Massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia - Background

Background

Polish-Ukrainian tensions date back several hundred years, with territorial, religious, and social dimensions, and the Khmelnytsky Uprising of the 17th century persisted in the national memories of both groups. While not always harmonious, the Poles and Ukrainians interacted with each other on every civic, economic, and political level throughout hundreds of years. With the rise of nationalism in the 19th century, the ethnicity of citizens became an issue, and the conflicts erupted anew after the First World War. Both Poles and Ukrainians claimed the territories of Volhynia and Eastern Galicia. The political conflicts escalated in the Second Polish Republic during the interwar period, particularly in the 1930s as a result of a cycle of terrorist actions by the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, formed in Poland, and the ensuing state repressions. Collective punishment meted out to thousands of mostly innocent peasants exacerbated animosity between the Polish state and the Ukrainian population.

At the onset of World War II, with Soviet invasion and annexation of the area in 1939–1941 (see: Polish September Campaign), militant Ukrainian nationalist extremists, distrustful of Polish territorial ambitions, saw an opportunity to cleanse Polish influence from territory historically considered to be Ukrainian and to exact retribution for the Polonization which the re-established Polish state had inflicted upon the Ukrainians. Killings of Poles in Volhynia and Galicia started soon after the Soviet annexation of the territory, climaxed during the German occupation, and continued after the Soviets re-occupied the Western Ukraine into the last year of the war.