Formed in 1943, it was mainly deployed in the Eastern Front of World War II in combat against the Red Army and in the repression of Soviet, Polish, and Yugoslav guerrilla partisans.

It was largely destroyed in the Lvov–Sandomierz offensive, reformed, and saw action in Slovakia, Yugoslavia, and Austria before being transferred to the command of the Ukrainian National Committee on 14 April 1945, a change that was only partially implemented amidst the collapse of Germany, and surrendering to the Western Allies by 10 May 1945.

It was originally known as the SS-Volunteer Division "Galicia" (German: SS-Freiwilligen-Division "Galizien", Ukrainian: Добровільна Дивізія СС "Галичина", romanized: Dobrovilna Dyviziia SS "Halychyna") from its creation until October 1943.

[5] The Ukrainian population of Galicia developed a strong national consciousness while the region was an Austrian province, more so than people in the rest of Ukraine, which during that same time period was part of the Russian Empire and then the Soviet Union.

[7] Regardless, in early 1920 the leaders of the Ukrainian People's Republic, which was being overrun by the Red Army, signed a treaty that gave Poland the entirety of Galicia in exchange for military support against the Soviets.

Adolf Hitler decided to invade to destroy Communism and to obtain Lebensraum, living space, for Germany in the east, as well as to gain access to more natural resources.

[16] The Nazi Party regarded Ukrainians and other Slavs as subhumans, and therefore when the OUN-B leaders reached the Galician capital Lviv on 30 June 1941 and declared an independent government of Ukraine, they were arrested by the security service of the SS.

It had no political status and was meant to organize social and welfare services for the western Ukrainian population,[30] including by cooperating with the International Red Cross, and throughout the occupation it appealed to German officials to minimize or prevent brutal policies from being imposed.

[34] The Galicia Division was supported by Andriy Melnyk's moderate faction of the OUN, who saw it as a counterweight to the extremist Banderite-dominated UPA, and by some officers of the former Ukrainian People's Republic, such as General Mykhailo Omelianovych-Pavlenko.

A bulletin published by them in May 1943 criticized the creation of a German-led Ukrainian division, as it would deprive their nationalist movement of potential recruits by using them as cannon fodder, and went on to say that it represented colonialism, comparing the idea to the British Indian Army.

[47] The division's chief of staff from January 1944 until the end of the war,[48] Wehrmacht Major Wolf-Dietrich Heike, noted that there was a shortage of German officers and NCOs,[49] and that many of them were unsuited for working with the Ukrainians because of cultural differences.

[53] Personnel who required specialized training in different fields (such as anti-tank warfare, communications, animal equipment maintenance, or combat engineering), and those who were selected to become officers, NCOs, or chaplains, were sent to various other locations throughout Europe before returning to the rest of the division.

During their training the recruits also received two hours per week of political education by company commanders in National Socialism, which aimed to instill in them the belief in the victory of the Third Reich.

[58] Shortly after Freitag departed, in mid-February 1944 the division received an order to form a Kampfgruppe (battlegroup) of one infantry regiment and one detachment each of artillery, sappers, anti-tank grenadiers to go into combat against Sydir Kovpak's Soviet partisan group, which entered Poland from Belarus.

[69] On 18 July, the division's Field Replacement Battalion largely escaped the encirclement and were reported as having fled west, whilst the remainder of XIII Corps, consisting of over 30,000 German and Ukrainian soldiers, was surrounded by the Soviets within the Brody pocket.

Pidhirtsy changed hands several times before the Galicians were finally overwhelmed by the late afternoon, and at Olesko a major Soviet attack using T-34 tanks was repulsed by the division's Fusilier and Engineer battalions.

[64][70][71] On 20 July, the German divisions within the pocket attempted a breakout which failed partly because rain on the previous day had made the roads impassable for the armour of III Panzer Corps which was striking north to relieve the entrapped forces, despite early successes.

[87][88] German commanders and members of Tiso's Slovak government acknowledged that the Ukrainians from the Galicia Division had a significant role in fighting the uprising in northwest Slovakia.

On 25 January 1945 the division received an order to move from Slovakia to the Austria–Slovenia border region, in occupied Yugoslavia, to be subordinated to the Higher SS and Police Leader in Ljubljana.

The current commander, Freitag, had received notice ahead of time from Fritz Arlt of the SS Eastern Volunteers Office informing him of the agreement with the Ukrainian National Committee.

[99][105] But because of the situation at the front line and the rapid advance of the Western Allies and the Soviets, the 1st Ukrainian Division remained in effect part of the German military right up to the end of the war.

[108] Among the German commanding officers of Waffen-SS Galizien were SS-Hauptsturmführer Heinrich Wiens, who had served with Einsatzgruppen D, which carried out the annihilation of Jews, Communists, and partisans in occupied eastern Ukraine, and SS-Obersturmbannführer Franz Magill.

[125] Yale historian Timothy Snyder noted that the division's role in the Massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia was limited, because the murders were primarily carried out by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army.

[134] Polish witness accounts state that the soldiers were accompanied by Ukrainian nationalists (paramilitary unit under Włodzimierz Czerniawski's command), which included members of the UPA, as well as inhabitants of nearby villages who took property from households.

[136] The Polish Institute of National Remembrance stated: "According to the witness' testimonies, and in the light of the collected documentation, there is no doubt that the 4th battalion 'Galizien' of the 14th division of SS committed the crime".

Fritz Freitag was the longest serving commander of the Galicia Division, and he continued in that role until the German surrender at the end of the war, at which point he committed suicide.

[160] On 22 September 2023, Yaroslav Hunka, a veteran of the division, was invited to the Parliament of Canada along with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, where they both received standing ovations from Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and most MPs.

[161][162][163] Following international criticism, including from the Simon Wiesenthal Center, the Speaker of the House of Commons Anthony Rota apologized on the 24th for inviting the veteran stating "I have subsequently become aware of more information which causes me to regret my decision [to honour Hunka].

[173]The Commission considered the International Military Tribunal's verdict at the Nuremberg Trials, at which the entire Waffen-SS organisation was declared a "criminal organization" guilty of war crimes.

In a 1989 article for the Ottawa Citizen, community activist and journalist Sol Littman said that "the All-Party Parliamentary War Crimes Group of the British House of Commons found that screening was virtually 'non-existent' for Ukrainian SS veterans who entered Canada in 1950."