New Publication on Western Ukrainian Struggle for Independence, 1918–1923

Published by CIUS Press in co-operation with the Wirth Institute for Austrian and Central European Studies at the University of Alberta, Vasyl Kuchabsky’s Western Ukraine in Conflict with Poland and Bolshevism, 1918–1923  (xxx + 361 pp. and 6 colour maps) is devoted to one of the most complex periods of twentieth-century history, when the defeat of the Central Powers in the First World War and the collapse of the Russian Empire made it possible for the “non-historical nations” of Central and Eastern Europe to undertake the creation of independent states.

Kuchabsky, whom the renowned specialist on modern Ukraine Ivan Lysiak-Rudnytsky considered “the most interesting historian of the Ukrainian  revolution,” wrote the most comprehensive account of the political, military, and diplomatic aspects of the Western Ukrainian struggle for independence. The central issues in his study are Ukrainian-Polish relations and the Ukrainian-Polish War of 1918–19. Kuchabsky also examines state-building in the Western Ukrainian People’s Republic (ZUNR) and, to some extent, in the Ukrainian People’s Republic (UNR), as well as relations between the two republics, within the broader context of European politics, the Paris Peace Conference, the interests of the Allied powers, and the Russian attitude toward Ukrainian independence.

A participant in the events he described, Kuchabsky (1895–1971) served as an officer in Ukrainian Sich Riflemen units. Having immigrated to Germany in 1922, he obtained a doctorate in history and Slavic philology from the University of Berlin in 1930. His monograph on Western Ukraine was written in German and originally published in Berlin in 1934.

The book was translated by Gus Fagan, senior lecturer in international relations at London Metropolitan University. Oleksandr Pavlyuk, who has published extensively on problems of Ukrainian diplomatic history and on the Western Ukrainian People’s Republic, has written an introduction, skillfully placing the work in the context of historiography on the Polish-Ukrainian war and the diplomatic situation in 1918–23. A generous financial subsidy for the publication of this book was provided by the V. K. Lypynsky East European Research Institute (Philadelphia).

Kuchabsky’s Western Ukraine in Conflict with Poland and Bolshevism, 1918–1923 appears as the fourth volume in the monograph series of the Peter Jacyk Centre for Ukrainian Historical Research. The book is available in a paperback edition for $34.95 and in hardcover for $59.95 (plus taxes and shipping; outside Canada, prices are in U.S. Dollars). Orders can be placed via the secure on-line ordering system of CIUS Press at http://www.utoronto.ca/cius/publications/books/kuchabsky_western_ukraine.htm or by contacting CIUS Press, 430 Pembina Hall, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada T6G 2H8; tel.: (780) 492-2973; fax: (780) 492-4967; e-mail: cius@ualberta.ca.

Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies