Lawfare Daily: The Complicated Past and Present of Ukraine’s Relations with Poland

[Intro]

Yaroslav Hrytsak: This territory was swarming by the partisans, by the three fractions of Ukrainian nationalist, a Polish army, Soviet partisans. It was literally war or all against war, and given the fact it was oc- occurred after the Holocaust and when there was a mass killings in this territory.

Anastasiia Lapatina: It's the Lawfare Podcast. I'm Anastasia Lapatina, Ukraine fellow at Lawfare, with Ukrainian historian Yaroslav Hrytsak.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: When Nawrocki said it, quite suddenly gave the largest support of the Polish society majority, which means that probably he crossed some kind of the line here. 'Cause that never happened because there was, there was, anti-Ukrainian groups was in minority. Now it seems to be becoming a majority, which is a very much dangerous trend.

Anastasiia Lapatina: We discussed the complicated history of relations between Ukraine and Poland, the Volhynian tragedy, and how grievances over historical memory may threaten Ukraine's future in Europe.

[Main Podcast]

So we're talking about Polish-Ukrainian relations today, and we're talking about it because there were some recent scandals between Ukrainian and Polish governments. Since the audience of Lawfare is, of course mainly American, I think there is a big lack of knowledge of, you know, history between the relationship of Ukraine and Poland. And so that's why I wanted to bring you on.

I think since 2022 when Russia's full-scale invasion began, Poland, of course, has been an immensely important ally for Ukraine. It's taken an enormous number of Ukrainian refugees. It's became a very important logistical hub during the war. And I think most people who are not following the Eastern European region closely probably mainly associate the relationship between Ukraine and Poland with this dynamic. The, you know, they view it through this lens of partnership, but actually the relationship is quite complicated and, and antagonistic, and that's what I wanted to talk about today.

So can you just describe the power dynamic between, you know, Ukraine and Poland, but really between the lands and entities that made up present day Ukraine and Poland going back centuries? And you can feel free to start at however deep in history you want. But yeah, what has been the dynamic, not of partnership, but of what?

Yaroslav Hrytsak: The starting point could be regarded as the end of the 10th century. In the, one of the earliest historical chronicle, there's a mention that in 981 the King Prince Voldomyr, Voldomyr the Great, he seized the lands of the Polish cities or Polish lands, and this was a kind of beginning. So some, some people claim that this is the longest war in the. European history because it last for more than thousand years. It's both true and false. It's true because it's really, it's a long-term conflict, but it's false because history also shows the many cases of the Polish-Ukrainian cooperation and the reconciliation, by the way.

Because basically the fact which must be repeated again and again, basically Ukraine and Poland reached reconciliation since the fall of the communism, unlike in this Russia. This is a basic fact we should not ignore. So we're talking about the duration of the relations rather that need of new reconsol- reconciliation. But the thing is Poland and Ukraine are very much closely related in the many levels. Say, in talking about the Kyiv princes, they quite often married with the daughters and sons of the Polish kings. So actually it was a kind of the family feud between the two families, and later was replaced by the societies which were close to each other. So what I'm saying is like, really could be claimed like a brotherhoods of, fo- brotherhood wars, which is not widely surprising because we know that quite often the most intensive violence runs exactly in the families. But the thing is that I believe in this kind of relations.

Poles and Ukrainians they share both responsibility for the state relations for good and worse. But I believe in many senses Polish responsibility is larger because for a variety of reasons we are going to, because we're too long talk, Polish has been a stronger part. They, they preserve their dynasty, their elites, their state, which Ukraine didn't manage. In some, some periods of the time in 19th century, Ukraine reduced to the nation of, of the priests and, and peasants, as they say, and Poles were very much stronger. So it is like the same family. If there's a feud between two brothers, the, this is mostly the older and the stronger who is to blame. So this is also could be applied to the Polish-Ukrainian relations.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Okay. I want to pause on the topic of Cossacks because I think they're very important for this discussion. How are the Cossacks and their role viewed and Uk- in Ukraine and in Poland?

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Several books has been written about this topic and I believe several in progress. But the thing is that, let's start with the very simple statement that Ukrainian Cossacks, they are main symbol of Ukrainian identity. So for Ukrainians they are very important and they see mostly very positively. All the figures of Ukrainian Cossack through, through history like Khmelnytsky or Mazepa, they're always on the top on historical memory. And by the way, there's no controversy among Ukrainians when we talk about the Cossacks. That's a kind of accepted fact. So this is, this is something very important here.

But then again, you should see that there is a Ukrainian Cossacks are not explicitly Ukrainian phenomenon. You have also Russians Cossacks, like Don Cossack, Kuban Cossacks, or Yaik Cossacks. The difference is that while you could easily write Russian history without Russian Cossacks, you cannot write history without Ukrainian Cossacks. And the main explanation is that Ukrainian Cossacks are very much more related to Poland than to Russia. In a sense that if you look on the biographies of the Cossack leaders, they were educated in the Polish Catholic schools. They knew languages like French, German and Latin, Greek, which was a must. They have a large libraries you could hardly imagine in case of the Russian Cossacks. So this is something. They were educated, educated in a sense of European education, what European education mean by that time. And basically this is a due of the simple fact that since they belonged to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth state so they had access, open window, not a window, just open access to the, to the sphere of the education.

So to let, to make this long story short, when you talk about West in Ukrainian case, and Ukraine was largely part of the Western society, in most of the cases, West came into Ukraine in the Polish dress. So this is something very important. And what makes Ukrainian very different from Russia it's exactly because of this access to the Western culture. So this is something very important.  

And vice versa when talking about the Polish ac- attitudes toward Ukrainian Cossacks, they're very much different. For sure when Ukrainian Cossack were fighting with the Poles so then the, that's were ne- negative. But then in 19th century when Poles u- lose their, lost their state, they start to look on the Ukrainian Cossack as their allies.

And there is emerge a myth on Ukrainian Cossacks in Polish literature by that time. Very popular in many Polish songs, musics, artists was exactly on Polish, Ukrainian Cossack as their allies against the Russian Empire. You may know it that there is a, a very, very popular trilogy written by a, a very popular Polish author, Nobel winning, a Nobel award author in, in S- Sienkiewicz, Henryk Sienkiewicz, who wrote a trilogy which is basically on the Polish-Ukrainian relations, and Ukrainians Cossacks, they related there in rather negative way. So the point is, 25 years ago or so the leading Polish movie director put this trilogy toward the screen, made a movie. And in, in this movie, he depicted, presented Ukrainian Cossack in the most positive way. There has been such a rumor or saying that many Polish ladies fall in love with this actor who playing the role of Ukrainian Cossack. They were presented so sympathetically.

So what I'm saying, there was ups and downs, ups and downs. But what's most, mostly interesting that you could hardly imagine Ukrainian political culture without Ukrainian Cossacks and these, all this kind of the relations to Poland because Cossacks fought against the Poland, but they emulated its political system. Let's see, if I may conclude this one, this one example. You may know it or remember that Zelensky loves to say the, this kind of slogan, "Nothing above us— “Nothing about us without us."

Anastasiia Lapatina: Yes.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Which is basically the slogan of Cossacks, which is literally, literally quotation from the principle of the Polish nobility. So this have you seen it-

Anastasiia Lapatina: That's fascinating.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: How, how that works. Yeah.

Anastasiia Lapatina: It really is a very important slogan that the Ukrainian government repeats all the time. That's very interesting. Okay. The next important point in this hundreds of years long history is the territory of Volyn and Galicia. I wanna ask you to tell us about, about that territory and again, the role that it played for both Ukraine and Poland and the territorial disputes that, that happened around it and sort of take us a little bit through the various disputes and wars that happened until World War II, and by then we'll go in greater detail about the war and the aftermath.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Well, if, if it, if you continue this, kind of, the perspective on Cossacks and Ukrainian relations with Poland Galicia and Volhynia they follow in the same kind of pattern, because those are two territories that for the longest time were outside of the reach of Russia. They were the most westernized territories of Ukraine, both in geographical and cultural sense and because exactly they close relations to Poland, which was at the same time close relation to the West. It was really kind of Ukraine and West in many and impossible and in in all many different meanings.

The thing is that Volhynia didn't play that much role in the Polish-Ukrainian relations or contests. The more important role was Galicia because since the end of the 19th century Galicia enjoys the liberal regime of the Austrian Habsburg Empire. And since Polish patriots, they failed to rebel with their, with their uprisings against Russian Empire, they decide to move their center to Galicia and to make Galicia as a core of their future state. But Ukrainian Russia Empire has the same kind of attitude. They have same trick. They think that they have to start their, their s- s- state from Galicia. So actually, this is kind when rivalry starts. It was basically both national movements claim the same territory as the core for their future state.

And there emerged a conflict, and by the end of 19th century, in the beginning of 20th century, entering the really kind of violent state. And since the fall of the Austrian Empire and the end of the World War, it evolves in the real full fle- full-fledged war, Pol-Ukrainian War. In 1918, 1919, very much violent war with anti-Jewish pogroms made by Poles, all that kind of things. So to, to make the r- long story short, since then, Galician Ukrainians become part of the interwar Poland, like very much like Volhynia, but Poland treat them like a second class, like a mi- an minority that presents a danger to their state. By the way, very much like Jews. The Polish elites, they treated Ukrainians and Jews as a kind of the threat to their identity, so to say. So, it was means the assimilation pressure, all that kind of things, repressions. And to put long story short, probably would be best described by the words of the famous Ukrainian historian Ivan Lysiak-Rudnytsky, who when he was a young man under Polish regime who suffered himself physically. So best he put this way about the Polish politics toward Ukrainians: It was worse than crime; It was just a stupidity.

So the Pole antagonized Ukrainians to the extreme. Which also could be said of to Volhynia, but in certain less extent because in this interwar period there was such interesting experiment, liberal experiment, condling experiment to make Ukrainian in there much loyal to Ukrainian, to a Polish state, but it failed. And since the end of '30s, closer to the war Polish regime embark on a very strong repressions, especially the most stupid and first one like a closing and destruction Ukrainian churches on this territory. And you have to take into account this territory, these local Ukrainians, they were much traditional and religious. So basically what you have there, you have already conflict. It was already starting to turn into powder keg. Just a, a, a sparkle will do to, to, to turn it into kind of explode, explosion.

Anastasiia Lapatina: So then we get to World War II. Of course, Ukraine and Poland suffer horrifically during, during the war. Can you just talk a little bit about, you know, compare their experience with the war and, and when the war ends, how they, how they see themselves and, and what status they have and how they come out of the war, what that looks like?

Yaroslav Hrytsak: So long ago, before the start of the war, there has been dispute between the Polish and Ukrainian ambassadors in Berlin, and they were fighting, competing, or arguing, who, who suffered most under the war, Poles or Ukrainians. And I believe this largely, this discussion makes no sense because Poles and Ukrainians suffer the most. This what was like what Timothy Snyder put it, it was a heart of the “bloodlands” of the nations and the people that was squeezed by the two most oppressive, ruthless regimes like Stalin's Russia and the Nazi, Hitler Nazis, so to say.

That said, that said, there were still some kind of differences, without a doubt, because basically talking about Volhynia, this kind of experience of the war, which is now in the center of the Polish-Ukrainian dispute. In Poland, this massive violence starts with the beginning of the First World- Second World War 1939. When first the Soviets came and then Nazi. In Ukraine it's different because majority of Ukrainian territory was under the Soviet Russia, and they started to feel this kind of mass violence much earlier, since the '20s, and with the upward peak in the Stalin regime in the '30s. So that said, unlike in Poland, Ukrainians they have suffered a wave after wave of the massive violence, which is very close to genocides, like Holodomor, like the, the, the destruction of the Soviet pol- prisoners of war, like the Holocaust and Volhynia and then deportation Crimean Tatars, deportation of Poles from, from Ukraine and Ukrainians from Poland, which means eight waves of the extreme violence, which was very close to genocides. So it's only in 15 years. So it is kind of unique ex- unique experience.

Therefore, many people, especially Poles, could not understand this kind of difference why Ukrainian feel that much different about their history. Because for them, Volhynia is not the central event. They have many of them. For them, the most, the most important event, tragic event is still Holodomor, the Great Famine. Like for Jews, Holocaust, which is the same defense. But again, Holocaust happened also in Ukraine. So this may be, this is very different. So to put lo- long story short, Volhynia doesn't come at the, at the beginning of the story. It's a end of the story after several waves of the violence, very massive extreme violence. And the point is that there were no group, and I repeat it, no group that was immune to this violence, which means that every group has its own victims and perpetrators. So this is something very important to, to understand when we’re talking about Volhynia.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Right. So now we get to the crux of the conversation and also the dispute, of course, between the two countries recently, and that is the Volhynian tragedy, which, you know, it is very telling that the Poles refer to it, I think, almost exclusively as the “Volhynian Massacre” or massacres. Whereas Ukraine, Ukrainian historians use the word “tragedy.” So the historical memory, national memory over what happened there during that time is at the crux of, you know, these political disputes. And I wanna, you know, ask you, can you just walk us through what actually happened there, and what are these events, and who were the victims, and who were the perpetrators, and what it is that the countries are arguing over now?

Yaroslav Hrytsak: It's the, the, the question's rather simple. The answer is very much complicated. There is no way to provide a simple, definite answer. The story is far too complicated and heavily contested. But if could be boiled to some kind of simple fact, that the fact is or was that on the morning of July 11, 1943, Ukrainian nationalists and peasants launched a attack on several dozen of Polish villages in Volhynia and killed everybody there they could reach. No one was spared, not the young, the old, women or children. And crucially, it's very important, it took, this kind of event took place on Sunday when people were heading to the cathedrals, to the churches. So attacks and killings occurred right there. So allowing people to be murdered on the spot. It was a crucial, crucial, crucial. It was kind of ruthless act. Basically, it was ethnic cleansing. So it's insane. But this is it.

But now dispute starts because there is no kind of the consensus on most of the dimensions. First, how many villages were attacked? Some say 180, which is maximum. Some says only 10. Then also numbers of victims. Ukrainians tends to say that 60,000. Poles say thou- te- 100,000 and recently Polish president even said that 150. So again, the question was, was this operation ordered by the top leaders of Ukraine nationalist or was it a bottom up in two local commanders? And above all, who started first? Because Ukrainians refer to the some anti-Ukrainian action made by the Polish underground and so forth and so forth. So what I'm saying here, it's a very hard to have some definitive answer. It's open space for historians to discuss and historians do, do their work for the last 30 years and some, some results are very much, very much impressive.

Problem is the, this problem of Volhynia, historical Volhynia is not left to historians only. There are politicians who don't listen to some kind of complicated answer. They need very simple answers. One hand answers which could be used for the mobilizing the, the electorate and there's no other way, easier way to mob-mobilize the numbers than by using the historical memory, which is very cynical. Which explains the kind of very much complicated character of this Volhynian issue both in history and nowadays present.

Anastasiia Lapatina: So the Ukrainian, and cor- of course, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the Ukrainian, both government and, I guess, mainstream historians in Ukraine talk about these events as sort of a joint waves of violence as in, you know, I think Ukrainians try to not discuss who attacked who first, but more like we all killed each other. Let's just sort of say sorry and apologize to each other and move on.

And it seems like for the Polish side, it is very, very important for them to actually get to the bottom of the question who attacked first, and I, and they seem to be saying that the Ukrainians did. And they do- they, they, they don't like this sort of two sides argument that, you know, this was just joint waves of violence. Can you talk a little bit more about how the Ukrainian side sort of views this and talks about it and versus, versus how the Poles do?

Yaroslav Hrytsak: You're perfectly right. You're perfectly right. This is exactly this kind of the distinction between Polish and Ukrainian side. But that said, I would say the, the, these differences between Poland and Ukraine, it runs within each country because there's groups in Poland and Ukraine that are, of course, closer in their listen. There are one who are called “memorial warriors” who want to country, two countries to be some kind of the most exclusive, mutually exclusive, exclusive relations and they tend to problematize, not problematize, but to, but to use this kind of the, the political extremes.

So the thing is there is wide spectrum of the attitudes and then you could express by the two mutual exclusive poles. On the one pole is Volodymyr Viatrovych, a youngish historian who has been the director of the Institute of National Memory. He wrote a book-

Anastasiia Lapatina: He's a Ukrainian historian.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: He's a historian. He is a youngish historian. He's very much politically active. He's a member of parliament. He has been director of the Institute of National Memory. He wrote a book on Ukrainian Volhynia, and they name it as “The Second Polish-Ukrainian War,” which is als- always automatically means for you always as a kind relativizing.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Right.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Which it exactly it is. Because it doesn't say this was kind of the, really kind of war. It was, it was a kind of genocide, whatever, just kind of war. And in war, everything happens.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Right.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: This one is part, part of this, part of this whole violence. He tends to minimize the number of victims, also tends to explicate then the, the Ukrainian nationalists or the other kind of things, which is kind of the quite expected. This is one pole. The opposite pole is taken by the Polish president, Nawrocki, who by the way, he's also is a historian.

Anastasiia Lapatina: He's also a historian, yeah.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: And also director of, former director of the Institute of National Memory on the Polish side. Yeah. And he put on other extreme. But this is basically, no, it is not a, it was not a kind of war, it was a kind of the decision made by the Nazi-like Ukrainian nationalist, fascist type, which meant to have this kind of action from the very beginning, so to say. And there's no way further if Ukrainians would not recognize that Ukraine nationalist was a crime su- was a, it was a kind of the crime institution which has to be put out of the sight of the historical memory kind of things. So this is true to large, large, large spectrum by the two poles. And many, and many peoples are closer to the center, so to say.

Yeah, I would say, if talking about Ukrainian historians and Polish historians most of them, they tend to tell, to talk to each other quite, say, say openly. If they tend to agree disagree, they, they, they still can listen to each other. And again, I say, in terms of when talking about historical studies, this is, I would say, less, much less complicated than it comes to the political, political sides. But then again, I say if you, the, if this matter would be left to the hands of historians, there would be no conflict, but it, it's not what it is. But it would be naive to think it could be otherwise.

Anastasiia Lapatina: So we've been talking about the nationalists who, you know, who carried out all of these killings. Who were these armies actually? Who were these units and these groups on the Ukrainian side? I, you know, I think we have to talk about this before we get into the more recent events and the issue of the naming of the unit and everything.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: So again, as I have to, have to, to start this with repeating this kind of the statement, don't expect a simple, and simple-

Anastasiia Lapatina: Of course, we’re not…

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Answer. They were nationalists. They were nationalists, but there were three different groups of nationalists which fought each other and they hated each other.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Right.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: So in Volhynia-

Anastasiia Lapatina: Seems very Ukrainian.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Very much so, but also very much Poland. Look at the Pol- look at America.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Yeah. Human.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Very much human. Very much human, so to say. So basically, there was a original Ukrainian insurgent army led by Taras Bulba, who by himself was a kind of democrat and very much close to the Polish state. But he used the beginning of the war as opportunity to create some kind of the independent state or independent semi-state in Volhynia when his army could rule. But then in '42, '43, when the Ukrainian nationalists has been arrested and repressed by the Nazis, they moved to the Volhynia, which was very much forest or region, very, very good to, to hide yourself, and there were two fractions.  One was led by the older nationalist, Ma- Me- Melnyk, and the other by the young nationalist, which was Bandera. In the long run, this Bandera fraction, which was very much most, most motivated, they integrated all to other fractions by Bulba and Ban- Melnyk, quite often by violence, by killing opponents, and thus created a core of the future army.

So now the question comes, this is the issue. To what extent their decision to exterminate Poles was really motivated by the ideological concerns or were just a match, quite just, kind of, coincidence of the facts? Basically, basically, there is a kind of the documents which says that some Ukrainian nationals before the war, they thought about exterminations of Poles and Jews from this territory. But, and the but's very important, first of all, they don't see it as a primary task because the main enemy was Stalin, Russia, and Hitler and Germany. Secondly, we never know whether this kind of the text has been accepted as a official documents, program documents of, of this nationalist, so to say.

Also, we know that, even in case of this Volhynia action, there has been dispute or rivalry or contestation between different kinds of groups within the Bandera movement, because some of them condemned it from the very beginning. Actually, I met many of, not many, but some of these older veterans of Ukrainian or insurgent army when I was with the United States in the beginning of the '90s, and most of them said that they have the very negativity to the Volhynia. That was, so it was either a crime or a kind of mistake, whatever, but this is their negative. They didn't talk about that much, so to say.

But what I'm, what I'm, what I'm saying here, so this is the big question, crucial question. Was this action premeditated? Premeditated in the sense that it was origins in the '30s, in the ideology of nationalism, which Nawrocki tends to claim as a criminal. That has been kind of condemned by Ukrainians. Or it came kind of as a sudden because of the confluence of the factors. I myself, like many Ukrainians don't tend to the second solution. That without a doubt ideology played a larger role, but it was not important role, because the larger confluence of the factor which was very much complicated.

Because basically again and again, Volhynia was a territory, the only territory in the Soviet Union, apart of Belarus, which could have a partisan actions because there was marshes and there was the forest, and neither Nazi or Soviet could do anything with that because the tanks and the airplanes were useless. Nobody can control this. This territory was swarming by the partisans, by the three fractions of Ukrainian nationalists, a Polish army, Soviet partisans.

It was literally war or all against war. And given the fact it was oc- occurred after the Holocaust, and when there was a mass killings in this territory, and the life very m- matter very m- not lo- has a very low value. So could easily get this kind of the violence emerging on this territory, so to say. So I would rather say that unlike what Nawrocki is saying, rather it was not result of that ideology. It was rather a confluence of the factors that was exactly come together on this territory in 1943.

Anastasiia Lapatina: I mean, do we know if these Ukrainian units, or these Ukrainian armies and factions who were all fighting each other, were they hypothetically, you know, going out and carrying these killings in revenge for the way the Poles treated Ukrainians in the past, or because they just wanted to cleanse the territory to establish their own state, or because they hated the Poles because of some ethnic, sort of, thinking? Like, do we know what, what the logic was at all? Is there any historical evidence there to explain?

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Takes all these propositions and think they are true, all of them.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Okay.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: But now the cr- the now, but, but now the, the real question is, the real challenge, what was the major, the most important factor?  Who pl- what played the, the most important role or was the less minor or marginal? This exactly what historians dispute about that.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Disagree.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Because without a doubt, this wouldn't happen if Poles would treated Ukrainians differently in the interwar period. This what Ukrainians tends to say, that this is not a relations between Nazi Germany and Jews. It's not one way violence. It's a both ways. It's a mutual violence. Long protracted violence. Most importantly this kind of the tendency, which is also confirmed by the other studies on the genocides, that when one side is not just repressed but humiliated, humiliation is important, ex- expect the kind of mass violence, genocide.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Right.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: It's a kind of rule. And Ukrainians were ex- not just repressed, they were humiliated. Ukrainians were like a subhumans at the second, as a second rate, so to say. I know from the story from so side. So what I'm saying here, yes, in a minor sense, it was a kind of revenge.

But again, also have some smaller stories because there was a stories of that time that allegedly, we don't know, that this was the Poles who started the, the, the killing of Ukrainians in 1941 in certain areas. We don't know if this is true, but the story was circulating.  What I mean to say that in times of the war, there's no internet, there's no newspapers. There are gossips. Gossip and rumors. And when they are circulating, and most of them they are provocation, they could used as a kind of the push or start up for this kind of violence. So we really don't know. We really don't know.

But the fact is, the fact is, in terms of the core, most likely, and you could say, claim with this, kind of, the responsibility that this was act initiated by the local commanders of the army in Volhynia which has no kind of the confirmation of the consensus from the, from the leaders of the Ukrainian nationalists.

Anastasiia Lapatina: So the army that we're talking about, one of the many perpetrators here, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, which in, in Ukrainian referred to as UPA, they play a huge role in Ukrainian history, and more importantly for this conversation, Ukrainian national memory. Can you explain why? Because especially since the full-scale invasion, I think all of these, all of these stories and, and historical, you know, legends and myths and actual history has been very much, kind of reinvigorated, which of course is why, and we will get to this in a second, Zelensky agreed to name one of these elite Ukrainian military units in honor of UPA. So why, why is, why is UPA, why is this army so important for Ukrainians?

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Let's start with the fact that Ukraine is a, a young state. It's a really kind of, this kind of separate category, which means it helps to build a national memory, quite often from the scratch. Because Ukrainian memory has been practically, literally taboo under Soviets, unlike in Poland. It's something very important. So therefore, Ukraine has to look for their symbols.

So when talking about the symbols that unite Ukrainians is Holodomor, without a doubt. It's a central event, and there's a consensus over Ukraine, regardless whether east or west Ukraine, Ukrainian speaker and Russian speaker, they have a kind of core consensus of Holodomor as a main tragic event in their history. This is something very important.

Anastasiia Lapatina: We should, we should include maybe for listeners who don't know, it was a man-made famine by the Soviets that killed millions of Ukrainians.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Yeah, thank you. A- around the four, four, four millions, so to say. So something very important. Yeah.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Yeah, the biggest tragedy in Ukrainian history, essentially.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: So what I'm saying-

Anastasiia Lapatina: Much bigger.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: They, they, they're looking for symbols, and if Holodomor, or by the way, attitude to Stalin, which Ukrainians has a very negative, unlike Russia to Stalin. Unlike those two issues, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army was the most divided issue before the war. If you want Ukrainians see fighting each other, shooting each other, start talking about Ukrainian Insurgent Army. Im- immediately, there will just be kind of the clash. One part would claim they are bandits, the other claim they are heroes.

So this was mostly the state of affair before the war. War change everything, because war is all a game changer. Since the beginning of the war, quite obviously, on the third month we lived the war, the survey says that most Ukrainians started to see Ukrainian Insurgent Army in a very positive way. Because they saw them as a symbol of anti-Russian resistance. So this is something very important. And none of them, or just few, majo- minority, then they see this kind of anti-Polish symbol, because they tend to disregard or tend, and they know is it, or they know about this Volhynia, what happened to Volhynia and this kind of blame, blame all Ukrainian Insurgent Army for their crimes because they believe this is a part of the Soviet and Putin propaganda.

So this also gives the kind of i- issue, another issue. There's a strong asymmetry in Polish-Ukrainian historical memory. Why in Polish-Ukrainian memory it's a central event, in Ukrainian historical memory it's very, Volhynia is a very marginal event. And why in Ukrainian Insurgent Army is exclusively anti-Russian symbol, in Polish memory it's anti-Polish symbol. And explains a lot.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Did the Volhynia tragedy or massacres, depending on who you ask, did it have an impact on the relationship between Ukraine and Poland, you know, much later you know, the '90s onward after Ukraine regained its independence and was sort of establishing new relations after the fall of the Soviet Union with Poland? Was this still an issue or did this become an issue recently?

Yaroslav Hrytsak: No, no, no. It was initially, as I said again what, what, what happened is kind of historical miracle, as I said. Given the span of the long protracted record of Polish-Ukrainian conflict, what happened that quite, or quite after the collapse of the Soviet Union Poles and Ukrainians reconcile immediately. And the fact is that Ukraine was the, Polish was the first country to accept or to recognize Ukraine independence.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Right.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Which was a clear message. By the way, they were very afraid that Canada will be the first. Because there's many Ukrainians. I know the story.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Of  course. The biggest diaspora.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: So they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they beat by, by several minutes, so to say. So that's clear message. But the issue is they were smart enough not to raise the issue of Volhynia. This kind of, the older elites, both liberal elites on the Uk- Polish part and the post-communist elites on Ukrainian parts. And the 50th anniversary was in 1993. There's probably no discussion. It was deliberately done intentionally not to touch this very much contested issue because they know it could happen.

So the first ele- the first really, kind of, the discussion emerged in 2003 when Poland was about to join the European Union.  And Ukraine was afraid that it will stay, we, we, we stay vis-a-vis Russia only, that will be left, left by these Polish as allies. And this gave a first wave of the discussion. And importantly, exactly in this day, 2003, there was another attempt or probably the first attempts at reconciliation for about Volhynia. At that time Polish President Kwas- Kwaśniewski and the Ukrainian President Kuchma, they met in one of this former Polish village where there was victims, and they shook the hands and they said this kind of feeling that we forgive. We ask for forgiveness and forgive, forgive us. It's very important, symbolical act, so to say. And because basically there, because there was very much personal chemistry between Kwa- Kwaśniewski and Kuchma, there was chemistry between Yushchenko and Kaczyński b- bro- brother, by the way led by Zelensky and the previous Polish president. So personal relations play very much.

And then again, and then again in 2015 when the Poroshenko, then president, visited Ukraine, visited Poland, Warsaw, he kneeled down be- toward the monument of the victims of Po- of the Polish massacre, which is very m- important symbolic gest- it, he was kind of emulating this gest, famous gest of the, of the Friedrich Schmidt when he, po- German Chancellor Schmidt who visited Poland in 1931 and kneeled down in front of the monument of the Jewish, Jewish victims Jewish, Jewish victims.

So what I mean to say here, it is something very important. There was a there was attempts on both sides to reconcile, say. What happened? What happened there? Two events. First of all, change of power. In 2013, I believe for the first time, the opposition came to power, which was very much opposed to the liberals, and they first start to use the historical memory to quite different effect. They say that Poles was much humiliated before the liberals. Now they have to took position of pride. So everything that was negative in Polish history has to be erased, and only those events who said that Poles were victims has to be, so to say, put in the center. So this is something very important, and this is exactly when the turn has happened.

And then the other crucial event is the victory of Nawrocki with the Pol- as the Polish president because he is a memory warrior. That's something very important. He want to wage a war against a memory. He's paid for that. It's kind of his part of salary, if I may say so, so to say. So this what ignited this, kind of, because basically, I would say the decision of Zelensky to name one of these kind of the units after UPA was a not kind mistake, but miscalculation.

Anastasiia Lapatina: I should probably just say a few, a few more words about that, that this May, so a few months ago, President Zelensky sent a decree naming an elite special forces unit, you know, a unit within the Ukrainian military, after the heroes of UPA. Re-reportedly, the unit wanted that designation, and, you know, the process is that, you know, the, the president has to sign off on that, and it seemed like a kind of a routine Ukrainian thing, but it triggered a severe negative response from the Polish government, and, you know, it was so severe that they ended up stripping President Zelensky of the highest Polish state order, the Order of the White Eagle, right? Which is, you know, the, the most important-

Yaroslav Hrytsak: The highest-

Anastasiia Lapatina: the highest, the highest order, yeah, the highest state order. And then, you know, a lot of drama unraveled that we'll talk about in a minute. But do you, what do you think about the naming of the unit after UPA? You, you already started saying that you don't think it was a mistake, it was a miscalculation. What do you mean?

Yaroslav Hrytsak: It was miscalculation. I like this practice because from what I know, this decision was made by Zelensky personally. One thing that's to be taken account is Zelensky doesn't know history, doesn't care about history.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Why do you say that?

Yaroslav Hrytsak: He's quite opposite to, to, to Nawrocki. Because I know it for a fact. He is a kind of ignorant of that. It's, it's nothing, he's, this is, this is noth- nothing said bad about him, but he was been raised in the Russian speaking territory, clearly being industrialized, and seems he, he didn't know where the kind of history. He didn't pay, care about the history of the previous presidents. This is something very important.

So what I'm saying here, most probably he didn't expect this kind of reactions, and his miscalculation was that basically, when taking this kind of decision, it must be put to the expertise. He does the kind of expertise, yes, but it was different. But it would make a single-handedly, so to say. This is miscalculation or probably just mistake, whatever you'd say, but this is, this is so. But what, what reaction on the Polish of as a critic was a, was such hysteria.  Was really kind of hysteria, which w-

Anastasiia Lapatina: I mean, it was, it was so extreme that some Polish politicians said that, you know, this will be a huge problem for Ukraine's path towards the European Union, that if Ukraine sticks to all of these ideas and continues naming things after UPA, that Poland should block Ukraine's asession.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Some of the Polish politicians kept saying long before the fact.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Right.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Long before it happened, so to say. But what happened then that when Nawrocki said it, quite all of a sudden negate a largest support of the Polish society. Majority. This was unexpected, which means that probably they crossed some kind of the line here. ‘Cause that never happened because there were, there was anti-Ukrainian op- groups was in minority. Now it seems to be becoming a majority, which is a very much dangerous trend.

But again, again, it's a typical history. I couldn't describe it in different, in different names. And again, I'm not talking about from my point of view, I'm talking point from my Polish friends, historians. Like, this is recent story that my friend Dariusz Stola, who is the director of the largest Polish Jewish museum in Poland, has been attacked massively for that he said that you com- compare Ukrainian Sich regiment to some of the Polish anti- some of the Polish clandestine organizations.  For the sim- sim- simple fact of comparison that something Polish history could be compared to UPA raises such a strong reaction-

Anastasiia Lapatina: Right

Yaroslav Hrytsak: And hatred against him. So to say. It's i- kind of i- imaginable. 'Cause the simple, simple fact, simple facts told by historians is very so, so I'm saying is something very dangerous coming nowadays, and I, we afraid, I'm talking about my names in my name, so names my Polish-Ukrainian historians and politicians and the leaders, the situation could get worse. Specifically, specifically because next year we have a parliamentary elections in Poland, which may be one of the most important elections in the Polish history since the fall of the communism.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Wow.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Yes, this what is saying here, because it means that Poles could follow the lead of the Orban Hungary. Becomes-

Anastasiia Lapatina: Okay.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: A very problematic territory for the future of the West and the European Union. Because the… Community, they're clearly very anti-European. The other fact which is often ignored, that it's not just anti-Ukrainian feelings, it's very strong anti-German feelings. Anti-German seem, Germany s- serve as a symbol of the central state of the European Union. And Nawrocki is very much anti-European, so to say. He tries to play the role of the, that vacant role that was lay vacant by Orban. This we could, may expect. So this is not problem for Ukraine. Without this problem for Ukraine, without them, it's a, problem for the future of the European-

Anastasiia Lapatina: Right.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Union, and Europe itself. And this very dangerous because if this, this may be, there's a risk that Ukraine issue became as, would became a central issue in these elections.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Right.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: This, that we may head into.

Anastasiia Lapatina: It's very likely, yes. We, we, we talked about the Polish reaction, but of course the Ukrainian reaction to the Polish reaction was also very interesting because when Zelensky was stripped of this highest Polish state award, the Order of the White Eagle, I was quite surprised to see that basically every Ukrainian president before Zelensky also came out publicly and gave up their Polish state orders. Several other Ukrainian officials have done so as well, and there was this sort of outpouring of support for President Zelensky and the Ukrainian government at large, and I didn't really see anyone within the Ukrainian government, within that bubble kind of, you know, rolling back and maybe saying, "Maybe we should, you know, take a step back and re- rethink the naming issue." So what did you make of that?

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Yes, it's effect, if effect to this kind of war memory, this kind of mobilization along the flag, without a doubt. Because this is a war. Luckily enough, it's a memory war. It's not real war, but it's kind of the fact. But that said, that said, I have to say that there is a community, on both Ukrainians and Polish sides, of people that had the orders from other side, and they keep their orders because they say s- exactly, because they say it's t- they too precious for them. They could not, let's say-

Anastasiia Lapatina: It's not worth it.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Risk them in the, yeah, in the, in the, in the, they say because this put on the risk of Polish-Ukrainian reconciliation. So what I'm saying here, I believe it's very much emotional response very much like this kind of response, this kind of hysteria. But what sad is also the opposite thing. There are still people who trying to work for the further reconciliation, that they want to happen, this kind of the, the, the, the crossing the red lines. And I know many of them, and they are very important figures on both Ukrainian-Polish sides. Most importantly, they meet, they talk, they think what to do, and most importantly, quite often, they represent not themselves, but the institutions. Most important, the civic institutions.

They don't want to leave this kind of Polish-Ukrainian relations into the sacrifice to the states only. They want to say the society has their own voice. It has to be some integrated because in many cases, the relations between Polish, Ukrainians for since the fall of the communists are so deep, are so intense, in many case, so positive, that people just could that easily society to, to risk them for the kind of political prophets.

Anastasiia Lapatina: I mean, the final question I have is really the most important one, I, I guess, which is, like, how does Ukraine move forward here in, in light of, of course, Ukraine's European aspirations and sort of the revival of Ukrainian history and tradition that we're seeing, especially after 2022? Like, should the Ukrainian government now every time they name anything after anyone think about what the Polish reaction would be, what some other allies' reaction might be? Or is this something that has to be 100% a sovereign decision that no foreign nation can tell us what to, what, what to name our streets after, who to name our streets after, and stuff like that? Again, there's, like, these two extremes here. How does Ukraine figure out what to do? What do you think?

Yaroslav Hrytsak: What you c- what you, what you call the, the, the second extreme is not extreme, it's a norm. Sovereign is a norm.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Right.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: To say. Also, it's also important it's… Works, the case of historical memory. And by the way, there is Polish historians that's also saying they, they, they, they, they defend Ukrainian sides the same exactly that's, they started this back at this point. Like my friend Mateusz Szpytma, who is director Institute of National Memory, he wrote a large piece for Gazeta Wyborcza claiming that Poles have nothing to say when it comes to Polish-Ukrainian memory, more often than the countries at war. So this is, this is kind of norm. This is kind, this is kind of case, kind of norm.

But the important this issue, it's not, I believe that history is, will be not the, the main core or the the, or the core of the Polish-Ukrainian dis- disputes. History was always the kind of precedent There's much more important issues, so to say, and you, in the Ukrainians minority, Ukraine minority in Poland, their state, all that kind of things. The competition rivalry between the Polish and Ukrainian agriculture, all that kind of things, so to say-

Anastasiia Lapatina: Right.

Yaroslav Hrytsak:  Were a much more important issue. That said, that said, I believe that when it comes to Ukraine integration into Europe, and this may be potentially problematic relations with Poland, potential, say it's anything unique in the Eastern European Unions. Look at the position of France for decades in opposition to Britain because they didn't want Great Britain to join European Union. Or look the kind inner disputes within, within, within the European before they make any European Union, so to say. Because again, we have this kind of the wrong expectations that Ukraine path toward European integration would be smooth. No, it wouldn't be because it never been to any kind of countries.

Anastasiia Lapatina: Right.

Yaroslav Hrytsak:  So be ready for this kind of the problems and we have to ble, let us, so the only real problem is political will. Whether they have political will and wisdom, very importantly, because basically timing in the, in the found that we have the common enemy, which is Russia, which dangers, endangers Ukraine, endangers Poland, endangers West, endangers the world. So there's much more at stake than just Poland-Ukraine relations.

Anastasiia Lapatina: This is a perfect note to end on. It's almost like you've done a few podcasts before, professor. Thank you so much. This was very interesting. Thank you for taking your time.

Yaroslav Hrytsak: Thank you.

[Outro]

Anastasiia Lapatina: The Lawfare Podcast is produced by the Lawfare Institute. If you want to support the show and listen ad-free, you can become a Lawfare material supporter at lawfaremedia.org/support. Supporters also get access to special events and other bonus content we don't share anywhere else. If you enjoy the podcast, please rate and review us wherever you listen. It really does help.

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