Figure 1.--The Germans seized Lviv a few days after launching Barbarossa (June 30, 1941). They released this photograph of children playing on an apparently undamaged Red Army tank. It is a back view of the T-34 which is why we do not see the forward cannon. The photograph was released for distribution in the West. They used the German name for the city -- Lemburg. It is the Soviet T-34 tank which would eventually become a legend on the Eastern Front. The Germans destroyed large numbers of Soviet tanks at the onset of Barbarossa. This was in large part because there were so many tanks of obsolete types. Another factopr was that at part of Stalin's Great Terror, most of the Red Army experts on tank warfare were shot or sent to the Gulag. Participation in the Rapallo program where the Germans and Soviets cooperatively developed armored tactics was a virtual NKVD death sentence. Soviet units had begun to receive T-34s, but Red Army commanders sho survuved Stalin's terror had little concept of mobile warfare. Note that the T-34 appears undamaged. The crew appears to have abandoned it.

Lviv (Lwów / Lemburg) was one of Poland's largest cities. It was on the ethnic border between Poland and Ukraine and had a substantial Jewish population. Before World War II it was close to the Soviet (Ukrainian) norder. Lviv is today considered one of the main cultural centres of Ukraine. It was named in honour of Leo, the eldest son of Daniel, King of Ruthenia. It was the medieval capital of the Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia (Kingdom of Ruthenia) (1272-1349). It was was conquered by King Casimir III the Great who became known as the King of Poland and Ruthenia. It was the regional capital of the Ruthenian Voivodeship in the Kingdom of Poland (1434). Austria acquired Galacia as part of the First Partition of Poland (1772). Tsarist Russia seized most of Polans, but the Prussians and Austrians took smaller areas of western and southern Poland. The city became the Austrian capital of the Habsburg Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria. Fighting swirled in and around Lviv in thev aftermath of World War I. The Poles, Ukranians and Soviets all wanted the city. The Poles gained control in the inter=War era. Soviet and NAZI armies fought for Eastern Europe (1939-45). After the German-Soviet invasion of Poland in 1939, Lviv was annexed by the Soviet Union awhen they in cooperated with the NAZIs invaded Poland (September 1939). The NAZIs then seized the vcity when they invaded the Soviet Union (June 1941). Both the Soviets and NAZIs commited terrible atrocities. Soviet Armies drove out the Germans (1944). The Soviet NKVD arrested Polish partisans who fought the Germas. Many were shot, other sent to the Gulag. The Soviet Union annexed the area. Ethnic Poles were expelled to a new Communist Poland established to the West. With the disolution of the Soviet Unin created an nindependent Ukraine and Lviv was made part of it.

Historical Background

Lviv (Lwów / Lemburg) was one of Poland's largest cities. It was on the ethnic border between Poland and Ukraine and had a substantial Jewish population. Before World War II it was close to the Soviet (Ukrainian) norder. Lviv is today considered one of the main cultural centres of Ukraine. It was named in honour of Leo, the eldest son of Daniel, King of Ruthenia. It was the medieval capital of the Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia (Kingdom of Ruthenia) (1272-1349). It was was conquered by King Casimir III the Great who became known as the King of Poland and Ruthenia. It was the regional capital of the Ruthenian Voivodeship in the Kingdom of Poland (1434). Austria acquired Galacia as part of the First Partition of Poland (1772). Tsarist Russia seized most of Poland, but the Prussians and Austrians took smaller areas of western and southern Poland. The city became the Austrian capital of the Habsburg Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria. Fighting swirled in and around Lviv in thev aftermath of World War I. The Poles, Ukranians and Soviets all wanted the city. The Poles gained control in the inter=War era.

World War I Aftermath

After World War, Ukranian nationalists attempted to create an independent Ukranian state. For a short time, Lviv was the capital of the West Ukrainian People's Republic. The Even before Poland was officially independent, fighting broke out between Poles and Ukranians over future national borders. This began at Lwów / Lviv. At the time the city within the collapsing Austro-Hungarian Empire was known by its German name--Lemberg. The Polish-Ukranian War occurred (1918-19). The Soviets suppressed the Ukranisn nationalists in the Russian Civil War (1918-21). Poland seized the area in the Polish-Soviet War (1921-22). The area was the centre of the Lwów Voivodeship in the Second Polish Republic.

Soviet Invasion (September 1939)

Germany and the Soviet Union as allies launched World War II by agreeing to the partition of Poland. The Germans struck first (September 1, 1939). The Germans had largely encuircled Lviv (by September14). ThevSovies struck (September 17). Lviv had been completely encircled by German units. [Kennedy] As the NAZIs and Soviets had in the Secret Protocol to the Molotov Ribbentrop alread agreed on how to divide Poland, the Germans withdrew and delivered the city to the Soviets. Polish authorities in the city surrendered to the Soviets (September 22). The Soviet Union has agreed with the NAZIs annexed the eastern half of Poland. The area had a mixed Belorussian and Ukraanian population with a substantial Jewish minority, primarily in the cities. The city became the capital of the Lviv Oblast formed by the Soviers. The Soviets made an effort to appeal to the Ukraines as part of the annexation process. They reopened uni-lingual Ukrainian schools which the Poles had closed. Some 1,000 schools were closed. [Piotrowski, pp. 201-02.] We believe these were mostly schools in Polish areas. Ukrainian was made the language of instruction at the University of Lviv. Polish language books were mostly desroyed. The Uninersity was Ukrainized. All of the Polish professors as well as Ukranian professors were dismissed. [Magocsi] Many were eventually arrested and disappeared into the Soviet Gulag as part of the joint NAZI and Soviet effort to destroy Polish culture and nationalism. Polish students were expelled. The University was renamed in honor of the Ukrainian author Ivan Franko. Despite the lanaguage moves as one author explains, "Soviet rule turned out to be much more oppressive than Polish rule." [Amar] Ukranians in the Soviet Union already knew that. Lviv despite the Polish occupation had been a rare hotbed of Ukranian culture. Ukranaian nationalist expression was strictly prohibited in the Soviet Union. The Soviets closed many Ukranian publications in Lviv. Journalism except for Communists and Communist sympathizers lost their jobs. [Amar, p. 87.] Like university professors, many journaists were arrested and disappeared into the Gulag. Stalin as part of ending the Great Terror had withdrawn the indiscrinate authority of the NKVD to viciously torture people arrested without specific persission. With the outbreak of the War this authority was reauthorized, especially in the case of Lithuaniuans and Ukranians. [Solzhenitsyn, pp. 99-100.]

Barbarossa: German Invasion (June 1941)

The NAZIs and Soviets could not coexist for ever, despite the huge quantities of oil and other \startegic materials the Soviers were delivering to the NAZIs (1939-41) THe NAZIs struck first (June 22, 1941). Within in a week, the Germans were in Lviv (June 30). The NKD before evacuating Soviets killed most of the their priooners, mostly Ukranian nationalists. Wehrmacht soldiersfomd evidence of the Soviet mass murders in the Lviv. y[58] committed by the NKVD and NKGB. The NKGB was the result of a just completed reorganization and was a unit bwithin the NKVD that focuded on foreign security threats. The Germans has been orgnizing Ukranian militias before the militia. Upon taking Lviv they organized local units and turned them loose on 'Jews and the Bolsheviks. Mass killings in Lviv and the surrounding region totaled 4,000 and 10,000 Jews.

Independent Ukraine (June September 1941)

Yaroslav Stetsko in Lviv proclaimed an independent Ukrainian state allied with NAZI Germany(June 30). This was done without permission of the NAZI authorities. An indepebdent Ukraine was not what HHitler wanted. Not understood by either the Poles or Ukanians is that they were lated for mass murder. At first the focus on Jews, but bas part of Genheralplan Ost they were also to be killed by the millionsn> Unlike the Jews, some were to be spared for a life of slave labor. The NAZI authorities in Lviv with no warning arrested the organizers (September 15).

Soviet-Polish Treaty (July 1941)

The NAZIs and Soviets after invading Poland, paritioned Poland (September 1939). This was provided for under the terms of the NAZI-Soviet Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Both countries launched a horific occupation designed to destroy not only the country, but the very notion of Polish nationality. Polish leaders and the iunteligensia were arrested and many executed in an effort to ensure that Poland would never again become a nation. The NAZIs pursued this policy throughout the War. Soviet policy changed after the NAZI invasion (June 1941). Stalin saw the Poles as possible allies. The Germans rapidly occupied the Soviet eastern zone of pre-War Poland, but the Soviets had large numbers of Poles, both POWS and civilians deported from Poland as part of the process of suppressing Polish resistance. Now with NAZI armies pouring into the Soviet Union, the Soviets were desperate fir allies. And the Poles were an obvious potential ally. The Sikorski–Mayski Agreement between the P London-based Polish Government-in-exile and the Soviet Union. The agreement was signed (July 30). It invalidated the NAZI-Soviet partition of Poland. The Soviets declared it null and void, but would soon renig on that commitment. The agreement also changed the status of the Poles detained in the Soviet Union. They were given the choice of fighting with the Red Army or joining the Polish forces fighting with the Western Allies.

Lviv and Galacia: General Government (August 1941)

The Germans after seizing Galacia (June 1941) incorprated it into into the General Government as District Galizien with Lviv as district's capital (August 1941). This meant that NAZI policies toward Poles and Jews now applied. Germans actions were even more horrendous than Soviet occupation policies. The NAZis murdered Polish university professors. This was a repeat of Aktion A-B German policy was significantly affected by racist ideology. NAZI racial doctrine ranked the Slavs as a people to be eliminated or enslaved. They were willing to make pragmatic war time concessioins and use the Ukranians to an extent. The Ukrainian Galicians, were part of the Austrian Crown Land, and thus the NAZUs viewed thaem as slightly more aryanised and civilised than the Poles and Uktaanians living to the East in the Soviet Union. As a result the Galacian Ukranians escaped the full force of NAZI racial policy. The NAZIs were much more brutal with the Ukrainians to the East which bcame part of theNAZI Reichskommissariat Ukraine.

Murdering Jews (1941-43)

It was the Lviv and other Galacian Jews who felt the full force of NAZI racial policies. The NAZIs by the time of Barbarossa had decided on murder. The Jews in Galacia immediately after the Germans seized the area began concentrating Jews in the Lwów Ghetto which was established in the city's Zamarstynów (Zamarstyniv) district. The NAZIs also established the Janowska concentration camp. There were some 75,000 Yiddish-speaking inhabitants in Lviv (1931). This was probably a good metric for the number of Jews in the city. There are believed to be some 100,000 Jews by 1941 before the arival of the Germans. The increase is presuably Jews escaping the horrors of NAZI occupied Poland before Barbarossa. Killings Jews began with the arrival of the Germarns, but massive killing began when the liquadation of the Ghetto and transport to the Belzac Death Camp (July 1942). Janowska played a role in the killing process. Transports of Jews were processed there. The ones selected for death were stripped naled and packed back on the transports to Belzac. This facilitated the killing process at Belzac. , Very few Jews survived. The NAZIs assumed their atrocities would never be discovered as they were sure they were going to win the War. After Stalingrad (January 1943) and Kursk (July 1943), the situation looked very different. SS Reichführer decided that evidence of mass murder had to be destroyed -- Aktion 1005. He ordered SS-Standartenführer Paul Blobel to destroy the destruction of all evidence of mass murders in the Lviv area. And there was huge mass graves. Not all the Death camps had crematoria. The mrdered Jews had been burried in mass graves. Belzac was one of the daeth camps without crematiria. Blobel began used slave labourers at Janowskato dig up mass graves and incinerated the decaying coprses (June 15). The Janowska inmates were horrified, some even found the bodies of family and people they knew. They staged an uprising and attempted a mass escape (November 19). Most of the inmates were recaptured and killed, but a few escaped. The SS staff and their local auxiliaries finally got around to liquidating the Janowska Camp, murdering 6,000 more inmates. They also began killing the Jews in other slave labor camps in Galicia. The bulk of the killing was done by the end of the year (Devember 1943). A few snall labor camps were nit liquidated until 1944 when the REd Army neared Galacia. Only some 200-800 Jews survived the killing operations in Galicia. [Friedman]

Post War Era

The Soviet NKVD arrested Polish partisans who fought the Germas. Many were shot, other sent to the Gulag. The Soviet Union annexed the area. Ethnic Poles were expelled to a new Communist Poland established to the West. With the disolution of the Soviet Unin created an nindependent Ukraine and Lviv was made part of it.

Sources

Amar, Tarik Cyril. "The Ukrainian encounter," The Paradox of Ukrainian Lviv: A Borderland City between Stalinists, Nazis, and Nationalists (Cornell University Press: 2015). Friedman, Filip. "Zagłada Żydów lwowskich" (Extermination of the Jews of Lwów).

Kennedy, Robert M. The German Campaign in Poland (1939) (U.S. Army: 1956).

Magocsi. Paul Robert. Magocsi. A History of Ukraine (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996).

Piotrowski, Tadeusz (1998). Poland's Holocaust: Ukrainian collaboration (McFarland: 1998).

Solzhenitsyn, Alexsanddr I. Trans, Thomas P. Wjitney. The Gulag Archipelago, 1918-56: An Experiment in Literary Investigation (Harper & Row: New York, 1973), 660p. Solzhenitsyn adds that this as especially the case when a underground organization existed or was suspected.

Created: 7:16 AM 8/12/2019
Last updated: 7:16 AM 8/12/2019