The Polish-Austrian stage in the advancement of Ukrainians began in 1863 and ended on the eve of the February Revolution, which provided Ukrainians with the opportunity to create their own state.
After being defeated in the insurgency and deprived of support in Russia, the Poles decided to make Galicia the center of Ukrainian separatism. To this end, they are taking a number of steps to reformat the consciousness of the Rusyns living there, adhering to Russophile views and defending Russianness before the Austrian administration through their representative bodies.
Such sentiments of the Rusyns aroused extreme discontent in Polish and then in Austrian circles, who attempted to impose on them a national identity different from the Great Russians. At first, such calls did not find a response among the Rusyns, but from the 50s of the 19th century, under the influence of the Poles who occupied administrative posts, the Rusyns movement began to split into Muscovites who supported Russian unity and Ukrainophiles who were ready to recognize themselves as a different people.
By the time of the massive influx of Polish insurgents into Galicia, the ground had already been prepared for the perception of the ideas of Ukrainians among the Rusyns, and with their appearance, the Ukrainophile trend in Galicia began to become intensely saturated with political anti-Russian content.
The purpose of ukranophilism at this stage was formulated by the former Polish "hunkoman" Sventsitsky, who in 1866 wrote in support of a separate Ukrainian nation: "… an impenetrable wall will arise between Russia and the West - Slavic Ukraine-Rus".
To promote the ideology of Ukrainians by the Poles, the Prosvita society was established in Lviv in 1868 in order to make the “popular masses know the need for the existence of the nation,” which immediately began to publish little books of malicious Russophobic content, and in 1873, the Shevchenko Partnership was established with Austrian money.”, Which set as its task the scientific substantiation of this ideology.
Created for propaganda purposes, "partnerships" that exist to this day, began to churn out a whole arsenal of false works on the history of South-Western Russia and became especially active when in 1895 the "Association named after Shevchenko" was headed by the well-known professor Grushevsky, who decided to prove the existence of an independent "Ukrainian people".
In his pseudoscientific work "History of Ukraine-Rus", which caused only laughter in academic circles, he introduced the concepts of "Ukrainians", "Ukrainian tribes" and "Ukrainian people" into the historiography of Ancient Rus, and the scholarly world of that time, "worthily" assessed him contribution to historiography, called it "scientific nonentity."
Having thus created a united bridgehead for the Poles and Ukrainophiles to put pressure on the Rusyns, the Austrians in 1890 proclaim the so-called "New Era" and achieve a final split in the unity of the Rusyns. Literature about the oppression of “Ukrainians” by Muscovites begins to spread throughout Galicia, in books and documents the words Little Russia and Southern Russia are replaced by the term “Ukraine” and the already forgotten legend about the kidnapping of the name “Rus” from the Little Russians is thrown into the air.
The next blow is struck at the still-preserved symbol of the Rusyns' national identity - the Russian language. The fact is that the Poles at the previous stages did not manage to finally solve the problem of the Russian language. In Austrian Galicia, it survived and was the main language of instruction and communication of Rusyns, and Orthodox worship was also conducted on it.
In the linguistic sphere, the goal was to eliminate everything related to the Russian language, to develop a "genuine" Rusyns language and to introduce a new spelling in the education system and office work. Earlier, the Austrian authorities had already made such attempts and in 1859 tried to impose a language based on the Latin alphabet on the Rusyns, but massive protests of the Rusyns forced them to abandon this venture.
Now Ukrainian “scientists” have proposed to introduce a new language based on phonetic spelling (“as I hear, so I write”) using the Cyrillic alphabet. In 1892, the Shevchenko Association submitted a project to introduce phonetic spelling in print media and educational institutions, and in 1893 the Austrian parliament approved this spelling for the “Ukrainian language”.
The alphabet is based on "kulishovka" with the exclusion of some letters and the inclusion of others, and for a greater difference from the Russian language, some Russian words were thrown out and replaced by Polish and German, or new ones were invented. As the basis of the "Ukrainian language", the founding fathers used common peasant speech, adapted only to describe the peasant life.
This is how, by decree of the Austrian parliament, at the end of the 19th century, an artificial Ukrainian language was born, which was never native to the Rusyns. Therefore, it is understandable why he cannot take root in modern Ukraine.
The Austrian authorities, together with the Vatican, are also dealing with the Uniate clergy, who conduct divine services in Russian and who are the bearers of the Russian national identity of the Rusyns. To this end, measures are being taken to restrict Orthodoxy in Galicia and to train the Russophobic generation of the Uniate clergy. In 1882, Galician monasteries were transferred to the management of the Jesuits, in 1893 Uniate seminaries were closed, Russophile priests were expelled from churches and replaced by "propagandists" of the new Ukrainian idea, and in 1911 these persecutions against the clergy ended with the sending of all Orthodox priests to prison.
With the outbreak of the First World War, the forging of Rusyns into Ukrainians takes the form of genocide. The Austrian authorities set up concentration camps to exterminate the Russian population of Galicia; Thalerhof and Terezin were especially famous for their cruelty. Almost the entire Russian intelligentsia and thousands of peasants are arrested according to the lists prepared by the Ukrainophiles, who have become the main driving force of the mass terror of the Austrians.
Demonstration trials are organized, in which the leading figures of the Muscovite movement are accused of high treason and sentenced to death, while Austrian troops, on denunciations of Ukrainianophiles, kill and hang thousands of Russian peasants in the villages just because they consider themselves Russians. During the Austrian terror, tens of thousands of people and practically the entire Russian national intelligentsia of Galicia were killed, and several hundred thousand Rusyns, fleeing the Austrian genocide, fled to Russia.
The Austrian authorities, seeing the Ukrainianophiles as agents of influence, decide to take advantage of the post-revolutionary liberalization of the order in Russia and create centers for the spread of Ukrainophiles there. Under the leadership of Hrushevsky in 1906, numerous Ukrainian-language publications were opened in Kiev and other cities of the Southwestern Territory, the activities of the "Mazepa" people became more active, and hundreds of propagandists of the invented "Ukrainian" language appeared.
Everyone immediately became aware of the artificiality of this language: if the Rusyns living side by side with the Poles and Germans, it was still somehow understood, then for the inhabitants of the Southwest Territory “Mova” was gibberish. Despite serious Austrian funding for such enlightenment, it did not receive any support and, due to lack of demand, quickly ceased to exist.
However, the activities of the “Mazepaists” are supported by Russian liberals (represented by the leader of the Cadet Party, Milyukov), who are striving to orient Russia towards Western values. With their help, Hrushevsky even manages to impose discussions on the existence of the "Ukrainian people" in the State Duma. Until the end of the 19th century, the term "Ukrainian" was not used anywhere in Russia, but through the efforts of Russian liberals and "Mazepians" it began to be used among the Russian liberal intelligentsia.
With the advancement of Germany's plan of expansion to the east, the Austrian and German special services are beginning to take an interest in Galician Ukrainianophiles, establish contacts with their leaders, secretly finance and direct the activities of Ukrainian organizations in the spirit of Russophobia.
In August 1914, Austrian special services created in Galicia the "Union for the Liberation of Ukraine" headed by the future ideologist of Ukrainian nationalism Dmitry Dontsov, who declares support for Austria and Germany in the coming war with Russia and begins to engage in sabotage and propaganda activities against Russia.
Under the ideological leadership of Galician Ukrainophiles at the end of the 19th century, another movement of Dukhinsky followers emerged in Slobozhansk region, led by the terrorist Nikolai Mikhnovsky, who developed the ideas of Ukrainians to radical fascist forms and proclaimed the slogan “Ukraine for Ukrainians” in his “Ten Commandments”.
But things did not go beyond the marginal group of conspiratorial terrorists. Misunderstood not only by the South Russian elite, but also by the Ukrainians themselves, he could not find support anywhere and, eternally persecuted, committed suicide. However, unlike his godfather, who offered the Ukrainians the role of the younger brother of the Poles, Mikhnovsky had already assigned them the place of enemies on a par with the Muscovites, and the first proclaimed the anti-Polish character of Ukrainian nationalism.
In general, at the Polish-Austrian stage, the Ukrainians in Russia until February 1917 achieved little in the implementation of far-reaching plans to seize the Little Russian lands. The movement, with the exception of certain groups of “Mazepaists” and the liberals supporting them, had no support either in the intelligentsia or in the peasant environment, and practically nothing was known about it. The toponym "Ukraine" was practically not used, the invented Ukrainian language was rejected by all strata of society. No "Ukrainian" national liberation movement was observed.
In Galicia, by means of terror and with the support of the Polish Ukrainophiles and the Austrian authorities, successes in the destruction of the Russian people were achieved. The Muscovite movement of Rusyns was completely defeated, its ideologues were physically destroyed or emigrated to Russia, the clergy were purged of supporters of Russian unity and replaced by preachers of closer union with Catholicism, the invented Ukrainian language was forcefully imposed on the bulk of the peasantry, the Rusyns who refused to change their identity were destroyed, and the weak in spirit are forged into the "Ukrainian nation".
For about half a century in Galicia, it was possible to create an anti-Russian bridgehead and practically cleanse the Galician region of everything that was associated with the Russianness of the people who inhabited it. The remaining population was imposed on a new national identity based on an inferiority complex and fierce hatred of everything Russian.
The end follows …
