FACES AND PLACES: UPA's impossible dream (06/24/01)

FACES AND PLACES

by Myron B. Kuropas

UPA's impossible dream

Throughout history heroic men and women did battle against hopeless odds. Sometimes they won. More often they lost. They remained steadfast in their resolve, however. They never wavered.

Three hundred resolute Greeks fighting off a Persian horde at Thermopylae Pass in the fifth century B.C. are an example of this kind of heroism. Today, their deeds are legend.

Confederate Gen. George Pickett's charge during the Battle of Gettysburg is another much repeated tale of devotion to a hopeless cause. Ordered to attack a union fortification, the general's troops moved out without question. A Union officer recorded what he saw as the rebels advanced, muskets in hand: "More than half a mile their front extends ... man touching man...rank pressing rank ... The red flags wave, their horsemen gallop up and down, the arms of [thirteen] thousand men, barrel and bayonet, gleam in the sun ... Right on they move, as with one soul ... magnificent, grim, irresistible." "It was," another Union officer remembered, "the most beautiful thing I ever saw."

It was also a slaughter: 6,500 Confederates were killed or captured as the tide finally turned in favor of the Union. The Confederate army, however, now hopelessly outnumbered, fought bravely for another two years.

Ireland's struggle against the mighty British empire also began as a hopeless endeavor until independence became a reality. We all marvel at IRA members who just recently were willing to starve themselves to death in a British gaol rather than give up the Irish-Catholic cause in Northern Ireland.

Ukraine has also had its share of heroes who died for a hopeless cause. The Battle of Kruty on January 29, 1918, saw a contingent of 500 young men, mostly students, military cadets and new recruits, hold off a Bolshevik contingent of 4,000 men heading towards Kyiv. Most of the Ukrainian youth perished, but their heroism stalled the Bolshevik advance and bought time for the Ukrainian government to conclude the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, forcing Lenin and Trotsky to recognize Ukraine's independence.

Another heroic but ultimately futile Ukrainian battle against the Soviets occurred in July of 1944. The Ukrainian Waffen SS Division Galicia, attached to the 13th German Army Corps, held off the Red Army's advance on Lviv near the town of Brody. Outnumbered and outgunned, the Galicia Division was decimated. Of the division's 11,000 men, only 3,000 survived.

While we know quite a bit about certain heroic moments in Ukrainian history, there is one chapter that is largely neglected. Precious little has been published about the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), especially in the English language. UPA veterans have recorded their experiences in the multi-volume, Ukrainian-language Litopys UPA, but even these memoirs remain largely unknown. And it's not much better in Ukraine, where many people still cling to the Soviet view of the UPA as a band of Banderite bandits.

Fortunately, the situation is beginning to improve, thanks to Ania Savage, who translated the UPA experiences of Maria Savchyn Pyskir. Titled "Thousands of Roads: A Memoir of a Young Woman's Life in the Ukrainian Underground During and After World War II," hers is a phenomenal story. While still a student, Maria became a member of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), pledging her life to the struggle for Ukraine's independence. Beginning her OUN career as a courier during the Polish occupation when the OUN was an active terrorist organization fighting Poland's vicious suppression of Ukrainian ethnonational life, Maria later became an UPA member during the Nazi and Soviet occupations.

Her life in the UPA was harsh. Serving as a secretary to various UPA leaders, she eventually married one of them, a man called Orlan (Vasyl Italasha). She had two sons and was forced to abandon both of them for the cause. Such discipline was necessary, she believes, "to overcome the fatalism of the Ukrainian Slav." Winters were often spent in underground bunkers. Many of her family members were arrested and sent to Siberia. She experienced privation, wounds from bomb fragments and betrayal by trusted comrades in arms. Fearing capture at one point, she was prepared to die. Twice she was captured by the Soviets.

During one of her interrogations by M.V. Slon, a KGB officer, she was chided for bringing children into the world and then abandoning them. "You wish you had people who would dedicate themselves to Communism the way we dedicated ourselves to our cause," Maria replied without hesitation. Startled by her fervor, Comrade Slon could not respond.

Eventually Maria arrived in the United States, remarried, settled in the Milwaukee area, and bore a son who graduated from West Point.

Lesia and I have known Maria Pyskir and her husband Volodymyr for years. Both are long time leaders of Milwaukee's Ukrainian community. I even stayed at their home in Wauwatosa, Wis., one night. During all this time we had no inkling of Maria's exploits in the UPA.

Lesia and I both read her book, and a few weeks ago we met Maria Pyskir again, this time at a SUM Hall reception in Chicago. Still a handsome, soft-spoken, demure lady, she explained her devotion to the UPA with conviction, and without notes. For the first time we experienced Maria Pyskir, UPA warrior - fiery, devoted, determined.

Was the UPA cause hopeless? "We knew we couldn't beat the Soviets militarily," she told her audience. "We were fighting for the Ukrainian conscience. We were needed; even our death was needed to provide moral strength to the Ukrainian people. Fighting for Ukraine's freedom is never in vain as some people have argued. Listen to the songs of the UPA and you will understand."

The UPA was an impossible dream, kept alive until the 1950s by dedicated souls like Maria Pyskir. Their impact has yet to be appreciated in the United States, and especially in Ukraine where UPA veterans have no status.

Read Maria's story and spread the message. Better yet, invite her to speak in your community. Her story is worth repeating. We need to be reminded that Ukraine's independence was not won by Ukrainian Kuchmaistas, but by Ukraine's true champions - those individuals who were willing to sacrifice their comfort, their families, their careers, even their lives to keep their cherished dream alive.

Myron Kuropas' e-mail address is: [email protected].

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