The Ukraine-Russia-USA Conflict, Part 3: Ukraine’s Massive Neonazi Problem
According to Western mainstream propaganda narratives, Putin’s and Russia’s claims about their military operations in Ukraine being also about the “de-nazification” of Ukraine are just excuses or Russian propaganda. As I will show in part 3, the clear fact of the matter, however, is that there is a strong Banderite ultranationalist and neonazi presence in Ukraine that continues to be backed by the USA in their proxy war against Russia and that was already backed by Western intelligence services in the 1930s in their proxy war against the anti-capitalist Soviet Union. [sections 1 and 2 are in part 1, sections 3 and 4 in part 2].
5. Ukrainian Banderite Neonazis
Does Ukraine have a bigger than usual violent right-wing extremist, fascist, ultranationalist and/or neonazi problem? Ever since the 2014 Maidan Coup, leftist, progressive, anti-imperialist journalists who are not part of the Western mainstream propaganda network have been reporting that, yes, Ukraine does have a massive neonazi problem and that these neonazis were a key factor in making the 2014 Maidan Coup happen (see part 2, section 4).
5.1 Straight from the Horse’s Mouth
To let the respective evidence speak for itself (the following footage is from February 2022):
“we perform the tasks set by the West”
“we have started a war that has not been seen for 60 years”
“not just become ‘a part of a European family’ that has already collapsed”
[On the Maidan Coup] “Maidan was the victory of the nationalist ideas. Nationalists were the key factor there, and clearly at the frontlines. Now there is a lot of speculation, saying ‘There were only a few (neo) Nazis,’ LGBT and foreign embassies saying ‘There were not much (neo) Nazis on Maidan, maybe about 10% of real ideological ones.’ The thing is that only a moron who has never been at war can say such a thing and don’t understand that those 10%, maybe even less, 8%, have been much more effective in their influence […]. If not for those 8% [of neo-Nazis], the effectiveness [of Maidan] would have dropped by 90%. […] If not for nationalists, the whole thing would have been a gay parade.”
Moving on to another obvious case of Ukrainian neonazis doing their thing that Western mainstream media wont report on since it contradicts their propaganda narrative:
To quote from Norton’s article:
A presenter on a major TV channel in Ukraine cited infamous Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann live on air and called for “exterminating” Russian children to bring about genocide of the people of Russia.
Eichmann was a leader of the Third Reich’s SS death squads and a key architect of the Nazi Holocaust.
The Ukrainian government and its Western backers insist the country does not have a problem with Nazism and far-right extremism, but neo-fascists have significant influence in the Ukrainian state, particularly in the security apparatus. And major media outlets have frequently helped to amplify Ukrainian neo-Nazi propaganda.
This shocking call for genocide against Russians was made live on TV on Ukraine’s Channel 24, by host Fakhrudin Sharafmal.
“Since you call me a Nazi, I adhere to the doctrine of Adolf Eichmann, and I will do everything in my power to ensure that you and your children never live on this earth,” Sharafmal said.
“You have to understand that this is not about peace; it is about the victory of the Ukrainian people,” he continued. “We need victory. And if we have to massacre all your families to do it, I’ll be one of the first to do it.”
Channel 24 is owned by a wealthy Ukrainian businesswoman, Kateryna Kit-Sadova, who is the wife of the right-wing mayor of Lviv, Andriy Sadovyi.
According to a native speaker, the above is supposed to be a misinterpretation, so it is also possible that some content or meaning was ‘lost in translation’ in this particular instance.
5.2 Earlier Western Mainstream Media (MSM) Confirmations
That Ukraine does have a neonazi problem was also occasionally reported by Western mainstream media before their collective amnesia today (the following overview contains a reference to the French pseudophilosopher and Western liberal imperialist Bernard-Henri Lévy):
5.2a CNN Confirms in 2014
Joe Lauria, the editor-in-chief of Consortium News, for instance found a report titled “Rein in Ukraine’s Neo-Fascists” that was published by CNN on March 6, 2014.
To quote from that CNN report:
There are some known facts: First, far-right, anti-Semitic, anti-Russian and openly fascist groups have existed and do exist as a blight on modern Ukraine. A 2012 European Parliament resolution condemned the main — but by no means most extreme — ultra-right party, Svoboda, as “racist, anti-Semitic and xenophobic.”
[…]
As if to endorse the sentiments of the EU resolution, the leader of Svoboda (or “Freedom”), Oleh Tyahnybok, is on record saying that Kiev is governed by “a Jewish-Russian mafia” and has said Ukrainians bravely fought Muscovites, Germans, Jews “and other scum” in World War II.
This unsavory constituency, including the “ultra” Right Sector movement, manned the barricades in the Kiev uprising, providing “security” to the mainstream political opposition leaders and matching the pro-government forces in violent tactics that led to the dozens of dead in and around the Maidan.
What we also learn from that CNN report is that Yanukovych was already on his way out due to a brokered agreement but that the Ukrainian right sector sabotaged that more peaceful solution:
These rightist-nationalist forces were in large part responsible for the collapse of the agreement signed in February that called for early parliamentary and presidential elections and a return to the 2004 Ukrainian constitution, which harks back to the “Orange Revolution” that brought a pro-West government to power in Ukraine.
In backing away from this face-saving compromise, one that was negotiated with the approval of the French, German and Polish governments, and which surely would have resulted in the removal of Yanukovych, moderate opposition leaders essentially capitulated to the far right.
The article then also mentions two other key far right figures beyond Oleh Tyahnybok who was a subject of the intercepted and leaked Nuland-Pyatt phonecall (see part 2, section 4):
The Russian position is also somewhat bolstered by the fact that Svoboda holds key posts in the interim government in Kiev, including that of deputy prime minister. Andriy Parubiy, the commander of the “Maidan self-defense,” has been appointed the head of the National Security and Defense Council, and the leader of the Right Sector ultras, Dmitro Yarosh, is expected to become his deputy chairman. Svoboda controls the prosecutor general office and the ministries of ecology and agriculture.
So in case you thought that the Ukrainian violent far right ultranationalist Banderite neonazis did not play such a big role in the 2014 Maidan Coup or that it was not a violent coup, think again.
There is also yet another confirming CNN report from 2014 in which they interview citizens of Donetsk who have been hit by Ukrainian artillery:
5.2b The Guardian Confirms in 2014
In what amounts to another such exception from the rule of Western propaganda in mainstream media, the British The Guardian (of the establishment) also reported on September 10, 2014, on the infamous far right and Mariupol-stationed Azov Battallion in an article titled “Azov fighters are Ukraine’s greatest weapon and may be its greatest threat.” The link to the article still mentions “ukraine-neo-nazis,” and when we read the article, we once again understand why. Also take note of the ridiculous excuses with which Azov Battallion neonazis try to distract from the obvious:
Dmitry claimed not to be a Nazi, but waxed lyrical about Adolf Hitler as a military leader, and believes the Holocaust never happened.
[…]
[E]ven those who laughed off the idea that they are neo-Nazis did not give the most convincing denials.
“Of course not, it’s all made up, there are just a lot of people who are interested in Nordic mythology,” said one fighter when asked if there were neo-Nazis in the battalion. When asked what his own political views were, however, he said “national socialist”. As for the swastika tattoos on at least one man seen at the Azov base, “the swastika has nothing to do with the Nazis, it was an ancient sun symbol,” he claimed.
5.2c Reuters and NATO’s Atlantic Council Confirm in 2018
In case you should still have any doubts, here is a useful reminder from Peter Hitchens (brother of the late and more formidable Christopher Hitchens) that the news agency Reuters also acknowledged (in 2018) that Ukraine actually does have or still has “a sizeable neo-Nazi problem”:
Even NATO’s Atlantic Council(!), which is another source of Western mainstream propaganda, admitted in a rare moment of truth in June 2018 and before the ramping up of their current propaganda war that “Ukraine’s Got a Real Problem with Far-Right Violence (And No, RT Didn’t Write This Headline)”:
5.2d Time Magazine Confirms in 2021
In January 2021, the Time Magazine confirms the same thing in a documentary:
5.3 The UN (2021) and an Ethnic Greek in Ukraine (2022) Confirm
The link to the above 2014 Guardian article was thankfully provided by one Paul Antonopoulos, an ethnic Greek in Ukraine, who has his own interesting story to tell about how the Azov Battallion neonazis committed “war crimes and human rights violations” in Mariupol, including against ethnic Greeks, since 2014:
His thread is also informative since he quotes UN numbers which indicate that Ukrainians/Azov had increased indiscriminiate shelling of the separatist regions in 2021 — one of the causes for Russia’s intervention:
To quote from the above GeoHistory article about Azov “fascists”:
Azov has shifted its emphasis inward, focusing strongly on opposing anti-fascists, liberals, LGBT+, Roma, and feminists within Ukraine as well as promoting xenophobic views (Miller, 2018). This extreme form of nationalism, as well as a focus on hatred towards both internal and external enemies, fits Mann’s nationalist aspect of fascism.
Mann points to the coercion of the opposition as an aspect of fascist paramilitarism. Azov has been connected to violence symagainst an anti-fascist march in Kyiv in 2018, a violent intervention in a lecture about discrimination in film in Mariupol, and an attack against feminist demonstrators and liberals on International Women’s Day (OpenDemocracy, 2018). These are only a few examples of the violence carried out against their opposition […]
Another part of the definition of fascism is cleansing: the removal of opponents and enemies, whether ethnic or political (Mann, 2004).
On the Azov far right political leader Andrew/Andriy Biletsky (1979-), the first commander of the Azov Battalion who co-founded the Social-National(!) Assembly (“Nazi” is an abbreviation for “National-Socialist”) and who was a member of the Ukrainian parliament from 2014 to 2019:
In 2016, Azov entered the political arena with its new leader, Andrew Biletsky. Biletsky has a history of being involved with the far-right and once said in 2010 that the nation’s mission was to “lead the white races of the world in a final crusade… against Semite-led Untermenschen [subhumans]” (Miller, 2018). Biletsky also had a leadership role in the ultranationalist organization, Patriot of Ukraine, which according to the Kharkiv Human Rights Group “espoused xenophobic and neo-Nazi ideas and was engaged in violent attacks against migrants, foreign students in Kharkiv, and those opposing its views” (Miller, 2018).
5.4 Progressive Anti-Imperialist Journalists Confirm
So when progressive anti-imperialist journalists such as Max Blumenthal or Ben Norton report on Ukrainian neonazis and more specifically on how US and Western power elites fund them to fight their proxy war against Russia in Ukraine (the reports are from 2018 and March 2022, respectively), then that does not make them or us Putin’s stooges. It instead makes us consistent with rarer and usually more propagandistic Western mainstream media reporting/manufacturing of consent and, above all, consistent with the facts and hence true and truthful:
As could be expected in such things, the CIA cutout NED/National Endowment for ‘Democracy’ (i.e. foreign coups; see part 2, section 4) of course also was involved. The following shows a speech from its CEO Damon Wilson (2021-), previously the Vice President of NATO’s Atlantic Council think tank/lobbying institute (2011–2021), who is egging on useful far right idiots who fight the USA’s proxy war against Russia in Ukraine:
Wilson’s ramblings predictably included propaganda about ‘freedom’ which is highly Orwellian and ironic since Ukraine has been under heavy US influence and control since 2014 (‘the free world’ is little but a propagandistic term for “the part of the world under US influence and control”):
One of the many conceivable reasons for why the CIA cutout NED apparently tried to cover its tracks about its activities in Ukraine is that supporting right-wing or other extremists tends to spectacularly backfire at some point.
Think, for instance, of how the USA and CIA funded religiously extremist mujahideen in Afghanistan in the 1980s during their proxy war against the Soviets there: The consequences of that were 1) the destruction of secularism in Afghanistan, 2) the support of a certain Osama bin Laden who then masterminded the 9/11 attacks against the USA (the second 9/11 after the US-backed coup in Chile September 11, 1973), and 3) the creation of a situation which then led to the USA’s 20-year-long war against Afghanistan’s Taleban together with crippling sanctions that still affect the entire population of that country. Had the USA and CIA not meddled and interfered in Afghanistan, nothing of that would have happened and massive untold suffering could have been avoided.
As far as the US support of far right extremists in Ukraine is concerned, the following noteworthy ‘side effect’ was mentioned by the politically highly aware British rapper Lowkey:
Even the NATO-affiliated and somewhat propagandistic outlet Bellingcat confirms the nazi-nature of this “Wotanjugend” (i.e. Wotan youth) and Alexey Levkin in an article from 2019:
Of course, the main and as some say intended side effect and consequence of the USA supporting russophobic neo-nazis in Ukraine is that Ukraine is now getting militarily hammered by Russia in its attempt to cleanse Ukraine from these neo-nazis and to protect ethinic Russians there, among other reasons. Needless to say, that military operation and the therefrom ensuing massive suffering could also could have been avoided if the USA had not meddled and interfered in Ukraine.
So we once again see history unnecessarily repeating itself since too many people have not studied and learned from it — the lessons in this case being that the US empire is a global cancer and parasite that leeches off and destroys everything that it touches, including Ukraine, and that it is not Russia but the US empire that needs to be sanctioned into oblivion.
5.5 Stepan Bandera (1909–1959), Ukrainian Nationalist Idol and Western Intelligence Asset
When discussing Ukraine’s neonazis, we also must not forget to look into the biography and ideology of their own historic leader Stepan Bandera who was first and foremost a Ukrainian nationalist whose political views were also shaped and radicalized by the catastrophic hunger deaths (Holodomor) in Ukraine which were part of the wider Soviet famine of 1932–33. Some quotes from his Wikipedia biography:
Stepan Bandera had met and associated himself with members of a variety of Ukrainian nationalist organizations throughout his schooling — from Plast, to the Union for the Liberation of Ukraine (Ukrainian: Українська Визвольна Організація) and also the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) (Ukrainian: Організація Українських Націоналістів). The most active of these organizations was the OUN, and the leader of the OUN was Andriy Melnyk.[32]
Because of his determined personality, Stepan Bandera quickly rose through the ranks of these organizations, becoming the chief propaganda officer of the OUN in 1931, the second in command of OUN in Galicia in 1932–1933, and the head of the National Executive of the OUN in 1933
On the history that led to the formation of the OUN-B, i.e. the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists that was headed by Bandera:
Stepan Bandera became head of the OUN national executive in Galicia in June 1933. He expanded the OUN’s network in the Kresy, directing it against both Poland and the Soviet Union. To stop expropriations, Bandera turned OUN against the Polish officials who were directly responsible for anti-Ukrainian policies. Activities included mass campaigns against Polish tobacco and alcohol monopolies and against the denationalization of Ukrainian youth. He was arrested in Lviv in 1934, and tried twice: first, concerning involvement in a plot to assassinate the minister of internal affairs, Bronisław Pieracki, and second at a general trial of OUN executives. He was convicted of terrorism and sentenced to death.[34]
The death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.[34] He was held in Wronki Prison; in 1938 some of his followers tried unsuccessfully to break him out of the jail.[36] According to various sources, Bandera was freed in September 1939, either by Ukrainian jailers after Polish jail administration left the jail,[37] by Poles[38] or by the Nazis soon after the German invasion of Poland.[39][40][41]
Soon thereafter Eastern Poland was occupied by the Soviet Union. Upon release from prison, Bandera moved to Kraków, the capital of Germany’s occupational General Government. There, he came in contact with the leader of the OUN, Andriy Atanasovych Melnyk. In 1940, the political differences between the two leaders caused the OUN to split into two factions; the OUN-M faction led by Melnyk preached a more conservative approach to nation-building, while the OUN-B faction, led by Bandera, supported a revolutionary approach.[42]
On how both Bandera and Melnyk were used by Nazi Germany and how they in turn tried to use German Nazis for their own Ukrainian nationalist goals:
OUN leaders Andriy Melnyk and Bandera were recruited before World War II into the Nazi Germany military intelligence Abwehr for espionage, counter-espionage and sabotage. Their goal was to run diversion activities after Germany’s attack on the Soviet Union. Melnyk was given code name ‘Consul I’. This information is part of the testimony that Abwehr Colonel Erwin Stolze gave on 25 December 1945 and submitted to the Nuremberg trials, with a request to be admitted as evidence.[45][46][47]
In the spring of 1941, Bandera held meetings with the heads of Germany’s intelligence, regarding the formation of “Nachtigall” and “Roland” Battalions. In spring of that year the OUN received 2.5 million marks for subversive activities inside the Soviet Union.[43][48][49] Gestapo and Abwehr officials protected Bandera followers, as both organizations intended to use them for their own purposes
On how Bandera’s nationalist plans did not work out and on how he instead became a prisoner in a Nazi concentration camp from 1942–44 before once again arriving at some arrangement with the Nazi leadership that was directed against the Soviet Army:
On 30 June 1941, with the arrival of Nazi troops in Ukraine, Bandera and the OUN-B declared an independent Ukrainian state (“Act of Renewal of Ukrainian Statehood”).[51] This declaration was accompanied by violent pogroms.[51] Some of the published proclamations of the formation of this state say that it would “work closely with the National-Socialist Greater Germany, under the leadership of its leader Adolf Hitler which is forming a new order in Europe and the world and is helping the Ukrainian People to free itself from Moscovite occupation.” — as stated in the text of the “Act of Proclamation of Ukrainian Statehood”.[43][49]
Bandera’s expectation that the Nazi regime would post factum recognize an independent fascist Ukraine as an Axis ally proved to be wrong.[51] In 1941 relations between Nazi Germany and the OUN-B had soured to the point where a Nazi document dated 25 November 1941 stated that “… the Bandera Movement is preparing a revolt in the Reichskommissariat which has as its ultimate aim the establishment of an independent Ukraine. All functionaries of the Bandera Movement must be arrested at once and, after thorough interrogation, are to be liquidated…”.[52] On 5 July, Bandera was transferred to Berlin. On 12 July, the prime minister of the newly formed Ukrainian National Government, Yaroslav Stetsko, was also arrested and taken to Berlin. Although released from custody on 14 July, both were required to stay in Berlin. On 15 September 1941 Bandera and leading OUN members were arrested by the Gestapo.
In January 1942, Bandera was transferred to Sachsenhausen concentration camp’s special barrack for high-profile political prisoners Zellenbau.[53] In April 1944, Bandera and his deputy Yaroslav Stetsko were approached by a Reich Security Main Office official to discuss plans for diversions and sabotage against the Soviet Army.[54] In September 1944,[55] Bandera was released by the German authorities, and returned to Ukraine where it was running resistance both against Nazis and communists
It is interesting to note that Bandera also appears to have been cooperating with Western pro-capitalist intelligence against the anti-capitalist Soviet Union before and after the war and just like today’s far right useful idiots for the West in Ukraine:
According to Stephen Dorril, author of MI6: Inside the Covert World of Her Majesty’s Secret Intelligence Service, OUN-B was re-formed in 1946 under the sponsorship of MI6. The organization had been receiving some support from MI6 since the 1930s.
It is also due to this assocation that Bandera was assassinated by the KGB on October 15, 1959, via cyanide poison gas.
Like German Nazis and contemporary neonazis, Ukrainian nationalists also had been and continue to be antisemitic for the longest time:
While the influences from Nazi Germany had a significant impact on the anti-Semitic attitudes of the OUN, the organization had its own anti-Semitic tradition, independent of the Nazis. Ukrainian nationalism in Galicia had developed a narrative already in the late nineteenth century, complete with an elaborate anti-Jewish discourse. (Rudling 2011, 5)
[…]
Radicalized over the 1930s, anti-Semitism became particularly prominent between 1939 and 1943, reaching a high point in 1941–1942. Leading members of the Bandera wing wanted Ukrainian Jews killed or removed, and offered to participate in the process. In April 1941, the OUN(b) declared that they “combat Jews as supporters of the Muscovite-Bolshevik regime.” Its
propaganda directives in the following month demanded the destruction of the Jews: “Ukraine for the Ukrainians! . . . Death to the Muscovite-Jewish commune! Beat the commune, save Ukraine!” There is no shortage of radical, even eliminatory, anti-Semitism in the writings of senior OUN ideologues and intellectuals, either during the interwar period or following the outbreak of the war. During the Holocaust, the nationalist Ukrainian press in occupied Poland, Ukraine, Germany, and Bohemia published anti-Semitic articles commissioned or endorsed by the German authorities. (Rudling 2011, 6–7)
To gain an understanding of how popular and non-marginal Bandera is today in Ukraine despite his collaboration with German Nazis and his and the OUN’s antisemitism and participation in genocides, behold the number of Stepan Bandera museums, streets or squares, monuments and honorary citizenships:
There are Stepan Bandera museums in Dubliany, Volia-Zaderevatska, Staryi Uhryniv, and Yahilnytsia. There is a Stepan Bandera Museum of Liberation Struggle in London, part of the OUN Archive, and The Bandera’s Family Museum (Музей родини Бандерів) in Stryi. There are also Stepan Bandera streets in Lviv (formerly Mury street), Lutsk (formerly Suvorovska street), Rivne (formerly Moskovska street), Kolomyia, Ivano-Frankivsk, Chervonohrad (formerly Nad Buhom street), Berezhany (formerly Cherniakhovskoho street), Drohobych (formerly Sliusarska street), Stryi, Kalush, Kovel, Volodymyr-Volynskyi, Horodenka, Dubrovytsia, Kolomyia, Dolyna, Iziaslav, Skole, Shepetivka, Brovary, and Boryspil, and a Stepan Bandera prospect in Ternopil (part of the former Lenin prospect). On 16 January 2017, the Ukrainian Institute of National Remembrance stated that of the 51,493 streets, squares and “other facilities” that had been renamed (since 2015) due to decommunization 34 streets were named after Stepan Bandera. Due to “association with the communist totalitarian regime”, the Kyiv City Council on 7 July 2016 voted 87 to 10 in favor of supporting renaming Moscow Avenue to Stepan Bandera Avenue.
Monuments dedicated to Stepan Bandera have been constructured in a number of western Ukrainian cities […] In 2010 and 2011, Bandera was named an honorary citizen of a number of western Ukrainian cities […]
In late 2018, the Lviv Oblast Council decided to declare the year of 2019 to be the year of Stepan Bandera, sparking protests by Israel.
The Ukrainian mayor of Konotop having a Bandera picture hanging right behind him during a recent Western propaganda interview serves as yet another example of that strong influence:
So much for the nationalist but also far-right, fascist, antisemitic, anti-Russian, neonazi and violent political legacy of Stepan Bandera that continues to have a heavy impact on contemporary Ukraine and its politics and political ideology.
5.6 Mykola Lebed (1909–1998), Ukrainian Nationalist Leader and Western Intelligence Asset
I already discussed Mykola Lebed in part 1 where I elaborated how, in the context of the CIA’s Project AERODYNAMIC, he worked as a propagandist from the 1950s to about 1990. In this part and using the same 2018 Muckrock article “The CIA and ‘Uncle Louie,’” I will look into his politicial and war criminal past, including into his activities as interim leader of the OUN/B while Bandera was imprisoned by the Nazis.
Mykola Lebed was sentenced to death in Poland in 1934. He died in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1998.
By various accounts, he was an assassin, a freedom fighter, a terrorist, a hero, a villain, a prisoner, a refugee, a Nazi collaborator, a Nazi target, a writer, and a war criminal. To the Central Intelligence Agency, which bankrolled his activities for close to half a century, he was known as “Uncle Louie.”
Lebed was one of the leaders of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists. Referred to by some as a terrorist group and by others as freedom fighters, the OUN and its subsidiaries were accused not only of political assassinations in Poland, but also of ethnic cleansing in Ukraine during the mid-20th century.
In 1934, along with several other OUN members, Lebed was sentenced to death for the murder of Polish official Bronisław Pieracki. The sentence was commuted in 1936 to lifetime imprisonment, and Lebed managed to escape prison during the the German invasion of Poland in 1939.
In 1940, The OUN split into two factions: the OUN-B for loyalists of Stepan Bandera, and the OUN-M for followers of Andrei Melnik. Lebed was a leader of the Bandera group.
Both factions of the OUN sided with the Nazis to some extent. Melnik aimed to be friendly with the Nazis in hopes that after the war Ukraine would emerge an independent nation. Bandera was more keen on forcefully creating an ethnically homogenous, independent Ukrainian state with himself as the leader of it.
By most accounts, OUN collaboration with the Nazis was opportunistic. They were groups at odds, but had a perceived common enemy. The OUN’s determination for an ethnically Ukrainian nation was not dissimilar to Nazi ideology, insofar as both aimed to remove ethnically Jewish and Polish people from their communities. Both were willing to obtain that objective by any means necessary, be it forced relocation or murder.
After his escape from prison, Lebed trained at a Gestapo police school in Zakopane. Exactly how long he spent there is unknown. Lebed admitted to being at Zakopane for about five weeks, but other accounts place him there for several months.
It is worth noting that OUN/B appears to have committed the majority of their war crimes under the interim Lebed leadership:
The Nazis sent Bandera to Sachsenhausen concentration camp in 1942 after he declared Ukraine an independent state. Lebed became the de facto leader of the Bandera faction, which largely controlled the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), through the end of the war. Over the following few years, the UPA was responsible for tens of thousands of murders.
But there never was any accountability for Lebed, Bandera and their war crimes since they, like the German Nazi scientists such as Wernherr von Braun who would be brought over into the USA via Operation/Project Overcast/Paperclip, would also work for the West, with Western imperialist intelligence shielding them from prosecution:
After the end of World War II, Western intelligence agencies sought to acquire OUN members as informants and infiltrators. The OUN was avowedly anti-Communist, and it already had a network of trained guerilla fighters at the ready for an anticipated Soviet offensive.
The United Kingdom’s MI6, their analogue to the CIA, opted to work with […] Bandera, who later died under mysterious circumstances, allegedly murdered by the KGB.
[…]
The CIA chose to work with Lebed, then the Foreign Minister of the Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council (UHVR). Lebed still had considerable influence among Ukrainian nationalists. Bandera was too extreme and his following, the CIA concluded, was dwindling.
The early CIA accounts of Lebed reveal the agency believed he and his comrades were “determined and able men, but with the psychology of the hunted … resolved to carry on their work with or without us, and If necessary against us.”
The CIA knew early on of Lebed’s conviction for assassination, his training at Zakopane, and his one-time control over the OUN-B, but documents show the agency believed it to be lies peddled by Soviets or Melnik loyalists. Later, the CIA shielded Lebed from allegations and deportation because he was too valuable of an asset and any publicity could compromise the entire project [i.e. AERODYNAMIC]
The CIA’s defense of Lebed essentially boiled down to that Lebed was never a member of the Nazi party […] but by many accounts he espoused the values of Nazism.
5.7 The OUN Greeting Becomes the Official Ukrainian Army Salute
Returning to the present and as reported by an Israeli outlet in 2018, another interesting and not so little detail that further confirms a strong violent rightwing extremist presence in not just underground but official Ukraine is that the Nazi collaborator greeting became the official Ukraine army salute:
August 24th, Ukrainian Independence Day, will see a ceremony introducing the country’s new official army salute, as prescribed by Ukraine’s Presidential decree: Glory to Ukraine! — Glory to the Heroes!
“We have consulted with the Minister of Defense, National Security and Defense Council, Government and I have decided that starting from August 24 these words will be heard for the first time as part of the official military parade ceremony on the Independence Day of Ukraine,” Petro Poroshenko was quoted saying on the Ukraine President’s official site.
Glory to Ukraine! — Glory to the Heroes! is a slogan of the UPA, the Ukraine Rebel Army who fought on the side of the Nazis. The slogans, their origin, and history are well known in Ukraine, although the President’s website does not make mention of these. Present neo-Nazi Ukrainian military formations established by order of the Ukrainian authorities appropriated the slogan from the end of 2013 onward. Now, the Ukrainian Nazi collaborator’s greeting will become the official salute in that country’s army.
Jimmy Dore also discussed that on his show:
5.8 The Orwellian Rewriting of History
And hey, if history is no longer to your liking, why not rewrite it in Orwellian fashion:
Relatedly and just as tellingly, the Ukrainian regime demolished a statue of a general who fought against Nazis in Ukraine in World War 2:
From Georgy K. Zhukov’s wikipedia page:
In February 1941, Zhukov was appointed as chief of the Red Army’s General Staff.
Following the German invasion of the Soviet Union, Zhukov lost his position as chief of the general staff. Subsequently, he organized the defense of Leningrad, Moscow, and Stalingrad. He participated in planning several major offensives, including the Battle of Kursk, and Operation Bagration. In 1945, Zhukov commanded the 1st Belorussian Front; he took part in the Vistula–Oder Offensive, and the Battle of Berlin, which resulted in the defeat of Nazi Germany, and the end of the war in Europe. In recognition of Zhukov’s role in the war, he was chosen to accept the German Instrument of Surrender, and inspect the Moscow Victory Parade of 1945.
After the war, Zhukov’s success and popularity caused Joseph Stalin to see him as a potential threat. Stalin stripped him of his positions and relegated him to military commands of little strategic significance. After Stalin’s death in 1953, Zhukov supported Nikita Khrushchev’s bid for Soviet leadership. In 1955, he was appointed as Defence Minister and made a member of the Presidium. In 1957 Zhukov lost favour again and was forced to retire. He never returned to a position of influence, and died in 1974.
5.9 The Murder of Ukrainian Negotiator Denis Kireev
To further complement the picture: The Ukrainian far right is so violent that they actually killed one member of their own peace negotiation team(!) by the name of Denis Kireev on March 5, 2022:
5.10 Ukraine — and USA — Vote Against a UN Resolution Condemning Nazism
Another noteworthy piece of evidence brought to light by Vijay Prashad is that “Ukraine voted against the UN resolution, including the United States also, which condemned naziism”:
Same thing the next year:
5.11 What Nazis?
Also good fun: Germany, the original Nazi country, needing to tell Ukrainian ‘heros’ and imitators to please not display their Nazi affiliations in public:
And those 14 + 88 tanks from Germany to Ukraine: Nah, totally not indicative of Nazis doing a winkwink and sending a not so secret code to other Nazis either:
A June 8, 2022, Reuters foto of Ukrainian army or security person in Kharkiv depicts a clearly visible German Nazi swastika tattoo on his upper arm:
The New York Times also had trouble explaining things at a certain point and went for a very convoluted phrase as a consequence:
Criticisms and rejections of this insane Western propaganda about Ukraine followed promptly:
Someone else provided an even more detailed refutation of that NYT propaganda article:
Glenn Greenwald also took apart this ludicrous NYT article:
But yeah, perish the thought that rightwing extremist ‘thugs’ (a prominent Western propaganda term) are running wild and have massive influence in Ukraine. Clearly, Putin’s claim about “de-nazifying” Ukraine are just Russian propaganda — or so Western propaganda and propagandists such as one John Sipher from the the CIA (“‘Former’ CIA Clandestine Service”) would have you believe:
Speaking of history: Among those Nazis which especially the USA imported in Operation Paperclip right after WW2 in their fight against communism were also Ukrainian ones:
Conclusion
So much for strong confirmations, including by rarer exceptions in Western mainstream media before the current propaganda blackout, that Ukraine actually does have a long-standing and massive violent far right, fascist, neonazi or ultranationalist problem and that Putin’s or Russia’s claim about their military intervention in Ukraine also serving the purpose of “de-nazifying” Ukraine actually does have an evidential or factual basis.
