Editing Stepan Bandera (section)

==Life==
Bandera was born on 1 January 1909 in the village of Staryi Uhryniv, located in the eastern part of Galicia, the easternmost province of the Habsburg Empire. During World War 1 the region was a battleground between Austria-Hungary and the Russian Empire. Political partisanship was polarised between russophile Pan-Slavism and Austroslavism, which made fighting on this front a de-facto regional Civil War that resulted in physical extermination of the local russophile movement as part of the Habsburgs counterinsurgency operations<ref>‘The Real History Of Ukraine’ (2021-05-28 17:58:09). ([[Russians with Attitude]]). Timestamp: ~36:00. Available at: https://kemono.party/patreon/user/45511713/post/51807374 (Accessed: 10 February 2023).</ref>. This in combination with the polish recolonisation of the region as part of their phyrric victory in the Polish-Soviet War after World War 1 set the context within which Bandera grew up. He was involved in the nationalist movement from a very early age. He joined the UVO, a precursor to the OUN, in 1927, shortly before moving Lvov. The OUN was established in 1929, which the UVO merged into. Bandera became active in the nationalist movement, being arrested many times by Polish authorities until the Nazi invasion of [[Republic of Poland (1918–1939)|Poland]].

When the Nazis invaded Poland, Bandera escaped from prison and continued to organize with other nationalists under the new Nazi government. While most Ukrainian nationalists at the time were not anti-semitic, Bandera was a pioneer. Bandera even petitioned the Nazi governor of Poland, Hanz Frank, to kill all the Jews and Poles in what he considered to be Ukrainian territories.
===Rise to leadership===
A split grew in the OUN as some members didn't trust the Nazis. On February 10th, 1940, Bandera gathered members that supported the Nazis in Krakow to proclaim a new organization - the OUN-B (OUN-Bandera). The other faction became the OUN-M (OUN-Mel’nyk)

On 31 March, 1941, the OUN-B organized the second great congress of the Ukrainian nationalists. Since the first great congress was organized by the OUN, this second congress was intended to show that the new OUN-B was the real successor. At this congress several resolutions were adopted, such as the concept of “One nation, one party, one leader”, the beginning of Ukrainian "race science", and declaring Jews as an enemy of the OUN-B.

The congress also introduced a set of fascist rituals. This included the red-and-black flag, which symbolizes blood and soil as well as the slogan "Slava Ukrayini!" (Glory to Ukraine) to which the response was "Heroiam slava!" (Glory to the heroes).

Stepan Bandera was then declared Providnyk, their new equivalent to the Nazi Fuhrer.

=== Arrest ===
Because of their networking with other [[National Socialism|National Socialists]] in Europe during the repartition of the former austrian sphere of influence the OUN assumed that they could rally a sufficiently useful collaborator movement and act as the vanguard of ethnic cleansing of Russians to establish a culturally homogenous Ukraine, which the Nazis would have to contend with in their plans.

Hitler disagreed and Bandera was interned as a "guest of honor" because his plans and fanaticism were incompatible with the goals of Generalplan Ost, which encompassed the genocide of Galicians as well. This did not negatively affect the de-facto collaboration between Germany and the OUN in practice. The OUN(b) continued acting as an official auxillery police to the Nazi state and it's only significant units capable of limited conventional combat were under direct command and leadership of the german military. 

After the Battle of Stalingrad and the OUN's hasty attempts to refashion themselves into anything other than a powerless collaborator gang, Bandera was transferred to a concentration camp because of his movement's nominal treason by attempting to align with the Allies. The first priority of his supporters on the ground remained the extermination of Poles and Jews. 

On the initiative of the OUN(b), negotiations with the SS and its Security Service (Sicherheitsdienst, SD) were resumed on March 5, 1944.<ref name=":0" /> By March 1944, the UPA was sharing information with the German authorities on their murder of “Poles, bandits, and Jews.” Formal cooperation with the German Security Police, Sicherheitspolizei (SiPo) and the SD was resumed in May 1944.<ref>Pohl, Nationalsozialistische Judenverfolgung in Ostgalizien, 376; Frank Golczewski, “Shades of Grey: Reflections on Jewish-Ukrainian and German-Ukranian Relations in Galicia,” in Ray Brandon and Wendy Lower, eds., The Shoah in Ukraine: History, Testimony, Memorialization (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2008), 143.</ref> 

Bandera was released in October 1944.