Stepan Bandera is more than a controversial historical figure. Revolutionary, leading propaganda for the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, head of punitive actions against representatives of the Polish occupation power. For some, his name symbolizes the struggle for the independence of Ukraine, for the majority, Bandera is a negative personality, a nationalist, a fascist and a murderer.
Stepan Bandera
Of course, the desire to achieve independence for his compatriots S. Bandera is worthy of respect, but the means and methods of this struggle are very, very controversial.
The whole life and work of the Ukrainian people's figure Stepan Bandera, an ardent nationalist and fighter for the independence of Ukraine, evokes various assessments of historians, politicians, and even ordinary people even today.
For his activities, S. Bandera was sentenced to death by the Warsaw court, sat in the fascist Sachsenhausen concentration camp, and was eventually killed by a KGB agent in Munich. There are no questions with the first sentence - Poland sentenced him for his participation in organizing the assassination and murder of Minister Bronislaw Peratsky. The actions of the KGB agents are also quite understandable. It remains to figure out why the Nazis imprisoned Bandera, because it all started with a completely successful, at first glance, coalition.
Bandera - hopes and illusions of the spring of 1941
Stepan Bandera made the decision to cooperate with Nazi Germany, hoping that by joint efforts the German troops and the Ukrainian Nationalist Druzhina (DUN) would liberate the Ukrainian state from the occupation of "Bolshevik Moscow".
Bandera naively counted on the recognition of the state independence of Ukraine by Germany and their further cooperation as equal allies.
Some internal contradictions between the Abwehr leadership, which favored a temporary alliance with the OUN (Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists), and the Nazis, who reject this cooperation, created the illusion that this option was possible. Motivated by such motives, Bandera forms from his supporters two battalions: "Roland" and "Nachtigall", hoping that in the future they will become the nucleus of an independent Ukrainian army.
July 1941 - the harsh truth of life
June 30, 1941 - the time of war, when the Nazi detachments, supported by the battalion "Nachtigall", occupied Lvov. At a meeting of many thousands, the leadership of the OUN (b) proclaimed the "Act of the revival of the Ukrainian state" and announced the formation of a new Ukrainian government. This is where the critical discrepancy between the goals of the so-called allies surfaced, because the Nazis initially planned not to liberate, but to seize Ukraine.
On July 5, Stepan Bandera was arrested and transferred to a German prison in Krakow, where he was asked to publicly abandon the adopted Revival Act. Historians are still arguing about whether Bandera fulfilled the requirements or not, but after a year and a half in the prison of Montelupich, he was transferred to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Bandera was released only in the fall (or winter) of 1944.
