Ukrainians Exploited By Poles Debunked Skrzypek

The Problem of Eastern Galicia, by Stanislaw Skrzypek. 1948

The Myth That Ukrainians Had it Bad in Interwar Poland (1918-1939): Fascinating Facts

Nowadays, Poland’s onetime possession of the Kresy is portrayed as something intrinsically unworkable that was inevitably doomed to failure. This book features seldom-t0ld corrective information:

THE ANCIENT POLISH PRESENCE IN THE KRESY

Poles had been living in what became eastern Galicia since time immemorial. This is proved by the very old towns whose names are of Polish origin (such as Lacka Wola, which is located east of the post-WWII Polish-Soviet, and now Polish-Ukrainian, border.)(p. 20). Later, multitudes of Ukrainians moved into this territory in the wake of the Tatar invasions of Kievan Rus. (p. 2, 19).

LOCAL MINORITY OR NOT, IT WAS THE POLES THAT BUILT EASTERN GALICIA

Skrzypek discusses the Poles’ developing of eastern Galicia. For instance, he writes: “Tarnopol [now Ternopil] was founded in 1540 by Hetman Jan Tarnowski; Stanislawow [Ivano-Frankivsk] in 1654 by Hetman Potocki; Zolkiew [Zhovka] by the family of the famous Hetman Zolkiewski; Brzezany [Berezhany] by the Sieniawskis; Zbaraz [Zbarazh] by the Zbaraski family, etc.” (p. 2).

HOW MANY POLES AND HOW MANY UKRAINIANS?

The author defends the authenticity of the 1931 census.(pp. 23-27). According to it, 41.7% of the population of eastern Galicia used Polish as their mother tongue; but only 30.6% of it was Roman Catholic. Interestingly, 16.2% of the marriages contracted in eastern Galicia, in 1927, were between Poles and Ukrainians. (p. 23).

UKRAINIANS HAD CULTURAL AUTONOMY IN PRE-WWII POLAND

It is fallacious to charge Poles with refusing to give the Ukrainians autonomy; No such promise had ever been made. (p. 52). However, Ukrainian freedoms were so extensive that a de facto autonomy already existed. For instance, the educational and cultural RIDNA SZKOLA (“Native School”) had 51 branches and 4,298 members under Austrian rule in 1910. As part of Poland, it had, in 1936, grown to 1,980 branches and 92,000 members. (p. 50). Similar growth was shown by PROSWITA, SILSKI HOSPODAR, and other Ukrainian institutions.

DISENGENUOUS UKRAINIAN DEMANDS FOR A UKRAINIAN UNIVERSITY IN LWOW (NOW LVIV)

The Ukrainians wanted a Ukrainian university in Lwow; the Poles, fearing an accentuation of Ukrainian separatist impulses, proposed Cracow, but were turned down by the Ukrainians. (p. 50). Still, the Ukrainians got a number of chairs at the Universities of Lwow, Cracow, and Warsaw. (p. 49).

POLAND DID NOT SYSTEMATICALLY DISCRIMINATE AGAINST UKRAINIANS

The Polish government did not abrogate its commitment to minority rights when it denounced the so-called Minorities Treaty in 1934. The USSR and Germany were not bound by this Treaty, yet had used it as a tool to meddle in Poland’s internal affairs. (p. 55).

Nor is it true that Poland kept Ukrainians out of administrative positions. There were Ukrainians in the Seym. (pp. 46-47). Also, the Ukrainians, in 1934, held 36,300 out of 70,600 seats in local government elections. (p. 52). The backwardness of the Ukrainians relative to Poles, rather than Polish discrimination, explains the under-representation of Ukrainians in administrative positions. For instance, even by 1931, 89% of Greek Catholics were still engaged in agriculture as against 69% of Roman Catholics. (p. 28).

UKRAINIAN-POLISH COOPERATION IN RAISING THE STANDARD OF LIVING IN EASTERN GALICIA

The Ukrainians made great strides with their agricultural cooperatives. In addition, the sugar-refining works PODOLE, founded by Ukrainian and Polish capital, was managed jointly by Ukrainians and Poles. (p. 54).

THOSE BIG BAD POLISH LANDLORDS

Both Ukrainian-separatist and Soviet-Communist propaganda had misrepresented Poles in eastern Galicia as privileged landowners of vast estates. In actuality, the overwhelming majority of the Poles owned small tracts of land. (p. 29). Still, some 872,000 acres of Polish-owned landed estates were parceled out from 1919-1939, with over half of the total given to Ukrainians. (p. 54).

THE FARCICAL SOVIET PLEBISCITE OF 1939

After the German-Soviet conquest of Poland, the Soviets tried to legitimize their conquest through the sham plebiscite of October 1939. A plebiscite conducted by a conquering power has no legality whatsoever, and this one was reminiscent of the ones conducted by Catherine the Great in order to justify the Partitions. (p. 18).

THE SOVIET CONFISCATION OF THE KRESY BECOMES PERMANENT

The Churchill-Roosevelt giveaway of these territories to the USSR at Teheran (1943) led to the expulsions of millions of Poles from these lands. This book, although of historical interest even when first written (1948), therefore, stands as a monument both to Soviet and western injustice.