“Death to the occupiers”, reads a poster circulating on social media purportedly put up by partisan groups on the streets of Ukraine’s Kherson. As the war drags on, cities taken over by Russian forces in East and Southeast Ukraine have seen an increase in resistance from civilian groups seeking to sabotage the enemy. The bombing of a café frequented by Russian forces in Kherson earlier this month, a massive explosion outside the pro-Kremlin head’s office in Melitopol in May, and a recent targeted attack on the employees of the Russian Ministry of Emergencies in Mariupol have been attributed to partisan forces. The simmering civilian resistance is reminiscent of Ukraine’s history of partisan warfare, first, against Nazi Germans and then, against the Soviets occupying the territory during the Second World War and its aftermath. Nazi Germany’s occupation, in fact, was met with mostly Communist-led partisan resistance across Eastern European countries such as the then Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, and Italy. Partisan warfare, over the years, has evolved to mean “any member of an irregular force consisting of a local population resisting a foreign occupation,” as stated in Partisans, Guerillas and Irregulars: Historical Archaeology of Asymmetric Warfare. The civilian resistance often employs guerrilla or unconventional tactics to defeat the enemy such as ambushes, disrupting supply lines or even countering propaganda. We take a look at the growing civilian resistance in Ukraine and its history. Growing partisan warfare in Ukraine’s occupied cities Months before Russia announced its “special military operation”, Ukrainian civilians began training in defence tactics to put up a resistance in the face of a potential invasion. In December 2021, The New York Times reported about government-run training sessions which would help form the Territorial Defence Forces – a group of volunteer fighters which first emerged in 2014 as the dispute in Donbas escalated. A 2021 study carried out by the Ukrainian think tank, Razumkov Center, noted that at least 24 per cent of the respondents were ready to defend the country with weapons in hand and 29 per cent would provide volunteer support. In April, nearly two months after the February 24 invasion, the mayor of Melitopol, a southeastern city among the first ones to fall to Russia, claimed that such partisans had killed at least 100 Russian soldiers. Widespread partisan activity in Melitopol has also been indicated by the US-based think tank, Institute for the Study of War. It also notes partisan resistance in Kherson, Tokmok, Enerhodar, and Mariupol. The Ukrainian Army’s Special Operations Forces have also set up a website, Centre of National Resistance, “to support and coordinate all those who want to fight for the liberation of our land from the Russian occupiers”. The website provides several guides: how to use a VPN to establish communication circumventing site blocks and surveillance, what to do if you spot a Russian drone, how to make smoke grenades at home or handle small firearms, and how to steal a Russian tank. It also provides updates on the acts of resistance across occupied territories. On June 20, the Centre stated that growing civil resistance was preventing Russians from getting public support for “voluntary accession” of regions. History of partisan resistance in Ukraine This isn’t the first time the civilians of Ukraine have taken up arms against occupying forces. Much before the occupation by Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union had staked claim over the territory, while western Ukraine was under the Polish government. Veterans of the independence struggle kept up the nationalistic fervour, resisting these regimes, which were largely said to be violent in their takeover. In 1929, the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) took birth and went on to fight against the Nazi Germans and later, the Soviets. During the war, the OUN split into two factions, with Stepan Bandera – a controversial partisan fighter whose role as a Nazi collaborator has been much debated by historians – leading the OUN-B. The faction formed the Ukrains’ka Povstancha Armia (UPA), also referred to as the Ukrainian Insurgent Army or the Ukrainian Partisan Army to fight the Soviet rule. The UPA consisted of approximately 28,000 combat troops, while nearly 2,50,0000 individuals may have provided support to the partisan army, notes Adrian Mandzy in his study, A Ukrainian Insurgent Army Company Ambush of a Soviet NKVD Battalion, 1945. However, the OUN and the UPA have a contentious history. Historian Per Anders Rudling has written about the attempts to cast the OUN and Bandera in a historic light – a sentiment still shared by several Ukrainians – despite their initial pro-German, anti-Soviet stance. “Both OUN wings were dedicated anti-democrats. Strongly influenced by fascist thought, they envisioned an ethnically homogeneous state for the Ukrainian people, free of Jews, Poles, Russians and other minorities,” writes Rudling in a study. When the Nazi Germans refused to recognise independent Ukraine declared by the OUN-B in 1941, the organisation as well as the UPA soon began putting up resistance against their occupiers while also fighting the Soviets and Poles. The partisan war continued against the Soviets, who sought to form the government in Ukraine after Nazi Germany retreated in 1943. A glimpse of partisan warfare in Europe During WWII, countries across Europe stood up to their occupiers. As the history of resistance movements is vast and complex, we take a brief look at those in France, Italy, and Yugoslavia. The French resistance is one of the most notable examples of partisan efforts. In 1940, the Vichy regime declared an armistice with Nazi Germany, prompting several grassroots groups to rise against the collaborationist government under the then prime minister Marshal Philippe Pétain and the occupying forces. The rallying call given by General Charles de Gaulle over BBC Radio that year, asking French civilians and military personnel to resist is seen as one of the markers of the beginning of the partisan movement. While several factions made up the Resistance, including the Communist Party which remained at odds with de Gaulle, the Socialists, Paris Liberation Committee and so on, the partisan movement was largely successful due to the participation of commonplace men and women. They indulged in clandestine tactics including coded communications and underground newspapers, sabotaged railways and attacked soldiers with knives and grenades to help the advance of the Allies. In Italy, the resistance movement, too, fought alongside the Allies against Nazi Germany as well as the fascist state under Benito Mussolini, who was reinstated to power by the occupying forces. The resistance movement, made up of working-class people, was brought around through the efforts of several organisations including the Communist Party, the Socialist Party and the National Liberation Committee (CLN). The partisans launched mass attacks on soldiers and damaged bridges, railways, and arms. They also countered fascist propaganda through leaflets, posters, and speeches. Following the retreat of Nazi Germany in 1943, the partisans captured and executed Mussolini and his mistress Claretta Petacci. Newsletter | Click to get the day's best explainers in your inbox Erstwhile Yugoslavia also put up a fierce resistance against their Axis occupiers through parallel movements led by the Communist Party and the Chetniks. A Partisan Army was created under Communist leader Josip Tito in 1941, while the Chetniks were led by a former military colonel under the exiled Royalist government. The partisan resistance saw support from the diverse nationalities present in the country, including the Serbs, Croats, Macedonians, and others, as well as the Jews, women and the Muslim population. With increasing tensions between the Partisans and the Chetniks, who began aligning with the occupiers against the Communists, the Allies pushed their weight behind the Partisans. In 1945, the Partisans had successfully managed to drive out the Germans with the help of the Soviets who arrived in 1944. Nationalist partisans continued to fight well into the 1950s against the Soviets as well.
