THE USAGE OF THE OPEN SOURCES INFORMATION BY THE SPECIAL UNITS OF THE UKRAINIAN NATIONALIST ORGANIZATIONS IN THE 1920s - 1980s
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.24919/2519-058X.20.240030Abstract
The purpose of the study is to highlight the intelligence activities based on open sources by special units of the Ukrainian nationalist organizations in the 1920s – 1980s. The principles of scientific objectivity and historicism are the methodological basis of the research. The scientific novelty of the obtained results consists in the following: for the first time in domestic and foreign historiography the intelligence activities of special units of the Ukrainian nationalists have been analyzed on the basis of open sources, the unpublished archival materials have been introduced into a scientific circulation as well. The Conclusions. The intelligence departments of the Ukrainian Military Organization (UMO) began the collection, compilation and analysis of the enemy's press in various languages by the special units of the Ukrainian nationalist organizations for the first time during the 1920s .
During the 1930s, intelligence of the Ukrainian Nationalists Organization (OUN) learned about the repressions in the USSR from the Soviet and Polish newspapers. After the German-Soviet annexation of Poland, the Security Service (SS) of the OUN was engaged in this work. During the post-war period, the Security Service focused on district and regional Soviet newspapers. From the newspapers the SS learned about the death or capture of underground fighters, planned measures of the Soviet government, identified the enemy active supporters among the local population.
The OUN Foreign Units (FU) played a particularly important role in obtaining and analyzing the Soviet publications. To know about the situation in the USSR, “Referentura of Countries Affairs, which were under the Soviet Rule” (“RCAUSR”) was established in Munich at the end of September of 1953. Due to a lack of funds and the necessary specialists, it was dissolved in 1968 and its functions were transferred to the Ukrainian Information Service (UIS) in London.
Conducting surveys of the civilian population was one of the types of getting intelligence information by special units of the Ukrainian nationalist organizations.
The OUN special units in Western countries used journalistic cover-ups or correspondence with relatives in the USSR and the Warsaw Treaty (the Warsaw Pact) countries to conduct covert surveys. At the beginning of the 1960s, the “offensive” departments were established in the structure of “The Central” and Field Leadership of the OUN SS FU, which were responsible for survey the Soviet tourists and employees of international institutions of the Ukrainian SSR. In addition, the “offensive” department of the OUN SS FU, as well as “The Public Guardianship Referentura”, interviewed Western tourists who visited the USSR.
Simultaniously with the “offensive” departments of the OUN SS FU, the “analytical and intelligence group” of the Foreign Representation of the Ukrainian Chief Liberation Council and the “dviykari” intelligence collected and analyzed the Soviet open sources of intelligence information.
Key words: intelligence, open sources, periodicals, offensive departments, OUN, SS, FU OUN, RCAUSR, UkrSSR, survey, KGB.
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