Direct conflict there was no conflict between Russians and Ukrainians during World War II, because there were no forces that, firstly, represented respectively. Russians and Ukrainians, secondly, there were no organizations (which arrogated to themselves the right to speak on behalf of the entire Russian or Ukrainian people) that would be in direct conflict interaction.
Speaking about both the conventional “Russians” and the conventional “Ukrainians” (hereinafter, quotation marks are used not to offend anyone or to question the existence of both the Russian and Ukrainian peoples, but in order to show the whole convention subjects on whose behalf the following forces acted), one must first of all understand that at this time there were many different forces that could either assign to themselves certain names or the right to speak on behalf of the corresponding nation (the question is whether they actually exist or only in someone’s imagination, let’s leave it aside), or used the corresponding words or ideas in their propaganda, or were considered by allies/enemies to represent relevant interests. To begin with, we provide an approximate list of such organizations. If we talk about conditional “Ukrainians,” then, on the one hand, there was Soviet Ukraine within the USSR. It had its own Communist Party of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks) of Ukraine, its own government (SNK of the Ukrainian SSR), but it goes without saying that it had full subjectivity public education did not have it, being completely subordinate to the decisions of the Stalinist Politburo. On the other hand, there were groups of supporters of Ukrainian independence, which either collaborated with the Germans or opposed both them and the Soviets (and had very complex and extremely confusing relationships with each other). The third party was, of course, the Germans, because... most of the territory of the Ukrainian SSR was included in the imperial commissariat "Ukraine"; a very significant number of Ukrainians served in various German military (as Hilfswillige, auxiliary employees in the German troops; military personnel of the “eastern”, construction and other battalions and other units subordinate to the army command), police (units and divisions of the Schutzmannschaft, auxiliary or city police), security guards (security concentration camps, as well as the staff of the guard school in the Trawniki camp), the SS (14th Volunteer Grenadier Division "Galizien") and other occupation structures.
The same can be said about the so-called “Russians”. On the one hand, one of the countries participating in the Second World War was the USSR, which included the Russian Federation (RSFSR) and which both its own leadership (with a very complex and peculiar motivation) and its allies and opponents by default called “Russia” ", and its citizens - "Russians". But it hardly makes sense to agree with this - despite all the propaganda rhetoric about the “Russian people, the victorious people,” neither the Soviet Union, nor even the Russian Federation as part of it provided the Russian people with any subjectivity either at that time or ever more. In this area, the Soviet government, throughout its existence, quite consistently (with certain course adjustments made in the late 30s and after the war) implemented Lenin’s policy formulated by the founder of the Soviet state in 1922: “Internationalism from the side of the oppressor or the so-called “ “a great” nation [i.e. Russian]… must consist not only in maintaining the formal equality of nations, but also in such inequality that would compensate on the part of the oppressing nation, the large nation, for the inequality that actually develops in life.” So, in Russian Federation there was no communist party of its own (as V. Molotov told F. Chuev, “we did not forget to create (the Communist Party of the RSFSR. - V.Zh.). There was simply no place for it"); The RSFSR itself was not a “Russian republic,” as follows from the words of I. Stalin himself: “We actually do not have a Russian republic. We have a Russian Federative Republic. It is not Russian, it is Russian.” And even in the post-war period, which is considered by many to be the time of virtually state Great Russian nationalism, the situation remained virtually unchanged - for example, during the “Leningrad Affair” those who promoted the project of creating the Russian Bolshevik Communist Party and, possibly, giving Leningrad the status of the capital of the RSFSR were repressed. Until the very end of the Soviet system, Russian nationalism was in a very vulnerable position - if non-systemic nationalist organizations (such as VSKhSON) were subject to dispersal, and their participants were subjected to long-term imprisonment in camps and prisons, then the nationalist opposition within the power structures and in literary circles although she was sometimes influential, she was never allowed to become a center of power, including using the KGB against the “nationalists.” Therefore, talking about the USSR as a party representing Russian national interests in this war makes no sense.
On the other hand, there were anti-Soviet organizations that considered themselves entitled to speak on behalf of the Russian people and represent their interests. By origin they were of two types - emigrants and from among Soviet prisoners of war; during the war they were largely mixed (emigrants participated in projects of former prisoners of war, prisoners of war joined emigrant organizations). Some of them collaborated with the Germans, some were created directly by them (the Germans), and several more organizations acted virtually illegally, at their own peril and risk. A noticeable number of Russians (as well as Ukrainians, as mentioned above) worked or served with the Germans - in the occupation authorities, police, Wehrmacht, SS. Nevertheless, despite such fragmentation (directly encouraged personally by Adolf Hitler, who was an absolute, principled and implacable opponent of granting any occupied peoples even a hint of any small autonomy), thanks to a certain confluence of circumstances, by the end of 1944 the Russian national movement took shape in The Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia (KONR), the Chairman of the Presidium of which was former Lieutenant General of the Red Army Andrei Vlasov, who at the same time became the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the KONR (the latter are usually called the ROA, which is not entirely correct). General Vlasov had the status of commander-in-chief of the army allied with Germany (he was never in German service). As the de facto head of the entire Russian national movement, General Vlasov was recognized by almost all authoritative leaders of both Russian emigrant organizations (and almost all Cossack organizations, with the exception of General P. Krasnov), and the commanders of individual armed formations, both of emigrant origin and created by the Germans from Soviet prisoners of war (Russian Corps in the Balkans, Cossack camp, etc.). Therefore, KONR can be considered in some sense a representative of the Russian people, but only to a limited extent - yes, this organization to some extent represented the interests of the Russians before the German authorities and command, and also tried to protect the interests of the “eastern workers” forcibly driven away from the USSR ( ostarbeiters, ostovtsy - that’s what they were called), but it is quite obvious that the Russian people themselves, who lived in Russia, never vested this organization with any powers.
So, a lot of words have been said about who can be considered the supposed parties to the hypothetical conflict between “Russians” and “Ukrainians,” but did this conflict actually happen? Obviously, no, or rather, if there was, it would be in a limited sense and very local. Why?
So, neither those controlled by the USSR (the party and the Council of People's Commissars of the Ukrainian SSR, the Ukrainian headquarters of the partisan movement), nor those controlled by the Germans (who were repressed by the Germans when they showed the slightest independence, such as the Ukrainian Central Rada created by the OUN (m)) Ukrainian organizations could not carry out any independent policy, they they only acted in accordance with the policies pursued by the forces leading them. For the same Ukrainian groups that tried to pursue a more or less independent policy up to the fight against both the Germans and the USSR, the concepts of “USSR” and “Russia” were almost identical (the first was broader due to ideological connotations, and this gave rise to certain nuances ), and the struggle of Ukrainian nationalists and their armed groups against Soviet power both before, during, and after the war, they thought of both the fight against the “Muscovite enslavers” and the fight against communism (in principle, there would be no mistake in calling the same S. Bandera a fascist - not a Nazi, namely a fascist, in the broad sense; especially since such confessions were made by his associates), i.e. V in a certain sense for them it was a conflict between two nations, however conditional the existence of such. For the USSR, Ukrainian nationalists were ideological opponents - Ukrainian nationalism was recognized primarily as an ideology hostile to the Soviet system, but not to the Russian or any other people. There was some semblance of a conflict between the forces controlled by the Germans - for example, it was planned to include representatives of Ukrainian movements in the mentioned Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia, for which purpose negotiations were held between General Vlasov and Taras Bulba-Borovets, but they were inconclusive, after which the latter blamed the general Vlasov in lies, calling him a “communist”. That, in fact, is the whole “conflict between Russians and Ukrainians in World War II.”
As they said earlier, there was no specific conflict between Ukrainians and Russians in its pure form as such. There was a conflict between the Soviet Union as a state and individual formations of Ukrainian nationalists in Western Ukrainian lands.
It all started with the Ribentrop-Molotov Pact between the USSR and Germany and the conquest, as a result of its conclusion, by the Soviet Union in 1939 of parts of Western Ukrainian lands that were previously part of Poland. In these lands, for many years, on the basis of cultural, religious, and other oppression of the Ukrainian population by the Polish government, a conflict smoldered; there were Ukrainian organizations (including extremist and separatist ones) that fought for separation from Poland and the creation of a Ukrainian national state. So, after arriving Soviet communists, who immediately began to “integrate” the local population into the Soviet state, local nationalist forces received a new enemy in return for Poland, which was defeated and divided between Nazi Germany and the USSR.
Invaded Soviet Union in 1941, the Germans became “the enemy of my enemy” for Ukrainian nationalists, and the first skillfully took advantage of this by promising to realize the dream of the Ukrainian people—a national state. Of course, at that time the current horrors of Nazism were not widely known to a wide circle persons, and the times were harsh - the global war raised the bar of acceptable cruelty in people's minds. Therefore, individual Ukrainian nationalist forces willingly participated in the military campaign of Nazi Germany against the communists who had recently shed blood and repressed them. The Soviet communists perceived this as aiding the enemy, collaborationism with the corresponding “organizational conclusions.” However, I’m not sure that the population of a territory conquered a year ago can be called collaborators if they united in the fight against you with your own enemy. It should also be noted that from time to time Ukrainians in Western Ukrainian lands fought both against the Germans and against the Soviet communists. But, at the same time, the leadership of Ukrainian nationalist organizations and individual Ukrainian national formations in the service of Nazi Germany, they committed war crimes, which had an extremely negative impact on their reputation and cast doubt on their motivation.
One way or another, it’s difficult to say now who is right and who is wrong, because both of them “messed up the woods.” It seems to me that in those conditions it was extremely difficult to conduct a successful military campaign, adhering to all the rules of warfare.
In a historical context, Russians and Ukrainians are always perceived as allies. This is largely due to the fact that most of the time the lands of modern Ukraine were part of Russian Empire, and later in the USSR.
However, history remembers several Russian-Ukrainian conflicts. True, most of them were in the nature of an uprising, and only one conflict was truly a war of two states.
Ruin (1657-1687)
After the death of Bogdan Khmelnytsky, a riot broke out in the lands of modern Ukraine. Civil War, which was called Ruin. This is how Ivan Vygovsky came to power, who was a supporter of the unification of Ukraine with Lithuania and Poland. The Cossack army rebelled against him, and received Russian support. By and large, it was more of a conflict between Russia and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth over the territory of Ukraine, however, Ukrainians took an active part in this war, which is why it was included in the list.
The result of the Ruin was the division of Ukrainian lands between Poland and Russia.
Mazepa in the Northern War (1708-1709)
During this period, the Northern War broke out between Russia and Sweden. During its course, the Cossack Hetman Mazepa went over to the side of Sweden and promised to support it with troops and supplies.
During this period, an agreement was signed between Ukraine and Sweden, during which Ukraine was to become an independent state under a Swedish protectorate.
The only battle where Mazepa’s army managed to take part was Battle of Poltava. The united Swedish-Ukrainian army was defeated, and Mazepa's hopes for sovereignty were not destined to come true.
Koliivshchyna (1768)
In 1768, the Russian protege Stanislav Poniatovsky became the ruler of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, who proclaimed the equality of all Christian religions on the territory of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.
However, the radical Polish gentry opposed this decision, and mass persecution of Orthodox Christians began. Refusing to accept this state of affairs, the Ukrainian Cossacks, whose lands were part of Poland, launched their own uprising against the Catholics.
To prevent the unrest from developing into a full-fledged civil war, Russia sent its army into the territory of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which suppressed both uprisings, even despite the fact that the Cossacks, by and large, were on the side of Russia.
After the 1917 coup, a large-scale civil war began on the territory of the former Russian Empire. Meanwhile, the creation of an independent Ukrainian People's Republic was proclaimed in Ukraine.
Of course, this turn of affairs did not please the Bolsheviks, so Bolshevik detachments were deployed against the newly-minted UPR. At first, they successfully advanced deeper into the territories and even captured Kyiv, but the UPR turned to Western countries, and a contingent of troops was stationed on its territory to guarantee the independence of the young country.
However, after the end of the First World War, Western troops were withdrawn from the territory of the UPR and the Bolsheviks made a new attempt to seize it, which was successful.
Ukrainian Insurgent Army (1941-1953)
After the occupation of Ukraine by German troops, some part of the population went over to the enemy’s side, others fought on the side of the Soviet regime, but there were also those who decided to quietly achieve the independence of Ukraine.
This is how the UPA was formed. Contrary to popular belief, they did not fight on the side of the Wehrmacht, but this does not change the fact that several heated skirmishes occurred between the soldiers of the Red Army and the UPA.
With the end of the war, the UPA fighters went underground and then completely disappeared.
The fight in Turkey on July 18, 2014 between Russians and Ukrainians, the video of which ended up on YouTube, where people around the world watch it, turned out to be only part of the conflict that took place in a hotel in Kemer. Quarrel between guys different countries began with the very arrival on vacation, and the fight in Kemer between Russians and Ukrainians became the final note. And although a video of the fight hit the Internet, the details of the previous events are known only to direct witnesses.
The sensational fight in Turkey, in which Russian and Ukrainian guys took part, is gradually becoming more detailed. The media are keenly interested in this topic, so new facts emerge every day. Meanwhile, the man who became, one might say, the progenitor of this story, opened all the cards, telling what was happening in Turkey that day.
Sister young man, who witnessed the fight and the whole situation, said that her brother sent her a whole story about how Russians and Ukrainians clashed in Kemer. The girl, without hesitation, posted part of his message in one of social networks, to amuse friends, but everything went much further, Metro reports. Suddenly, the media became interested in the fight, and the story began to spread with incredible speed.
It turned out that the conflict began from the very day of arrival. When all the vacationers gathered in the hotel lobby, the Ukrainians, realizing that the Russians were nearby, immediately began to fight, already indicating a conflict. The St. Petersburg guys at first did not pay attention to the Kyiv nationalists, but took note that they needed to be careful. And in the evening the second phase of the quarrel began.
So, after a hearty dinner, when residents of different countries were again in sight of each other, the Ukrainians again could not resist caustic comments and started a quarrel. The Russian guys did not remain silent and a fight broke out, which, however, quickly subsided. Probably because hotel workers were nearby and quickly separated the overexcited young people.
But the unfinished business haunted the Ukrainians, and at about two o’clock in the morning, when the blood boiled from the amount of alcohol consumed, loud screams were heard again in the hotel, the people of Kiev were literally chanting offensive words towards Russian holidaymakers. This time the fight turned out to be much longer and more spectacular.
Dozens of guys collided, furiously trying to push each other. Sun loungers and chairs flew into pieces, hitting the backs of opponents. Every minute splashes of water were heard in the pool, where either Ukrainians or Russians fell. Later, Muscovites, and then the Turks, came to the aid of the St. Petersburg guys. By that time, the hotel staff had already called the police, so after some time all those fighting had to face the law.
The Ukrainians, as the sister of an eyewitness told the Metro newspaper, had to pay a certain amount of money for the destroyed hotel; in addition, the Kiev residents were forced to give part of the money to the police in order not to end up behind bars.
Video: youtube “Fight in a hotel in Turkey” (2013)
They leave the beaches and restaurants
Tourists returning from holidays in Egypt, Turkey and Greece complain about the attitude of Russians towards them. “I went to Turkey for a week alone, without company. There were few Russian speakers at the hotel, so I was bored. One evening in a hotel cafe I met a whole group of Russians, we walked together, and then one of them asked: “Are you from Moscow?” I replied that they were from Kyiv, they started yelling something about the fascists and the junta. I literally ran away. A couple of days later we found ourselves nearby on the beach, and although there were free sun loungers near me, they went somewhere to the other end of the beach and didn’t even say hello,” says Kiev resident Elena Burmachenko.
On travel forums, people complain about similar situations in hotel restaurants - when Russians refused to sit at the same breakfast table with Ukrainians. According to Oleg Kulik, co-founder of the “Come with us” travel agency network, there are no large-scale fights this year, but isolated brawls do occur. “When a couple of tipsy Russians meet equally tipsy Ukrainians and the issue of politics comes up, fights happen, but they usually don’t last very long, because the conflicting people are separated by the hotel administration or their friends,” Kulik told us.
“They hit furniture and each other”
Hotel staff also admit that there is tension. The manager of the Royal Royana hotel in Sharm el-Sheikh, Anastasia, says that this year there have already been several clashes between Russians and Ukrainians. “But our security service, understanding the situation, is especially watching the tourists, and therefore managed to separate them in time,” she said. The manager of the Pyramiza hotel said that a week ago there was a conflict on ethnic grounds in a neighboring hotel. “It was a drunken fight, they hit furniture and each other. It didn’t last long, about five minutes, but the damage was severe. They decided not to call the police, the tourists agreed to pay everything,” he explained.
Hiding the bracelet
Problems arise not only among our tourists, but also among Ukrainians who work in Egypt and Turkey. “I came to work as an animator two weeks ago. And then some kind of cruelty began. My responsibilities include conducting yoga and aqua aerobics classes, and when the Russian tourists found out that I was Ukrainian, they raised a scandal, called the administration demanding to explain why they were not immediately told that they would have to work with Benderovka, and then left. Most of the girls who work at my hotel are also from Russia, and even some of them don’t want to communicate with me,” Ekaterina Kudina from Zaporozhye, who now works as an animator in one of the hotels in Sharm el-Sheikh, told us.
According to her, some tourists from Ukraine try not to advertise where they came from. “In some hotels, tourists are given bracelets whose colors correspond to the flag of their country. So, our tourists sometimes turn their bracelets over so that no one understands that they are Ukrainians,” says Ekaterina.
Russians on forums also complain about tourists from Ukraine. “They used to relax nearby, and everything was fine, but now if they drink, then all their toasts are “Glory to Ukraine!”, And some drunks even shout after the Russians, “Putin is f..lo,” writes a user from Nizhny Novgorod.
Hotels for Ukrainians will appear soon
To avoid unpleasant situations on vacation, many Ukrainians, even before purchasing a tour, ask for a hotel without Russian tourists. “Such requests are very common. And there are tour operators who meet halfway and offer hotels themselves, in which there may not be absolutely no Russians, because this is practically impossible, but there are few of them,” Alexander Novikovsky, president of the Association of Travel Business Leaders, told us.
He does not rule out that in the near future some tour operators will switch exclusively to serving Ukrainian tourists. Oleg Kulik adds: there are already travel agencies that display Ukrainian flags near their hotels - this means that there are practically no Russians there.
On Sunday, November 25, an armed clash occurred in the Black Sea, as a result of which three ships of the Ukrainian Navy were captured by the Russian FSB border service. "Reedus" presents a complete chronology of the events of the past day.
Beginning of the conflict
The first reports of violations of the state border of the Russian Federation by Ukrainian ships began to appear on Sunday morning. According to the Russian FSB, three Ukrainian military vessels - the armored boats Nikopol and Berdyansk, as well as the tugboat Yany Kapu - at about 7 a.m. Moscow time.
Ships maneuver dangerously and do not obey legal requirements Russian authorities, - said one of the first official statements of the FSB.
In response to the insubordination of the Ukrainian sailors, Russian border guards tried to push the tugboat Yany Kapu out of Russian waters with a ram. One of the Russian warships made an attack on the vessel that violated the border.
The Ukrainian side promptly responded to the incident, declaring the aggressive actions of the Russian military, allegedly attacking a group of Ukrainian Navy ships that were making a “scheduled passage from Odessa to Mariupol.”
As a result of the collision, the tug "Yany Kapu" received damage to the engine, casing and railing, however, despite the efforts of Russian border guards, all three vessels continued their movement towards the Kerch Strait, separating the Black and Azov Seas.
At 11:30 am, two more warships of the Ukrainian Navy will meet the Berdyansk, Nikopol and Yany Kapu from the port of Berdyansk in the Sea of Azov.
Kyiv continues to ignore the demands of the Russian Federation to stop maneuvers in Russian waters, which is why CEO Crimean seaports Alexey Volkov decides to close the passage through Kerch Strait for the passage of civil vessels in order to ensure navigation safety.
On Sunday afternoon, the Russian side's reaction to the actions of the Ukrainian sailors begins to arrive. Many politicians and experts are taking their aggressive actions with the direct instructions of President Petro Poroshenko.
Moscow calls the invasion of Ukrainian ships into Russian waters a provocation, and a version is expressed about the plans of the head of Ukraine to achieve the introduction of martial law in the country.
Attack and capture
After a short information lull, which lasted until Sunday evening, at about 22:00 Moscow time, a statement from the Ukrainian Navy appeared about the Berdyansk, Nikopol and the already damaged Yany Kapu. In Kyiv, they report the appearance of the first wounded, as well as the failure of one of the armored boats.
An hour later, the press service of the Ukrainian naval department announced the seizure of all three ships by Russian special forces. At the same time, Russian news agencies, citing information from the FSB, report that the Ukrainian ships that came to the rescue “set on a reverse course and are heading to Berdyansk.”
Only after midnight does an official statement from the Russian side appear about the fate of Berdyansk, Nikopol and Yana Kapu. To the FSB about the seizure of ships, we're talking about about three wounded Ukrainian sailors who received timely medical assistance. Russian security forces also confirm information about the use of weapons on their part.
At this time, President Petro Poroshenko of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine. It decides to introduce martial law in the country for a period of 60 days. A plenary meeting of deputies of the Verkhovna Rada is scheduled for Monday, November 26, where the plan of the Ukrainian National Security Council can be finally approved.
Shortly after a meeting of the National Security Council of Ukraine, a fire breaks out near the Russian embassy in Kyiv. About 200 aggressive young people are chanting “Death to Russia!” and throw smoke bombs at the territory of the diplomatic mission.
International reaction
On November 26, Russia intends to discuss the situation in the Black Sea with member countries of the UN Security Council. As it became known from the words of First Deputy Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation Dmitry Polyansky, Moscow intends to convene an emergency meeting of the organization’s Security Council “in connection with the dangerous development of the situation in the Sea of Azov and the events that followed.”
Meanwhile, some states have already made statements regarding the Sunday incident. Thus, Estonia and Canada condemned Russia’s actions, calling on Moscow to return “illegally seized ships” to Ukraine, Interfax reports.
New official statements and comments in connection with the incident are expected to appear in the coming hours.
