The struggle of all the nations subjugated by Russian-Bolshevik Imperialism, and united in the ABN (Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations) is directed to the division of the Russian Empire into its separate States, each having its own independent national Government, and covering its own ethnic area, populated by its own nationals. For this reason, ABN is fighting, not only the Bolshevik Russian Empire, but any Russian Empire, whether “Democratic“, “Totalitarian“, “Monarchist“, or “Socialist“.
While not denying the right of the Russian people to form a State of their own within their own ethnic frontiers, ABN refuses, on any terms whatsoever, to collaborate with Russian imperialistic circles. ABN is also fighting to restore freedom and independence to the satellite States, with the right to form the Governments they wish, as ascertained by democratic methods.
It follows, that according to the national principle, ABN is opposed to the pre-1939 Polish Eastern frontiers, as this would again include Ukrainian, White Ruthenian and Lithuanian territories.
The events that occurred in these territories during the Second World War afforded sufficient proof that their nations were definitely against Polish domination.
ABN is opposed to such constructions as Czecho-Slovakia, Yugoslavia, and so on, for the above reasons. The absurdity of the “Union“ of the Russian Empire is apparent when it is realised that there are not more than 25% Russians in the whole Soviet Union, yet claiming to be the “master race “ of the vast USSR. Instead of a “Union“, the USSR is a prison of the nations. None but these nations, through their national representatives, have a right to decide their fate, and this right must be internationally recognised. Help from any quarter to these struggling nations, struggling merely for human freedom, will increase the inner pressure[1] in the USSR which will ultimately blow to pieces this prison of the nations.
ABN is engaged in organising the democratic anti-Bolshevik liberating revolution of the nations of the USSR and its satellites, with the declared object of disintegrating any kind of Russian Empire; the only way to free these nations from the national and social slavery imposed by Russian imperialism at the moment in the form of Bolshevism[1]. Support of this struggle is the only way in which the Western nations can save themselves.
National liberation and national independence have always been the driving force in our centuries-old fight for freedom, and all our nationalities instantly responded to the principles of President Wilson and threw off the chains of Russian slavery in the revolutions of 1917 to 1918. Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland Ukraine, White Ruthenia, Don, Terek, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Northern-Caucasia became free and independent, and others experienced a great national revival. But the freedom of our nations was short-lived, as a Communist Dictatorship established itself on the ruins of the Tsarist Empire, and we fell victim to Bolshevik oppression. During the Second World War, most of our nations fought against both Russian and German aggressors, and, always changing our forms of warfare, we (the Ukrainian Insurgent Army — UPA, the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists — OUN, the political Organisations of Liberation and armed underground forces of White Ruthenians, Lithuanians, Latvians, Estonians, Slovaks, Hungarians, Serbs, Croats, Rumanians. Bulgarians, Cossacks, Turkmens, North Caucasians. Georgians, Azerbaijanis, Siberians, Idel-Uraliens and others) are still at war with the USSR, and are fighting at the present day. Fighting against Soviet tyranny, we are surely entitled to claim Western support and be recognised as regular armies in a state of war, according to The Hague Convention concerning the Rules of Warfare (1 b and 2, 1899 and 1907).
Further, it is essential that the National Centres, Liberation Councils, Liberation Committees and Governments in Exile be acknowledged by Western nations as the sole bodies competent to represent their nations at International Conferences, and this right be denied to the Bolshevik agencies set up as “national democracies” behind the Iron Curtain. Owing to the enslavement of our countries we are misrepresented at all International Institutions standing for the unity of Europe, but a unity freely decided upon by free nations and the destruction of the Russian Empire is therefore a sine qua non as a preliminary: the nations having reached self-government, will themselves decide as to their participation in a United Europe, having then equality with the West.
There can be no United Europe where a number of the nations are free and a number remain slaves: all must enjoy equal rights, and all must assume equal restrictions. It is impossible to establish two Europes — there is only one Europe. There is no such thing as “PanSlavism“ or a “Slavic Block“, there is only a Bolshevik one. The Slavic nations are not fighting for the Slavic race they are only fighting for their freedom. The enemy of Western Europe is not the Eastern European nations, but only Russian imperialism, and it is a tragic error, therefore, to identify the aims of the Eastern European nations with those of the USSR; they are friends of the West, Russia — the enemy.
ABN wishes to see the freedom of all nations the world over, but, as its first duty, it is limiting its activities to the disintegration of the USSR and the restoration of freedom and sovereignty to the satellite countries. ABN believes that the national State is, and will remain the highest form of any nation’s existence, and the pre-requisite of a community of interests. The national States, therefore, will never die or let themselves be converted into supernational organizations.
Subjugated nations have never freed themselves by international ideas, but always by adopting their own national aims. Therefore, a United Europe cannot be the supreme ideal of the subjugated nations of the USSR, and they will not fight and die for it, but only for the vision of free, national States of their own. They will only decide on the matter of participating in a United Europe after having achieved freedom and equal status with the Western nations. In the inevitable crusade of the West against the USSR, it would be useless to offer the enslaved nations a United Europe as its aim, for it would be emphatically refused, these nationalities having been repeatedly misled by Western interventions and we must warn the statesman of the West against repeating a disastrous error.
A Russian national State, limited to its own ethnic territory, could be admitted to the United Europe of the future, but, in the meantime, treated as defeated Germany is today.
When all the nations subjugated by the Bolsheviks regain their sovereign independence, they must be guaranteed against future aggression, and to enable this, occupation forces must remain in ethnographical Russia till all technical and material means of warfare are destroyed and a system set up which will prevent a resuscitation of Russian militarism and imperialism. Only on such conditions should Russia be admitted as a member of a United Europe.
ABN, on principle, resolutely refuses any form of political connection with Russia — union, federation or confederation, for all these varieties have always been changed into national suppression by Russian imperialism. ABN is organising a regional association of defence against any revival of Russian imperialism of any kind whatsoever, but based on good-neighbourly relations with a Russian State reduced to its ethnic borders, and without any aggressive or retaliatory intentions towards the Russian people.
Striving for the unity of the world, however. ABN cannot overlook the possibility of the activity or continuation of imperialism, especially of Russian imperialism, against which the nations composing ABN would have to defend their precious, regained freedom with their own forces.
To sum up, there is no course for rational policy-making other than what is contained in this manifesto.
Jaroslav Stetzko, President of the Central Committee of ABN
Архів ОУН. - Бібліотека. - Неперіодичні видання. - ABN Correspondence. - 1950. - March
