Turning the pages back... December 22, 1945 (12/16/01)

Turning the pages back...

December 22, 1945

On December 22, 1945, The Ukrainian Weekly's front page focused on the issue of forced repatriation of Ukrainian refugees from the Soviet Union.

"Today, December 22, appears to be a veritable doomsday for Ukrainian displaced persons in a certain sector of the American occupation zone in Germany-Austria," reported The Weekly. "According to recent cables from Europe, despite all their pleas and efforts to the contrary, today they will be sent to Soviet camps and from there to the USSR and to the persecution, suffering and perhaps death which will be their lot under Red totalitarian misrule."

A cable sent by the Ukrainian Relief Committee in Belgium and relayed to the Ukrainian Congress Committee by the Ukrainian Canadian Committee, read: "Brussels is advised that Office Military Government APO 758 ordered all Soviet displaced persons must be sent December eighth to Soviet repatriation camps at Neunkirschen and Stuttgart 19001 East 3000 West Side American Zone. ... Ukrainians requested delay limit for two weeks [ending today, December 22 - Editor] to die Christianly. Authorities agreed. Eight self-murders reported at Mannheim. Urgently request the obtaining of cancellation of above order."

A cable confirming that information was received on December 18 from the Ukrainian Relief Bureau in Paris by the United Ukrainian American Relief Committee in America. The message read: "According to order of Col. Newman and Capt. Wallach of Grosshessen Military Government in Wissbaden of November 27, 1945, all Ukrainian former Soviet subjects have to cease work as German civilians before 22 December of this year and to gather in Soviet camps to be sent back to (Soviet) Union. Most of them are preparing to die and have received Holy Sacraments. Please do your utmost to have the order rescinded."

Stephen Shumeyko, president of Ukrainian Congress Committee of America [as well as editor of The Ukrainian Weekly], appealed for a cancellation of the military order decreeing the forced repatriation in messages sent to President Harry S. Truman, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower and several members of Congress; a special cable was sent to Secretary of State James F. Byrnes care of the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, where he was attending the Big Three Ministers Conference.

The cable to Mr. Byrnes underscored: "Although at the Foreign Ministers Council meeting in London our country's representatives took a stand against the forcible repatriation by Soviet authorities of displaced persons in the American zone of occupation in Central Europe, and although at about the same time Gen. Eisenhower directed that no American soldiers lend themselves in any way to the forcible repatriation of the DPs, of whom the Ukrainians form the majority, nevertheless forcible repatriation of them continues to this day and threatens to get worse. ..."

The cable ended with an appeal to Secretary of State Byrnes to do everything possible to help rescind the order dooming Ukrainian displaced persons to certain persecution, suffering and even death.

According to the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, repatriation was the Allies' main solution to the problem of displaced persons, and the legal basis of the policy of repatriation was enshrined in the Yalta Agreement of February 1945. By the fall of 1945 most U.S. generals were objecting to the use of force in repatriation of DPs from the USSR. In late December 1945 the Americans exempted the remaining displaced Soviet citizens from forced repatriation, though the British continued to assist the Soviets for about another half year. Nonetheless, the Soviet repatriation team did not leave Western Europe until March 1949.

The encyclopedia notes that some 2 million Ukrainians were repatriated to the USSR by mid-1945 and another 40,000 to 60,000 were repatriated after that period.

Source: "Threatened With Forcible Repatriation," The Ukrainian Weekly, December 22, 1945; "Repatriation," Encyclopedia of Ukraine, Vol. IV, Toronto: University of Toronto Press Inc., 1993.

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