Yaroslav Stetsko (Ukrainian: Ярослав Стецько; born 19 January 1912 in Ternopil, Austria–Hungary; died 5 July 1986 in Munich, Germany) was the leader of Stepan Bandera's Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), from 1968 until death. In 1941, during Nazi Germany invasion into the Soviet Union he was self-proclaimed temporary head of the self-proclaimed Ukrainian statehood. Stetsko was the head of the Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations from the time of foundation until 1986, the year of his death.

Biography

Yaroslav Stetsko was born on 19 January 1912 in Ternopil, Austria–Hungary (now Ukraine) into a Ukrainian Catholic priest's family. His father, Semen, and his mother, Teodoziya, née Chubaty, encouraged him to pursue a higher education, which was very difficult for ethnic Ukrainians. Yaroslav not only graduated high school in Ternopil, but later studied Law and Philosophy at the Kraków and Lwów Universities, graduating in 1934.

Yaroslav Stetsko was active in Ukrainian nationalist organizations from an early age. He was a member of three separate organizations: "Ukrayinska Natsionalistychna Molod'" (Ukrainian Nationalist Youth; Ukrainian: Українська Націоналістична Молодь) where he became a member of the National Executive in 1932, Ukrainian Military Organization the UVO (Ukrainian: Українська Військова Організація) and eventually the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) (Ukrainian: Організація Українських Націоналістів).

Because of his anti-Polish activities and the recent assassination of Piernacki by Ukrainian nationalists, Stetsko was arrested by Polish authorities in 1934 and sentenced to a 5-year term. This sentence was reduced, and Stetsko was released in 1937 in a general amnesty.

In 1929–1934, he studied philosophy at the Universities of Lwow and Kraków in Poland. In the 1930s, he became one of the leaders of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN).

World War II

According to the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine and other sources, OUN leaders had meetings with the heads of Nazi Germany's intelligence, regarding the formation of "Nachtigall" and "Roland" Battalions. In spring the OUN received 2.5 million marks for subversive activities inside the USSR.

On 30 June 1941, Stetsko declared in Lviv the formation of a Ukrainian state which "will closely cooperate with the National-Socialist Greater Germany, under the leadership of its leader Adolf Hitler which is forming a new order in Europe and the world" – as stated in the text of the "Act of Proclamation of Ukrainian Statehood" Gestapo and Abwehr officials protected Bandera followers, as both organizations intended to use them for their own purposes.

On 5 July, OUN-B leader Bandera was placed under honorary arrest (Latin: custodia honesta) in Kraków, and transported to Berlin the next day. 14 July he was released, but required to stay in Berlin. 12 July 1941 he was joined in Berlin by his deputy Yaroslav Stetsko, whom the Germans had moved from Lviv after an unsuccessful attempt by unknown persons to assassinate him. During July–August both of them submitted dozens of proposals for cooperation to different Nazi institutions (OKW, RSHA etc.) and freely communicate with their followers.  After the assassination of two key members of Melnyk OUN, said to have been committed by members of OUN-B, Bandera and Stetsko after 15 September 1941 were held in the central Berlin prison at Spandau and, in January 1942, transferred to Sachsenhausen concentration camp's special barrack for high-profile political prisoners Zellenbau.

In April 1944 Stepan Bandera and his deputy Yaroslav Stetsko were approached by Otto Skorzeny to discuss plans for diversions and sabotage against Soviet Army.

In September 1944 Stetsko and Stepan Bandera were released by the German authorities in the hope that he would rouse the native populace to fight the advancing Soviet Army. With German consent Bandera set up headquarters in Berlin. Germans supplied OUN-B and UIA by air with arms and equipment. Assigned German personnel and agents trained to conduct terrorist and intelligence activities behind Soviet lines, as well as some OUN-B leaders, were also transported by air until early 1945.

In April 1945 Stetsko was seriously injured during an Allied air-attack on Nazi military vehicles convoy in Bohemia.

In August 1941 Stetsko wrote his autobiography. It was addressed to the German authorities, and contained several notable antisemitic passages, in particular he stated that he considered Marxism a product of Jewish thought, that was put into practice by the Muscovite-Asiatic people with Jewish assistance; that Moscow and the Jewry are the carriers of the international ideas of the Bolsheviks. He stated that although he consider Moscow rather than Jewry to be the main enemy of imprisoned Ukraine, he absolutely endorses the idea of the indubitable harmful role of Jews in the enslavement of Ukraine by Moscow. He finally states that he absolutely endorses the extermination of Jews, and the rationality of the German methods of extermination of Jews, instead of assimilating them.

After the war

Stetsko continued to be very active politically after World War II. In 1968 he became the supreme leader of the OUN-B. He also became a board member of the World Anti-Communist League.

In 1946, Stetsko spearheaded the creation of a new anti-soviet organization, the Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations, the ABN. He was president of this organization until his death.

Death

On 5 July 1986, Yaroslav Stetsko died in Munich, Germany. He was 74 years old.

Legacy

Stetsko's (written in 1951) book "Two Revolutions" is the ideological base of the political party All-Ukrainian Union "Svoboda". The essence of this doctrine is: "the revolution will not end with the establishment of the Ukrainian state, but will go on to establish equal opportunities for all people to create and share material and spiritual values and in this respect the national revolution is also a social one".