II HIS WORK is of an historic nature, describing the military engagements of the Ukrainian Division during World War li.
It is an incontestable fact that the Ukrainian Division fought on the German side. Thus, in this memoir the reasons for its formation or for the side on which it fought are not addressed; this subject has been treated by various authors, and others are free to do so in the future. Nor will readers find any of my personal political convictions, or be confronted with an ideological polemic. Only my operational and tactical observations, strategic thinking, as well as the historical facts about various battles of this military formation, organized in the summer of 1943 in Galicia and active until its capitulation to the Western Allies on 8 May 1945, are the focus.
During World War ll 1 was a professional soldier of the German infantry and an officer of the Ukrainian Division’s general staff, not a politician. I have provided factual information about military engagements in chronological order, on the basis of my field diary entries, various maps preserved from the period, and my own recollections. The work was completed as early as in 1947, during my stay in an internment camp. I have tried, in this military-historical account, to present a portrait, similar to those produced in every country of the world, of a military unit worthy of respect and veneration.
One thing should be stressed at the outset for today’s generation and those to come: in the 1943-45 period of the war the Ukrainian Division enlisted close to thirty-two thousand men. They fought with the Germans in good faith and for a cause they considered just; they battled, suffered, overcame, and were overcome. This was not the Division’s fault. Its soldiers, no less than those on the other side, were fulfilling their duty. Alongside the peasants and workers stood older and distinguished veterans of World War
I, soldiers and officers from the Austro-Hungarian Army and the Ukrainian Galician Army (UHA), as well as scores of young men of the Western Ukrainian intelligentsia. They paid dearly in blood, a fact that the German people should never forget.
I wish to dedicate this book both to Ukrainians and to the German people, who owe the former a debt of gratitude. Regardless of our hard lot, we Germans should show sincere sympathy for the Ukrainian people, whom history so sorely tested in the past. I also dedicate it to my comrades in arms, as an addition to their general military history.
This work was written by a German who discovered and experienced the history and relations of the Ukrainian Division, the largest self-consciously Ukrainian military unit on the German side during World War il. I have taken the Division’s part because 1 personally observed the results of the great errors of German policy, which also influenced the Ukrainian Division.
Let this work bring rightful recognition of the worthy deeds of Ukrainians who fought for true democracy, and let it serve as a testament to the courage and rectimde of soldiers who carried their swords honestly, to the end of the war, and put them down unstained.
World History
