National resistance to German and Soviet occupation played a significant role in the war on the Eastern Front. This episode takes a closer look at the large, organized and powerful resistance armies in Poland and Ukraine.
Map: Ukrainian border shifts between 1939 and 1945
Source: Paul Robert Magosci and Geoffrey J. Matthews, cartographer: Ukraine: A Historical Atlas. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1985. Used with the gracious permission of the author.
Historical photos
“To Arms!” poster recruiting members to join the Warsaw Uprising in 1944. Poster by Mieczysław Jurgielewicz and Edmunt Burke
A unit portrait from the Polish Home Army. Source: U.S. Holocaust Museum
UPA propaganda poster showing a UPA soldier standing on the banners of the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. The Cyrillic text is official greeting of the OUN/UPA: Glory to Ukraine! Glory to the heroes!.
UPA soldiers in the forest, circa 1944. Source: Encyclopedia of Ukraine.
Sources
- Polish resistance movement in World War II
- Belarusian resistance during World War II
- Resistance in Lithuania during World War II
- German occupation of Latvia during World War II
- Estonian anti-German resistance movement 1941–1944
Larysa Zariczniak, “The Ukrainian Trial of the Century: Bilas and Danylyshyn,” Wandering the Edge podcast, 15 August 2023. https://www.wanderingtheedge.net/podcast/episode/4bd50314/the-ukrainian-trial-of-the-century-bilas-and-danylyshyn
