Beginning in March 1943, and lasting until early 1945, a violent ethnic cleansing operation against Poles – conducted primarily by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) – occurred in the regions of Eastern Galicia and Volhynia (now in Western Ukraine).
The most thorough is the work of Ewa and Władysław Siemaszko, the result of years of research conducted with the goal of demonstrating that the Poles were victims of genocide.
Nonetheless, the 45 years of state censorship resulted in an excessive supply of works described as "heavy in narrative", "light in analysis" and "inherently – though perhaps unconsciously – biased against Ukrainians.
"[1] The Polish historiography of the Volyn tragedy during the dictatorship of the communist party can be broken down into three periods:[2] In the early People's Republic of Poland, the question of the Polish–Ukrainian conflict was never a subject of independent studies.
[7] This category includes the works of Ryszard Torzecki,[7][8] who explained the reason for the conflict as Hitlerite politics based on the tenet of divide and conquer, the chauvinism of Ukrainian nationalists, and Ukrainian-Polish disagreements in the interbellum, which were used by the Nazis in their interests.
Officially the book was dedicated to the activities of the Ukrainian nationalists in the interbellum but it also explained that the conflict had its origins in the late 19th century, and that the Volyn tragedy was a continuation of the terror campaigns of 1918-1939.
In his opinion, the use of a journalistic style, falsification, and manipulation reflect the state of Polish historiography in the last years of the communist Poland.
[12] He ascribes the reason for the Volyn tragedy to the inadequate policies of the Polish government in the interbellum and the destruction of moral society during the Soviet and German occupations.
In the article from 1991, he divides "Volhynian terror" into the following stages: Olszański underlines the influence of numerous provocations by the NKVD and Soviet partisans in the occupied zones in directing conflict against the UPA.
Vast numbers of peasants participating in anti-Polish attacks, together with UPA units or individually, were also motivated by numerous Banderist agitators and by communist agents from the north of Volhynia.
He points that field organizations of the OUN were penetrated by communist agents and in some instances Soviet units disguised as UPA murdered Poles to gain support of local Polish population.
"[14] Zbigniew Kowalewski's study (1993)[17] stated that the role of the auxiliary police and its collaboration with Soviet Polish diversionist-partisan groups provoked the Ukrainians to use force.
Kowalewski introduces the thesis that the reason why OUN changed its strategy regarding the Poles in 1944–45 was in order to form a unified Polish-Ukrainian front against the USSR.
This would explain the waves of OUN propaganda that were spread in the Polish population regarding the formation of a unified front and the cessation of retributive actions.
[18] One of the first such studies was undertaken by J. Turowski and Władysław Siemaszko in 1990, based on 350 eyewitness accounts from veterans of the Polish Home army regarding the anti-Polish terror in Volyn.
Subsequently, Władysław with daughter Ewa Siemaszko – in their own ten-year-long research project – went on to document murders committed on Polish citizens by Ukrainian Insurgents in some 1,865 villages and towns of Volhynia during the Nazi and Soviet occupations.
Their books were based on witness accounts, court documents including transcripts from trials of Ukrainian war criminals, as well as the Polish national archives and statistical censuses.
The liberal-democratic movement is represented by the works of Ryszard Torzecki[28] which reviewed the thesis put forward during the communist administration and developed a framework for further scholarship.
Describing concrete incidence of terror in Volyn, he states that the pivotal moment for the development of bloodshed came with the transfer of armed Ukrainian police into the forests.
He lays blame personally on Roman Shukhevych, who was accustomed to dealing with problems from a position of force, and would consider using terror on the civilian population.
[31] Grzegorz Motyka and Rafal Wnuk point out that at the end of World War II there was a real potential for Polish–Ukrainian dialogue and understanding.
[dubious – discuss] Encouraged by the mass desertion of the Ukrainian police, Dmytro Kliachkivsky (Klym Savur) initiated a wave of UPA attacks against the Polish civilian population.
By Autumn 1944 most of the anti-Polish actions stopped and terror was used only against those who co-operated with the NKVD, and the Ukrainians leaders had understood that it was time to unite with the Poles against the USSR.
In his latest studies,[citation needed] Motyka attempts to synthesize the main concepts of both current directions in Polish historiography, analyzing and understanding the problem of anti-Polish terror in Volyn, the reasons and the results, in order to induce the Ukrainians to officially condemn the activities of the OUN and UPA.
This is evident by the treatment of the Ukrainian–Polish conflict as an episode of purely Polish history; focusing attention to the anti-Polish terror of the UPA and demanding that the Ukrainians condemn these actions.
Despite publishing a number of works devoted to the history of UPA, the Ukrainian emigration researchers (with only few exceptions) remained completely mute about the Volyn events for many years.
[39] The active collection and publication of information regarding the Volyn Tragedy began in the summer of 2002 after it became known that Kresy organizations (made up of AK veterans and various Associations) were planning to hold commemorations in memory of only the Polish victims of the conflict.
[48] According to the Polish historian Grzegorz Motyka Tsaruk's research didn't change his point of view on Volhynia events: that the Ukrainian nationalists were responsible for beginning and escalating the massacres of Poles.
[50] Tsaruk's criticism of Polish historiography was echoed by Ihor Ilyushin, a prominent Ukrainian historian tasked with investigating the events in Volhynia.