Chortkiv offensive

On 7 June 1919 the Ukrainian Galician Army, which the Polish command considered beaten, attacked the Poles from the Zbruch and the Dniester. The next day it took Czortków (Chortkiv), from which the attack took its name. The Chortkiv offensive was the last Ukrainian attack in the war for Eastern Galicia. In three weeks it took from the Poles a large part of the country they had occupied in May and nearly brought the front back to Lviv.

In the triangle on the Zbruch

General Haller’s May offensive had pushed the Ukrainians into the south-eastern corner of Galicia, a triangle between the Zbruch, the Dniester and the line Husiatyn–Tovste–Ustechko. This was the last land over which the government of the West Ukrainian People’s Republic still held sway. According to the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, about 19,000 combat-ready soldiers with 50 artillery batteries were gathered there, and with them crowds of civilian refugees. Ammunition was short and morale was low. Beyond the Zbruch lay the land of the Ukrainian People’s Republic, with which the West Ukrainian republic had formally united in January, but the troops of the Directorate were themselves retreating before the Red Army at the time.

The Poles did not expect an attack. After the May victories two of Haller’s divisions and some other units had been moved west in case of war with Germany, and weaker units were left at the front. The plan of attack was drawn up by Major Alfred Bisanz (PL) and General Myron Tarnavsky (PL). The aim was to push the Poles back beyond the Zolota Lypa river, so as to gain room for further fighting and raise the army’s spirits. The commander-in-chief, General Mykhailo Omelianovych-Pavlenko (PL), at first treated it as a local operation.

The attack

The attack began on 7 June. The Ukrainians made use of surprise and took Czortków on 8 June. Success changed the political situation. On 9 June the Ukrainian National Council dissolved the government and gave dictatorial power to Yevhen Petrushevych. He at once changed the army’s commander: Omelianovych-Pavlenko was replaced by General Oleksandr Hrekov (PL), a graduate of the Russian general staff academy.

In the following days the Ukrainians won engagements at Jazłowiec, Buczacz and Trembowla, and on 15 June, after heavy fighting, they took Tarnopol. The offensive was greeted with enthusiasm by the Ukrainian population. Conscripts and volunteers flowed into the army, and partisan detachments began to operate behind the Polish lines. As a review in the Toruń quarterly Klio of a monograph by the Ukrainian historian Oleksandr Dedyk notes, the Galician Army was as a result considerably larger in mid-July than at the beginning of June.

On 16 June, in talks in Lviv, representatives of the two sides agreed on an armistice line, named after the head of the Ukrainian delegation the Delwig line (PL). Petrushevych did not approve it and the army kept advancing. On 21 June it took Brzeżany, a large Polish supply depot, although the garrison managed to withdraw. In three weeks the Ukrainians advanced, according to different studies, by 120 to 150 kilometres and reached the line Brody–Krasne–Przemyślany–Hnyla Lypa, about 40 kilometres from Lviv.

Out of ammunition

There the attack ran out of steam. Above all there was no ammunition, and the Polish command brought up reinforcements, including Haller’s 1st Rifle Division. On 28 June the Polish army, led in person by Józef Piłsudski, broke the Ukrainian front at Janczyn. The Encyclopedia of Ukraine states that the Poles then had more than 38,000 bayonets and 207 guns, the Ukrainians 24,000 bayonets and 144 guns.

Historians still argue over the point of the offensive. Michał Klimecki and the veteran of the Galician army and historian Lev Shankovsky held that it would have been better to withdraw beyond the Zbruch at once with a stock of ammunition that would have been useful in the fight against the Bolsheviks and the Whites. Dedyk and the reviewer of his book reply that the army gained men and self-confidence from it, which it later showed in Dnieper Ukraine.