The KGB against the Ukrainian diaspora: 'active measures'
A diaspora that worried Moscow
After the Second World War, the Ukrainian diaspora grew significantly stronger — especially in Canada, where it numbered around a million people. The postwar wave of emigration was political: it brought educated people and scholars who saw no future for themselves under the Bolshevik regime. Despite internal divisions into competing currents, the community united in the face of Moscow — and it was precisely this unity that alarmed the Soviet authorities[1].
”Decomposition”: the directive of 1962
The response was a targeted operation. From the late 1950s the KGB developed measures for the “decomposition” of the Ukrainian diaspora, and in 1962, under a “secret” classification, a work appeared by Colonel Borys Shulzhenko, deputy head of the KGB of the Ukrainian SSR, setting out the stages of this “decomposition”[2]. This was not a matter of isolated episodes but a systemic, documented policy.
Three “active measures”
The term itself — “active measures” — is KGB jargon, and it has not disappeared to this day. According to Siromsky, they proceeded along three lines[3]:
- Imposing the Soviet interpretation of events — both past and current.
- Sowing discord among community leaders through fabricated smears: a false accusation of someone for theft or dishonorable conduct. Even after refutation, as the historian notes, “the residue remains.”
- Infiltrating KGB agents into influential positions in Ukrainian organizations — the Ukrainian Canadian Committee, the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America — in order to provoke conflicts from within and promote the idea of a “cultural exchange” with the USSR instead of political resistance.
What this means
The techniques now called “Russian hybrid disinformation” have a long Soviet pedigree. Fabricated compromising material, the splitting of communities from within, agents of influence, the imposition of the “correct” version of history — all of this the KGB systematically applied against the Ukrainian diaspora half a century ago. Understanding this continuity matters: contemporary Russian operations are not improvisation but the continuation of an old, well-honed school of active measures.
Related persons
- Ruslan Siromsky — Doctor of Historical Sciences, dean of the Faculty of History at Ivan Franko National University of Lviv
References
- [1] summary
Після Другої світової війни українська діаспора — особливо в Канаді, де вона мільйонна, — зміцніла завдяки повоєнній політичній хвилі еміграції (освічені люди, науковці). Попри внутрішній поділ на конкурентні течії, перед лицем московського комуністичного режиму громада об'єднувалася — і це непокоїло Москву.
Back to text - [2] summary
З кінця 1950-х КДБ розробляє цілі заходи з «розкладання» української діаспори. У 1962 році під грифом «секретно» вийшла праця полковника Бориса Шульженка, заступника голови КДБ УРСР, що розкривала етапи цього «розкладання».
Back to text - [3] summary
«Активні заходи» йшли в трьох напрямах: нав'язування радянського трактування подій минулого й сучасності; сіяння розбрату між лідерами громади через сфабриковані вкиди (фальшиві звинувачення, після спростування яких «осад лишається»); і впровадження агентів КДБ на впливові позиції в українських організаціях (Комітет українців Канади, Український конгресовий комітет Америки), щоб провокувати конфлікти й просувати «культурний обмін» із СРСР.
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Sources
- book (2020) Active Measures: The Secret History of Disinformation and Political Warfare — Farrar, Straus and Giroux A definitive academic history of 'active measures' — organized disinformation and political warfare by intelligence services from the 1920s to the internet age (FSG, 2020; ISBN 978-0374287269). Independent corroboration of the thesis that active measures were a systemic tool of the Soviet/Russian intelligence services.