Polish offensive in Eastern Galicia

On 14 May 1919 the Polish forces launched a great offensive against the Ukrainian Galician Army in Eastern Galicia and against the troops of Symon Petliura in Volhynia (PL). It was commanded by General Józef Haller, and in the first wave went the divisions of his army, formed in France and only just brought to the country. The Western powers, which had agreed to its transfer, had stipulated that it would not be used against the Ukrainians. Poland, however, was determined to settle the war for Eastern Galicia by force before decisions on its fate were taken in Paris.

Before the offensive

The Polish–Ukrainian war had been going on since November 1918. In March the Poles broke the Ukrainian ring round Lviv, but the front still ran a few kilometres from the city, and most of Eastern Galicia, with Tarnopol, Stanisławów and the oilfield at Borysław, remained in Ukrainian hands. A decision could come only with the Polish Army in France, which Haller had taken over in the autumn of 1918. According to the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, on 17 March the Supreme Council of the peace conference agreed to the transport of its six divisions, some 68,000 men, to Poland. In April its units began to arrive in the country. The Allies, who were trying at the time to bring about a Polish–Ukrainian armistice, would not, however, agree to this well-armed army being used in Galicia.

On 30 April the Polish command adopted Haller’s plan, entitled “Disposition for offensive action in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia”. The offensive was to smash the Ukrainian Galician Army and Petliura’s units, take the whole of Eastern Galicia and give Poland a common border with Romania. Under Haller’s orders were the I Corps of the French general Dominique Odry (PL) with the rifle divisions of Haller’s army, the group of General Aleksander Karnicki (PL) in Volhynia, the Lviv infantry division and the army of General Wacław Iwaszkiewicz south of Lviv. According to Polish studies, together they numbered about 50,000 soldiers, 200 guns and 900 machine guns. The Ukrainian army of General Mykhailo Omelianovych-Pavlenko (PL) had, according to the same sources, about 44,000 men and 144 guns. Political backing for the operation came from the Legislative Sejm, which on 9 May called on the government to use “immediately all the most severe means” to put an end to Ukrainian crimes against the Polish population.

The attack

On the morning of 14 May the first to move were Odry’s I Corps, Karnicki’s group and the units from Lviv. North of the city the Poles broke through the Ukrainian defences and, according to an IPN study, in the first days of the attack reached the line Uhrynów–Krystynopol–Baranie–Milatyn–Łokacze. The main objectives in the north were Lutsk and Krasne (PL), from where the troops were to turn south-east and throw the Ukrainians back from Lviv. The next day Iwaszkiewicz’s army went over to the attack and struck at Sambor from three sides.

Two weeks

The Ukrainian front quickly collapsed. According to the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, within six days the Poles took Drohobycz and Stryi in the south and Kamionka Strumiłowa in the north. The units that had been besieging Lviv for half a year withdrew so as not to be encircled. On 22 May the Warsaw paper Kurier Poranny reported “the liberation of Galicia from the haidamak bands”. On 25 May the Polish forces stood on a line from the Styr through Krasne, Bóbrka and Chodorów (PL) to Bolechów, while from the south the Romanian army was entering Pokuttia (PL). By 27 May the Poles had taken Halicz and Stanisławów. Some Ukrainian units, cut off from the main force, crossed into Czechoslovakia and were interned there.

There the offensive stopped. The Entente protested against the use of Haller’s army, and the Polish General Staff feared a German attack on the country’s western borders. As early as 24 May Haller was ordered to transfer the 2nd Rifle Division to the Częstochowa area, and later the 1st Division left as well. Piłsudski halted the advance on the line of the Zolota Lypa, and from 31 May Iwaszkiewicz took over command of the front. The Ukrainian Galician Army, pushed into a triangle between the Dniester, the Zbruch and Czortków, seemed to be beaten.