Ukrainian political activist, Ukrainian nationalist, and guerrilla fighter
Mykola Kyrylovych Lebed or Lebid (Ukrainian: Микола Кирилович Лебідь;[lower-alpha 1] January 11, 1909 – July 18, 1998), also known as Maksym Ruban, Marko or Yevhen Skyrba, was a Ukrainian nationalist political activist and guerrilla fighter. He was among those tried, convicted, and imprisoned for the murder of Polish interior minister Bronisław Pieracki in 1934. The court sentenced him to death, but the state commuted the sentence to life imprisonment. He escaped when the Germans invaded Poland in 1939.[1]:73 As a leader of OUN-B, he was responsible for the massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia.[2][3][4]
Quick Facts Born, Died ...
Mykola Lebed
Микола Лебідь
Lebed after his arrest for his role in the murder of Bronisław Pieracki (June 24, 1934)
In 1934, he participated in the preparation of the assassination of the Polish Minister of Internal Affairs Bronisław Pieracki. After the assassination he attempted to flee through Gdańsk-Szczecin to Germany, but by order of Himmler was arrested by the Gestapo and handed over to the Polish authorities.[6] During the Warsaw Process (1934–36) he was given the death penalty which was later commuted to life imprisonment. He escaped in September 1939 while being evacuated from the Bereza Kartuska Prison due to the threatening Soviet invasion.
From November 1939 through March 1940 he served as the chief of the school of espionage and sabotage founded by the Abwehr in Zakopane.
In 1940, during the internal conflict that erupted within the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) he supported Stepan Bandera, and, in 1941, became his assistant. In June 1941, he was one of the functionaries in the short-lived Ukrainian government. In 1942, he was a participant in the 3rd Special Conference of the OUN, and headed the head council and the delegate for external contacts of the Direction of the OUN.
Lebed assumed control of Bandera's faction of the OUN in western Ukraine, which would come to dominate the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) until 1943.[7] As leader of OUN-B, Lebed was responsible for the ethnic cleansing of around 100,000 Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia, including giving orders to carry out the killings.[3][2][4]
In 1944 he became one of the founders of the Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council (UHVR) and the general Secretary of International Policies of the UHVR. At the recommendation of the UHVR he traveled to the West where he contacted various Western governments. In 1948, he became a member of the OUN (Diaspora).
Collaboration with Nazi Germany
In a government reports publication, published by the National Archives,[1] Lebed is being suspected of having collaborated with Nazi Germany.
Lebed was described as a "Ukrainian fascist leader and suspected Nazi collaborator",[8] and later labeled as a "well-known sadist and collaborator of the Germans" by United States Army counterintelligence.[9]
Although some say that Lebed was also persecuted by the Gestapo, it is also known that the OUN/B, in which Lebed was a key player, pursued its own ethnic cleansing policies complementing the German aims. "On the one hand, [OUN/B] fought German rule, and the Gestapo put a price on Lebed's head. On the other, it pursued its own ethnic cleansing policies complementing German aims."[1]
Post-war activities
From 1949, Lebed lived in the United States. During 1952–1974, he headed the Prolog Research Center in New York; in 1982–85, he was Deputy Chairman and since 1974 he was a Member of the Board of Directors of the institution. In 1956-91 he was a member of the board of the Ukrainian Society of Foreign Studies in Munich and Toronto, publishing committee "Chronicle of the UPA (1975). Author memories "UPA" (1946, 1987). Thanks to his collaboration with the CIA and their active shielding of him, Lebed was never tried for the war crimes he and his men had committed against Poles and Jews during WWII.[7]
Lebed proposed in April to "cleanse the entire revolutionary territory of the Polish population," so that a resurgent Polish state would not claim the region as in 1918. Richard Breitman, Norman J.W. Goda, Hitler's Shadow: Nazi War Criminals, U.S. Intelligence, and the Cold War page 75.
The Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) was created in 1942 by a faction of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN). The UPA fought mostly against the Armia Krajowa of Poland and the Red Army in Western Ukraine.
The OUN-UPA men – who were also known as the "Bandera Men" – are accused of several crimes, including killing some 100,000 Poles, Czechs and Jews in the Western Volyn Region. Thousands of Ukrainians who refused to cooperate with them were also murdered. For those activities, Bandera is now considered to be a criminal and a terrorist in Poland. In 1941 UPA leader Bandera urged the Ukrainian people to help Nazis destroy Moscow and the Bolsheviks.
In Western Ukraine, many people see Bandera as a hero. Streets in several cities have been named after him and a monument has also been recently been erected in his name in Lviv. But in eastern, southern and central parts of the country Bandera is seen as a traitor and Nazi sympathizer
Breitman, Richard; Norman J.W. Goda (2010). Hitler's Shadow: Nazi War Criminals, US Intelligence, and the Cold War(PDF). National Archives. p.74. Retrieved 2010-12-12.
This article uses material from the Wikipedia article Mykola_Lebed, and is written by contributors.
Text is available under a CC BY-SA 4.0 International License; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.