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Stepan Bandera. Photo by author unknown.

Top 10 Amazing Facts about Stepan Bandera

Stepan Bandera whose full name was Stepan Andriyovych Bandera was a Ukrainian nationalist leader and a politician who is a Hero of Ukrainian liberation struggle.

He was born in 1909 and died on 15^th October, 1959 through assassination carried out by a Soviet KGB spy agent Bohdan Stashynsky who later defected to Berlin and confessed to carrying out the assassination.

Bandera鈥檚 assassination was carried out at the orders of the then KGB head Alexander Shelepin and the then Soviet Premier, Nikita Khrushchev and it was done through cyanide gas poisoning.

Bandera served as the head of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) and particularly the theorist of its military wing (OUN-B).

The OUN-B was dedicated to the independence of Ukraine even though it was implicated in collaboration with Nazi Germany and ethnic cleansing during the Second World War.

The top 10 amazing facts about Stephan Bandera include the following.

1. Bandera Was Almost Killed by The Polish Government

Bronislaw Pieracki. Photo by Unknown author.

Bandera was initially sentenced to death and the sentence later commuted to life in prison. This was after he was accused of orchestrating the assassination of Polish Interior Minister Bronislaw Pieracki in 1934 among other terrorism accusations.

Bandera was freed from Bereza Kartuska prison as a result of invasion of Poland in 1939 by Nazi Germany.

After he was released, he moved to the German-occupied zone of Krakow and maintained close relations with the Germany armed forces, the Wehrmacht and its military-intelligence service, the Abwehr.

2. Bandera Collaborated with Nazi Germany On Various Occasions

Bandera prepared Proclamation of Ukrainian statehood in Lviv in 1941 pledging to work with Nazi Germany immediately after Nazi Germany invaded Soviet Union.

However, he was arrested by the Gestapo i.e. Nazi Secret State Police, during the same year and held under house arrest for his refusal to rescind the decree.

However, he was released by Nazi Germany in the hope that he would be instrumental in deterring the advancing Soviet forces in 1944. The Soviet forces were part of the advancing allied forces.

3. Bandera Served as An Agent of The Nazi Military During Second World War

 Nazi German military intelligence service, the Abwehr recruited members of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) into Bergbauernhilfe unit prior to Nazi invasion of Poland.

Bergbauernhilfe was a subversive unit affiliated to the German military intelligence, the Abwehr, consisting of 120 men recruited from the OUN.

Stepan Bandera was one of the agents who was recruited by the Abwehr. The Bergbauernhilfe agents were sent to Poland before invasion of Poland in 1939 to conduct a terror campaign against Jews and Polish farmers to erode Polish defenses.

4. Bandera Envisaged a Ukraine Which Was an Ally of Nazi Germany

Adolf Hitler 1938. Photo by Unknown author.

One day after Nazi forces invaded Soviet Union on 23^rd June, 1941, Bandera sent a letter to Hitler arguing for a case of an independent Ukraine which would co-operate with Nazi Germany.

Bandera and his OUN-B wing unilaterally proclaimed the independence of Ukraine after Nazi troops entered Ukrainian territory.

The proclamation pledged a corporation of the new Ukrainian state with Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler.

5. Bandera Carried Violent Pogroms Against the Jews And Targeted Groups

Stalin. Photo by Unknown author.

Violent pogroms against the Jews and other targeted groups were carried out after Bandera鈥檚 proclamation of a new Ukrainian state in which four thousand Jews were killed.

Bandera, his deputies and the Nazis strongly held an obsessive belief that the Jews in Ukraine were behind Communism and Stalinist imperialism and needed to be exterminated.

Bandera held that 鈥淭he Jews of the Soviet Union鈥� were the vanguard of Muscovite imperialism and the most loyal supporters of the Bolshevik Regime.

Bandera鈥檚 Jewish policy in Ukraine led to the Killing of over 1.5 million Ukrainian Jews in total before close of the war.

6. Bandera Was Arrested by The Same Nazis He Pledged to Cooperate With

Bandera鈥檚 expectation that an independent fascist Ukraine as an Axis ally would be recognized and upheld post factum by the Nazi regime was far-fetched.

On 5^th July 1941, Bandera was arrested by the Gestapo and taken to Berlin after he failed to rescind the proclamation for Ukrainian independence and an accusation of planning a revolt.

Bandera鈥檚 father, brothers and sisters were also arrested for various related accusations and at different times.

7. Bandera Advocated for The Creation of A pure Ukrainian Society

Bandera鈥檚 worldview was shaped by numerous far-right values and concepts including ultra-nationalism, fascism, racism and anti-Semitism according to Grzegorz Rossoli艅ski-Liebe.

Bandera believed that only war and hostility to democracy, communism and socialism could the Ukrainian state be established.

Bandera and his followers advocated the selective breeding to create a 鈥減ure鈥� Ukrainian race according to Swedish-American historian Per Anders Rudling.

8. Bandera Received Help from Underground Nazi Organizations After the War

Bandera and his family settled in Munich after moving several times around West Germany after the war.

His movement was only possible as he concealed his past relationship with the Nazis by using false identification documents.

In Munich Bandera received help from underground organizations of former Nazis. He also received protection from Gehlen Organization; a German intelligence agency formed after the war.

9. Bandera鈥檚 Assassination Was Ordered by Top Soviet Leadership

Nikita Khrushchev. Photo by Junge, Heinz.

Attempts were made to kidnap or assassinate Bandera multiple times starting 1954. Bandera was eventually assassinated on 15^th October 1959 outside of Kreittmayrstrasse 7 in Munich.

German judicial bodies announced Bandera was murdered by a KGB agent Bohdan Stashynsky by spraying him with cyanide gas which poisoned him two years after his death.

The KGB agent acted on the orders of Alexander Shelepin, the then Soviet KGB head and Nikita Khrushchev who was then the Soviet premier.

10. Bandera Was A Hero of Ukrainian National Liberation Struggle

Bandera was a hero of Ukrainian national liberation struggle despite his extreme views, flaws, actions or inactions.

Bandera鈥檚 family faced death and suffering due to his struggle to create an independent Ukrainian state.

 His brothers Oleksandr and Vasyl were killed by Polish inmates at Auschwitz concentration camp. His father Andriy was sentenced to death and executed for harboring an OUN member.

His sisters Oksana and Marta鈥揗aria were sent to a gulag in Siberia while his other sister Volodymyra served a term in Soviet labor camps.

Bandera was himself assassinated for his liberation struggle while his wife and three children relocated to Canada after his assassination for safety.

In 2010 Bandera was awarded the title of Hero of Ukraine by the then-President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko posthumously.