941 he served as dean of the Faculty of Law and Social and Political Sciences of the Karl-Ferdinand University in Prague and was considered an expert in the field Agriculture and Eastern European Law, had two doctorates.
True, he turned all his knowledge base to very specific goals: Oberländer became one of the inspirers of the ethnic concept of the “new order” in Eastern Europe (work “Struggle at the forefront”, 1937), holding the opinion that the economic decline in Germany is the result of actions of "Eastern European Jewry", which is the agent of the Comintern. The theory of overpopulation as a source social problems Germany has become one of the most important justifications for the mass extermination of the population in the territories intended for the resettlement of Germans in the East. So, this convinced Nazi with serious theoretical background as the political leader of the Nachtigal battalion turned out to be, as they say, in his place.
The short but turbulent history of the Ukrainian Nachtigall Battalion is one of the cornerstones of the history of Ukrainian nationalism during World War II. It is from the "Nachtigal" that the fierce armed struggle of Ukrainian nationalists on the territory of Western Ukraine originates, which continued almost until the mid-1950s. The leaders of Nachtigall today are at the head of the pantheon of Ukrainian heroes. Those who remembered the war are leaving, and the aggressive pressure of the OUN lobby forms the image of the OUN-UPA as the bearer of the ideas of humanism and democracy, and its participants as sacrificial and noble fighters. R. Shukhevych was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of Ukraine in 2007.
The lessons of history, which did not benefit the Kiev authorities, have now brought Ukraine to the brink of disaster - military, political, economic and ideological.
Alexander ISAKOV
Special unit "Nachtigal"(German Nachtigall(nightingale)) - a detachment, consisting mainly of members and supporters of the OUN (b), acting together with the German Nazis during World War II.
Basic information
At various times, the group "North" of the Druzhina of Ukrainian Nationalists was also called, "Ukrainian Legion. S. Bandera ", battalion" Nachtigall ".
It was formed and trained by the Abwehr for operations together with the 1st battalion of the sabotage unit "Brandenburg 800" (German. Lehrregiment "Brandenburg" z.b.V. 800 ) in Operation Barbarossa on the territory of the Ukrainian SSR.
World War II and preparations for an attack on the USSR
Since the spring of 1939, the Abwehr has been actively training and educating OUN militants in order to use them in the Polish campaign. The rapid advance of the German troops in September 1939 reduced their actions to separate episodic actions. On September 12, 1939 (shortly before the fall of Warsaw), questions regarding Poland and the ethnic Ukrainian population of Poland were discussed at a special meeting on Hitler's train.
According to Hitler's plans, on the border with the USSR it was necessary to create "laying states" between "Asia" and the "West" - loyal to the Third Reich Ukraine (on the territory of Galicia and Volhynia) and Lithuania. Based on the political instructions of Ribbentrop, Keitel formulated the task for Canaris: "You, Canaris, must organize an uprising with the help of Ukrainian organizations working with you and having the same goals, namely Poles and Jews." Ribbentrop, specifying the forms of the uprising, specifically pointed out the need to exterminate the Poles and Jews. Under the "Ukrainian organizations" meant the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists. The result of these instructions is the so-called "Memorandum of Canaris of September 12, 1939", presented in the materials of the Nuremberg Tribunal as document 3047-ps).
From the OUN (b), centurion Roman Shukhevych was appointed commander of the Nachtigal kuren. During the "Operation Barbarossa" battalion "Nachtigal", where Shukhevych, in the rank of Hauptmann (captain), served as Ukrainian deputy commander, together with German troops took part in the invasion of the territory of Ukraine.
Events in Lviv
On June 22, 1941, at 3 o'clock in the morning, the 1st battalion and Nachtigal crossed the border onto the river. San and began actions to overcome the border fortified area, in which the Nachtigall itself was not involved. After breaking through the Soviet defense line, the unit advanced in the direction of Lvov. Lviv was abandoned by the Soviet troops on June 26, 1941.
On the night of June 29-30, 1941, the battalion was the first to enter Lvov. The date of entry of the combat group into Lvov itself is indicated by the commander of the 1st battalion, Heinz, as "night of June 29"- while in various publications of the post-war OUN, the entry date is June 30 - although even J. Stetsko himself points out that he and S. Bandera were already in Lviv on June 29, and the radio station was already busy. .
In Lvov, the soldiers of both units guarded the key points of the city - a power station, a railway station, a radio station, water towers and other objects.
Discussion about documentary evidence of the crimes of "Nachtigal"
According to representatives of the Israeli Yad Vashem memorial complex, its archives contain a collection of documents obtained from German and Soviet sources that indicate the involvement of Ukrainian nationalists in punitive operations against the Jewish population of Lviv in the summer of 1941. According to Yad Vashem, members of the Einsatzgruppe C, German soldiers and, generally speaking, without specification, "Ukrainian nationalists" took part in the extermination of the Jews.
“We have a whole dossier, from which it follows that Shukhevych was one of those involved in the massacres. Until that time, the Ukrainian side has not asked us to hand over these documents. If such a request is received, I think we will satisfy it, ”Yosef (Tomi) Lapid, head of the Yad Vashem memorial complex in Jerusalem, said in an interview with the Deutsche Welle radio station.
After a visit to Israel on February 27, 2008 by a delegation of the Ukrainian Institute of National Remembrance in order to verify this information, the adviser to the head of the SBU, candidate of historical sciences Vladimir Vyatrovich stated that there were no documents in the archives of the memorial complex that would confirm the involvement of Roman Shukhevych in the murders of Jews in Ukraine during World War II . According to him, two small folders with copies of documents were handed over to the Ukrainian side.
The first of the folders contained records of the KGB interrogation of one of the UPA officers, Luka Pavlyshyn, which contained only general phrases, as well as more detailed testimony of Yaroslav Shpital, which had been published in the Soviet propaganda brochure "Oberländer's Bloody Crimes" back in 1960 and had already been known to historians.
The second folder contained the testimony of Grigory Melnyk, a former Nachtigall soldier, also previously published in this pamphlet. Documents found in the archives of the SBU allegedly testify that Hryhoriy Melnyk was recruited by the KGB to take part in the trial. According to instructions from Moscow, he should have been "prepared for interrogation" using "articles published in the press about the crimes of Nachtigall."
It was these testimonies that were used as the main ones at the trial in the GDR, the purpose of which was to compromise one of the German commanders of the Nachtigall, Theodor Oberlander.
In an interview given by representatives of Yad Vashem in response to Viatrovych's statement, the following was said:
“The statement of Vladimir Vyatrovich, released the day before yesterday, sins against the truth.
Continuing the interview, representatives of Yad Vashem say that Yosef (Tomi) Lapid, the head of the Jerusalem memorial complex Yad Vashem, relied on scientific research in his statement, indicating a deep and intense connection between the Nachtigall battalion, led by Roman Shukhevych and the German authorities, and also a link between the Nachtigall Battalion under Shukhevych and the pogrom in Lvov in July 1941, which claimed the lives of approximately 4,000 Jews.
Lapid also relied on documents available in the archive concerning the Nachtigall Battalion and Roman Shukhevych. Copies of these documents were handed over to the Ukrainian delegation last week.” Some feel that the evidence presented in these documents is insufficient.
Israeli journalist Nathan Gross served for twenty years as a member of the Righteous Among the Nations in the Tel Aviv branch of Yad Vashem. Gross explains Yad Vashem's position towards Ukrainian nationalists using the example of Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky, who, supporting the OUN-UPA, saved several hundred Jews in Lvov from the hands of the Nazis:
At least 20 meetings were devoted to the “Sheptytsky case”… Rav Kahane wept, begging the members of the commission to confer on the Metropolitan the title of Righteous, and I fought like a lion, but it did not help. The rabbi was told that no one doubts the facts, the story touches the heart, but still the majority of the council members are against it.
I think it was a political decision. In my opinion, Yad Vashem was afraid of the reaction of the Jewish world to the awarding of the title to a Ukrainian nationalist. Usually, not those who survived the Holocaust sit in the commission, but those who know it only from numerous testimonies…".
Some Polish historians also point out that "Ukrainian nationalists" were involved in the killings and repressions against the Jewish and Polish population, which began immediately after the entry of the Nachtigall battalion into Lviv.
The "Encyclopedia of the Holocaust" also notes that after the withdrawal from Lviv, the "Nachtigal" battalion staged Jewish pogroms in Zolochiv and Ternopil.
Notes
- S. Lenkavsky Friendships of Ukrainian nationalists in 1941-42 Munich 1953.
- IMT vol 3. p. 21 http://www.holocaust-history.org/works/imt/03/htm/t021.htm
- Martin Broszat's Nationalsozialistische Polenpolitik 1939-1945 (Stuttgart, 1961).
- IMT vol 2. p. 478 http://www.holocaust-history.org/works/imt/02/htm/t478.htm
- IMT vol 2. p. 448 http://www.holocaust-history.org/works/imt/02/htm/t448.htm
- http://www.friedrich-wilhelm-heinz.de/index2.html
- OUN in 1941 Rots: Documents: In 2 hours Institute of History of Ukraine NAS of Ukraine K. 2006 ISBN 966-02-2535-0 p.420
Hitler's spy machine. Military and political intelligence of the Third Reich. 1933–1945 Jorgensen Christer
Battalion "Nachtigal"
Battalion "Nachtigal"
In the autumn of 1940, with a lull on the Western Front due to uncertainty over Operation Zeleve (Sea Lion), the OKB/OKH began to develop a plan for an invasion of the USSR. In the winter of 1940/41, a new training camp was set up at Neuhammer, near Legnica. Partisan agents were recruited from the OUN and UPA detachments of Stepan Bandera, and they were led by the outstanding Ukrainian commander Skonprynka. Another source of replenishment was the Ukrainian composition of the Polish units, who went over to the side of the Germans during their invasion of Poland. The training course was particularly rigorous, and Skonprynka tirelessly emphasized that he was preparing soldiers for the liberation of the occupied homeland. The German command of the unit was represented by Lieutenant Albrecht Herzner and Professor T. Oberländer. The Abwehr named the division, in which many sang well, "Nachtigal", that is, "Nightingale". The name is beautiful, but not the case.
In June 1941, Nachtigal was attached to units special purpose. On June 29-30, having heard about the planned reprisal against compatriots in the Lvov NKVD prison, Nachtigal entered the battle until the Germans approached and held out for several hours. Like the Lithuanians, the Ukrainians naively believed that the Germans would grant independence to their country immediately after the expulsion of the Soviets.
They first announced the creation of an independent Ukraine when they seized a radio station in Lvov. The Germans immediately refuted this statement and reported that Western Ukraine was included in the General Government (what was left of Poland. - Ed.) Hans Frank. Morale in all Ukrainian units (created by the Germans), especially in Nachtigall, dropped noticeably, and the Germans decided to disband them.
An angry Oberländer, an expert on Ukraine and an ardent supporter of its independence, obtained an audience with Hitler and expressed displeasure at such a dismissive attitude towards Germany's valuable ally in the war against Stalin. The Fuhrer was not impressed by his arguments. Demonstrating ignorance and astounding stupidity, he said, “You don't understand what you're saying. Russia is our Africa, and Russians are our Negroes.” Struck by this answer, the professor returned to report to the commander of the Brandenburg regiment and blurted out in a fit of temper: "This is Hitler's concept, and with such a concept we will lose the war." Oberländer was not mistaken in his prediction.
Peter Vershigora, leader of the Soviet Ukrainian partisans and mortal enemy of both Germans and Ukrainian nationalists. Commanded thousands of partisans in Ukraine
At first, the only thing that saved the Germans in the East was that Stalin so turned the Ukrainians against him by his actions - ruinous economic policy, mass repressions and deportations - that they were ready to serve the Germans even after the events of 1941. In the end, choosing between two evils, Ukrainians , like the peoples of the Baltic states (some of those and others. - Ed.), preferred the one that they did not know. Surprisingly, even a year later, 200-250 thousand Ukrainians served in the ranks of German army and the SS (defending their common homeland, the USSR, 1,377,400 Ukrainians died in the ranks of the Soviet armed forces (including those tortured in captivity and other demographic losses). - Ed.). As for the Balts, even after three years of humiliation and insults, they rushed in 1944 to help the SS units that defended their countries from the advancing Red Army (including from the 8th Estonian Rifle Corps and other formations. - Ed.).
Ukrainians warmly greet their German liberators from the "Stalinist yoke" in August 1941. Their enthusiasm soon faded due to Hitler's colonial policy
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First, we present data on the organization of these formations in the system of the Nazi Abwehr.
Stepan Bandera wrote: "At the beginning of 1941, it became possible to create a school for two Ukrainian units, approximately up to a kuren, under the German army." Here, Bandera noted that "military training sessions" were performed by OUN-Bandera R. Shukhevych, D. Gritsay-Perebiynis and O. Gasin-Lytsar. It is quite well known that the special Abwehr battalion "Nachtigal" ("Nightingale", "Night Bird") named after S. Bandera was formed in March-April in 1941 from Bandera. The formation underwent military training in Neuhammer as part of the 1st battalion of the Brandenburg-800 special forces regiment, which was subordinate to Abwehr-2 (the Abwehr department, which was engaged in sabotage in the enemy camp). The political leader of the battalion was Theodor Oberländer (a well-known German figure who dealt with the Germans of the East, Oberführer SS), the commander of the battalion on the part of the Germans was Lieutenant Albrecht Herzner, the commander of the battalion on the part of the Ukrainians was Captain Roman Shukhevych.
The special battalion of the Abwehr "Roland" named after E. Konovalets and S. Petlyura was formed in April 1941 from Bandera, Melnikov, Petliurists and Hetmans and underwent military training in Saubersdorf near Vienna under the leadership of the Wehrkreiskommando XVII of Vienna, which was also subordinate to special formation of the Abwehr "Brandenburg-800", but the battalion was intended for military operations in the southern direction of the Eastern Front. Its leaders were: Riko Yary from the German side and Major Evgen Pobigushchiy ("Ren") - from the Ukrainian side. In essence, Major Pobiguschiy was the leader of the battalion, because R. Yariy, as a member of the OUN-Bandera wire and at the same time a resident of the Abwehr in the same OUN, constantly carried out other assignments.
Before talking about those so-called "Ukrainian" special battalions, it is necessary to give a short information about the Abwehr "Brandenburg-800" formation, which they were part of, and about the "special" purpose of these formations (which is often hidden by nationalist authors) . And the point is this. In the book of the German General B. Müller-Gillebrand "Land Army of Germany. 1933-1945" it is noted: "The Brandenburg-800 division was formed on September 21 in 1943 on the basis of the deployment of units of the 800th Special Purpose Construction Training Regiment Brandenburg, which was a special unit that was at the disposal of the 2nd Directorate of the Abwehr of the OKW (Intelligence and Counterintelligence Service of the OKW).However, the deployment of the division was delayed.In October in 1944, it was reorganized into the brandenburg motorized division.
Here, as we see, the author goes around sharp corners and the division is presented as an ordinary military formation, moreover, a "construction", "training" and at the same time "special unit for special purposes". What did the Abwehr saboteurs of the 2nd division build, if the regiment, and then the division, was called "construction"? Nothing. They were causing destruction, sabotage and massacres!
Other authors reveal the truth. It turns out that the special purpose regiment "Brandenburg-800" and the special purpose division "Brandenburg" were "construction" and "training" only for disguise. In fact, these formations were special units of the Abwehr-2 (sabotage in the camp of the enemy) only because they carried out special assignments at the front and in the immediate rear of the enemy: organized and carried out sabotage, cleared entire areas of the enemy from possible and impossible preparations for sabotage against Germany. Detachments of this formation caused panic and chaos in the area of action. Their actions were also intended against partisan detachments and formations that carried out frequent and massive sabotage in the rear of the Nazi troops.
Abwehr historiographer Gert Buchgait testifies that during the "Eastern campaign" of the Nazis, only one front-line intelligence, subordinate to the first department (Abwehr-1) of the Abwehr administration at the headquarters of the Wehrmacht High Command (OKW), was "neutralized", that is, liquidated, 20 thousand Soviet citizens. Buchgait does not name such an action of the 2nd department of the Abwehr, which was directly involved in sabotage and punitive actions in the state of the enemy and which, in fact, belonged to the special forces "Brandenburg-800" and "Brandenburg", and they, in turn, - such special -battalions like "Nachtigal" and "Roland".
Another researcher, the Hungarian historian and publicist Julius Mader, who conducted a rather voluminous analysis of many studies of the actions of the Abwehr during the last war, sheds light in the same direction: , insisting on the speedy destruction of resistance groups and partisan detachments.The Abwehr and its special unit "Brandenburg-800" operated in 13 European countries.Only in 12 of them (not counting the USSR) were Nazi invaders killed during hostilities, shot and tortured in prisons more than 1 277 750. Most of these victims should be attributed to the killers from the Abwehr and their professional "partisan hunters". Soviet people? So far not counted. I think that future historians will still calculate these victims.
Thus, we will make some clarifications and summarize. The formation of the special purpose "Brandenburg-800" arose even before the war of Nazi Germany against the Soviet Union. At first it was a special battalion, which in 1940 became the Brandenburg-800 Special Purpose Regiment, and then in 1943 the Brandenburg Division. It was not an ordinary army unit, but a special association of saboteurs, punishers, bashi-bazouks, formed from condottieres of non-German nationalities, from those countries against which the Nazis were preparing aggression. So, the 1st battalion, stationed in Brandenburg (whose name is given to the entire regiment and special forces division), was formed from representatives of the peoples of Eastern Europe (mainly the territories of the USSR) and was intended for war in the "eastern direction" (it was the battalion "Nachtigal" was assigned for training in Neuhammer and the attack on Lvov); The 2nd battalion was stationed in Düren (Rhine region) and consisted of Alsatians, French traitors, Belgians and Dutch; The 3rd battalion was stationed in Baden (near Vienna) and intended for operations in the south, in the countries of South-Eastern Europe (the Roland special battalion was assigned to it). At the same time, companies, battalions, and then regiments of this formation significantly, or even several times, exceeded the usual manning standards in their numbers.
Consequently, "Nachtigal" and "Roland" were not just ordinary military formations within the Wehrmacht (nationalists are still trying to call them "Squads of Ukrainian Nationalists" (DUN), but special-purpose Abwehr formations - to carry out sabotage and punitive actions in the camp for this purpose, they underwent military training in special schools to ensure the completion of tasks. E. Pobigushchiy, head of the Roland battalion, and then the Schutzmannschaft battalion, in his memoirs notes that the task of the detachment was "to look for the developments of Soviet units and thus provide rear services." And what is "providing rear" is well known, because it meant liquidating those "bookmarks"!
Both formations, as almost all nationalist authors testify, were the realization of the long-standing dream of the OUN leaders to form professional military units with the help of the Nazis and turn them into the basis of their future nationalist armed forces. This dream, as you know, came true, but unsuccessfully and not as intended.
Actions of "Nachtigal" and "Roland"
This question is complicated because the Abwehr, as you know, did not advertise their actions. It is known that on June 30, 1941, the special battalion "Nachtigal" entered Lviv together with the 1st battalion of the special purpose regiment "Brandenburg-800". The Gestapo and SB units (imperial security services) have not yet arrived in the city, and therefore internal order was assigned to the military commandant General Renz and his field commandant's office. This gave grounds to Polish and Soviet publicists and historians in the 1950s and 1970s to accuse the Brandenburgers and Nachtigallers of punitive actions during the first days of the occupation of Lviv. As the well-known scientist and public figure of the NIR A. Norden testified at a press conference in Berlin on October 22, 1959, regarding the investigation of the crime of the Bonn Minister T. in particular, the Tamara-1 and Tamara-2 detachments in Chechnya), from July 1 to July 6, 1941, the Abwehrs from the Nachtigall, controlled by Oberlander-Herzner-Shukhevych, together with the Fireburgers, Feljandarmes and Bohvkars of the regional executive of the OUN- b, killed 3,000 people in Lvov, mostly Soviet activists, Jews and Poles, among them over 70 famous scientists and cultural figures.
It is believed that in the near future all this will be fully investigated, despite the former "fog" and "smoke screen", both in Polish and Soviet literature, and in Ukrainian nationalist literature.
However, even now there are some clarifications. Recently, a book by the Polish author Alexander Korman "From the Bloody Days of Lvov 1941" was published in London. The author cites numerous facts, names, eyewitness accounts of this tragedy. The researcher states unequivocally: from June 3 to July 6 in 1941 (the time of the stay of the special battalion "Nachtigal" in Lviv), Polish scientists, Jews and communists were destroyed by the Nazis, Nakhtigalists and militants from the OUN-Bandera.
Korman cites in the book a photocopy of Stepan Bandera's appeal, which was distributed in Lvov from June 30 to July 11, 1941 in the form of flyers and posters: "People! Know! Moscow, Poland, Magyars, Jews - these are your enemies! Destroy them!" In another interpretation, this postcard sounded like this: "Destroy the Poles, Jews, Communists without mercy, do not pity the enemies of the Ukrainian people's revolution!"
The author claims that the extermination action was led by SS Hauptsturmführer (Captain) Hans Krueger (Krieger), who later led the Gestapo in Stanisław. The murders were carried out according to a list prepared by the services of E. Vretsena (SB OUN-b) and "Legends" (I. Klymiv), the head of the OUN-b regional executive. The arrests were carried out by the departments of the Abwehr (Brandenburgers), field police and Nachtigall. The shootings were carried out by them. E. Wretsena himself personally participated in the executions of Polish scientists.
A. Korman cites many testimonies in the book. Here are a few of them: "Nakhtigalevtsy" dragged communists and Poles out of their houses, who were hanged on balconies here"; "Ukrainian soldiers of the Nachtigall battalion" were called "poultry houses" by the residents of Lvov; "The poultrymen were in German uniforms and with German military distinctions. They spoke Ukrainian"; "On the streets of Russkaya and Boimov, several Polish students were shot dead, who were brought by militants of Ukrainian nationalists"; "..500 Jews. Ukrainians muzzled them all," etc.
The author also cites the fact that the wife of the arrested professor of the Lviv Polytechnic Kazimir Bartel (former Prime Minister of Poland) visited Sheptytsky, an artsibiskup, with a request to help release her husband, but he replied that he "could not do anything."
In general, Alexander Korman's book is a reliable, meaningful study. However, it is one-sided, because it is imbued not with universal, but mainly Polish passions.
Despite the lack of weighty and comprehensive documents and analytical research, we now know for certain that the Bandera action of the first days of the occupation of Lviv was large-scale and rather desperate: from the proclamation of the "Act of June 30" to the bloody massacre - the extermination of Soviet activists, representatives of the Polish intelligentsia and the Jewish population. Undoubtedly, this action was led by N. Lebid, the chief of the OUN security service, and a little later, the conductor of the entire OUN-Bandera in the region. His henchmen were: his deputy in the security service of the OUN E. Vretsena and the head of the regional executive of the OUN-b "Legend" (I. Klymiv), the Gestapo lieutenant J. Moroz and the leaders of "Nachtigal" T. Oberlender, A. Hertsner and R. Shukhevych . Although the heavy hand of the Gestapo (G. Krieger) and the Abwehr (T. Oberländer) gravitated over all this.
The Abwehr special battalion "Nakhtgal" together with the 1st battalion of the "Brandenburg-800" regiment, detachments of the Feldgendarmerie and OUN militants from the "Legends" resort - Klymiva took a direct part in the bloody orgies of the first days of the occupation of Lviv.
The further "fate" of the special battalions
After an unsuccessful "mutual understanding" with the Nazis during the proclamation of the "Act of June 30, 1941", that is, the so-called proclamation of an independent Ukraine in Lvov, which was carried out by J. Stetsko ("Karbovich", Bandera's first deputy), with the help of "Nachtigal" named after S. Bandera, and on the orders of Bandera, and after the arrests of the participants in this venture, both special battalions were withdrawn from the front and at the end of October merged into one formation, which immediately began training for a new assignment.
In mid-March, in 1942, the combined (now Schutzmannschaft) battalion under the command of E. Pobigushchy ("Ren") was sent to Belarus and operated in the Mogilev-Vitebsk-Lepel triangle as part of the 201st police ("security") division of General Jacobi against Belarusian partisans and civilians.
In the collection "Squads of Ukrainian Nationalists in 1941-1942" (published in 1953), E. Pobigushchy writes: "Artists would have excellent motives for drawing", describing and admiring the beautiful Belarusian landscapes of the places where they were brought.
But they were sent here, of course, not to draw on the open air, but in order to "guard the bridges," notes Pobigushchy. We know very well that the "bridge guards" did not fight the partisans, but only constantly guarded the bridges, carrying out this service day after day. At the same time, we are well aware that the "army guards" of Nazi Germany did not guard bridges, but carried out security service in the rear of the Nazi troops, which meant that they constantly carried out punitive actions against "bandits" (as the Red partisans called the Red partisans ) and local residents who helped the "bandits".
It is also known that the schutzmannschaft battalion, with four companies commanded by R. Shukhevych, M. Brigider, V. Sidor and Pavlik, became a subdivision of the 201st police division and brigades and separate operational battalions commanded by von dem E. Bach-Zelewski, Obergruppenführer (Colonel-General) of the SS troops. This SS Obergruppenführer led the fight against partisans in the occupied territories of the Soviet Union and Poland, especially in Belarus and in the northern part of Ukraine. The units reporting to him were predominantly SS men, and therefore the 201st Police Division was forced to act like them.
It becomes somewhat clearer when the Beating "Ren" writes about "combat operations" (which, of course, were not carried out in any way by the "bridge guards") and that SS Obergruppenführer von Bach "said at a meeting of all commanders that this is my best department , then he did not say this for a red word, that the merit in that is foremen. It is also known that those foremen, including Shukhevych and Pobigushchy, were marked by the Nazis with "iron crosses" not for "guarding bridges", but for "combat prowess". The beating one stated: "the legion completed its task by 100 percent." Here he boasts that the command of the division asked the "legion" to protect the division commander. Therefore, the former Nakhtigalevites and Rolandites deserve such an honor! Useless, of course: such differences!
The same E. Pobigushchiy is more frank in his memoirs: “Of course, there were frequent battles against partisans, combing forests, attacks on their places of standing. guarded the middle rear of the Eastern Front - our chicken did the job best of all.
Now it is completely clear that they did not "guard the bridges", but "guarded the middle rear" of the group of the Nazi army "Center", which was advancing on Moscow.
Another author, M. Kalba, in the book "Nachtigal" (DUN smoke) in the light of facts and documents "(Denver, 1984) writes that the Nachtigall was never a sabotage formation and did not carry out any acts of sabotage, although he also determines here that kuren "was attached to the" Brandenburg ". And then Kalba refers to the German author Werner Brockford, who wrote about the formation of Brandenburg and, incidentally, pointed out that Nachtigall "performed fantastic deeds" in the spirit of "an American-made war film." What exactly Brockford had in mind is still unknown, remains behind the scenes, but "fantastic deeds" in the spirit of "a war film of American production" intrigue not only the author's imagination.
However, it is already quite clear today that the Schutzmannfaft Battalion did not "guard the bridges" in the partisan region in Belarus, but acted as part of the punitive formations of SS Obergruppenführer von dem Bach-Zelewski against Belarusian partisans and civilians, participated in the punitive operations "Bolotnaya fever", "Triangle", "Cottbus" and others. That the neighbor of the 201st security division and an enterprising partner in the fighting against the partisans and peasants of Belarus was the notorious “Dirlivanger brigade”, known during the war, formed from criminals, professional sadists and murderers. Several Chotas of the "Ukrainian" formation as part of the 15th police regiment participated in the punitive action described in Vladimir Yavorivsky's documentary story "Eternal Kortelis", as a result of which animals with human names wiped off the face of the earth, along with the inhabitants, the Volyn villages of Borki, Zabolotye, Borisovka and Cortelis.
Abwehr battalions "Nachtigal" and "Roland"
The same Killing "Ren" recalls that before Christmas in 1943, "the legion was disbanded." The reasons for this have not yet been elucidated. They served wonderfully, received "iron crosses", were the best in the punitive troops of the SS von dem Bach-Zelewski, and suddenly .., "disbanded"! Pobigushchiy also recalls that SS Obergruppenführer von Bach told him personally that "all legionnaires" (as Pobigushchiy and other authors call the punitive policemen) "would go home in small groups and must register with the police in Lvov."
"Demobilization" took place, but under very mysterious circumstances. However, in Lvov, some of the Ukrainian officers and non-commissioned officers, including Pobigusche, were kept "under arrest" by the Nazis, but "a change in political conditions saved us." Here in question, it is clear that during the formation of the 14th SS Grenadier Division "Galitsien" they were called up as junior officers of the now SS formation, where Pobigushchiy-"Ren" was first the commander of the regiment, and then the battalion with the rank of Sturmbannfuehrer (major) SS. So, finally, the officer cadres from the Abwehr-police turned into SS men.
"What is the use of DUN"? - Stepan Bandera asked in one of his articles and answered here: "The special thing that they brought with them is the knowledge of the organization, strategy and tactics of the partisan struggle used by the Bolsheviks in the Second World War, and the German methods of destroying partisan detachments. This knowledge was very useful in the creation of the UPA."
As you can see, Bandera was interested in the experience of the struggle of the Nazis against the Soviet partisans. And we must also add that the head of the UPA, its "commander-in-chief" was the recent captain of the Abwehr and the Schutzmannschaft of the formation R. Shukhevych, who in the UPA immediately became a cornet general.
Consequently, the former Nakhtigalevites and Rolandists did not learn the experience of "protecting bridges", but the fight against partisans and civilians of Belarus on the German methods of "von dem Bach-Zelewski and Dirlivanger".
Vitaly Ivanovich Maslovsky
Translation from Ukrainian RM.U
