Khomiak O. Representation of Miliraty Experience in Memory of the "Galicia" Division Veterans (1943-2013)

This study focuses on formation, representation and instrumentalization of military experience in the collective and individual memory of the Waffen SS "Galicia" Division veterans. The research is based on conducted autobiographical half-structured interviews with the Division and / or UPA veterans living in Ukraine, Canada, Great Britain and the USA. It also relies on memoirs, interrogation materials and criminal records from the KGB archives in Ukraine, published materials of the Brotherhood of the former soldiers of the 1st UD UNA as well as unpublished archival material, mostly from collections of the state archives in Kyiv, Lviv, Ternopil and Ukrainian-Canadian Research and Documentation Centre in Toronto, Canada. The first chapter offers an analysis of historiography, sources, and research methodology. The following chapter examines in detail various factors that influenced formation of the veteran's collective identity in Diaspora and Soviet society. It confirmed the role of memory and identity as consolidating agents to overcome external threats. The third chapter focuses on the representation of war experience in the collective memory of the Division veterans. Their narrative combines glorification of their past activities as of "fighters for Ukrainian independence" and victimization as they mostly remember being victims of the violence managed by the Soviet state. Representation of being a possible perpetrator is almost missing. It is one of silenced elements in their narrative. Since 1991 the Galician Brotherhood in Ukraine has become a consumer and distributor of the Division narrative created in Diaspora. Instrumentalization of the veterans memory took place in the form of the Brotherhood of the former soldiers of the 1st UD UNA. It has been explored through the study of the commemoration activities and places. The last chapter of the dissertation examines motivations to join Division at different stages of the recruitment campaign. Joining the Division is seen as the most important strategy of survival during the war. Everyday life in the Division is studied through the moral and psychological atmosphere in the Division.