THE ANNEXATION OF SUB-CARPATHIAN RUS TO THE USSR. From the book by a Czech historian: Jan Rychlík. Podkarpatská Rus a formování národní identity Rusínů. Praha, 2025

Abstract

Renowned Czech historian, specialist in the history of Central and Eastern Europe, and professor at Charles University in Prague, Jan Rychlík has prepared his latest book on the history of Ukraine, entitled ‘Subcarpathian Rus and the Formation of Rusyn National Identity.’ Given the controversial nature of certain issues in the history of Transcarpathia, and with the author's permission, we are publishing one of the chapters of this work, which may be of interest to historians and the general public in Ukraine due to the original perspective of a foreign scholar on one of the landmark events in the modern history of Transcarpathia and Ukraine.

In particular, this refers to Chapter 8 of the Czech historian's new work, which examines little-known aspects of the annexation of Subcarpathian Rus/Transcarpathian Ukraine to the USSR in November 1944 on the basis of Czech, Ukrainian and Russian archival documents. The chapter is also based on recently published documents and the results of the author's research in the Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic. The author emphasises that the Czechoslovak émigré government in London considered Subcarpathian Rus to be an integral part of Czechoslovak territory from the very beginning, and its goal was to restore Czechoslovakia within its pre-Munich borders (i.e. as of 29 October 1938). To this end, it was possible to gradually gain the support of the USSR and the USA, as well as Great Britain and France, which, together with Germany, were signatories to the Munich Agreement. After Italy's capitulation in the winter of 1943, Italy also withdrew its consent to the Munich Agreement and the Vienna Arbitration. President Edward Beneš insisted primarily on the return of the Sudetenland and the retention of Slovakia, while the issue of Subcarpathian Rus was of secondary importance. If it could not be resolved, Beneš was prepared to relinquish this territory.

After the Red Army entered Subcarpathian Rus at the end of October 1944, Czechoslovak government representative Minister František Němec arrived in Khust with the task of organising Czechoslovak affairs, and the military commander of the region, General Antonín Hasal, who was responsible for replenishing the Czechoslovak army. From the very beginning, the Soviet military authorities prevented the Czechoslovak authorities from performing their duties, in particular by recruiting local men into the Red Army, despite the fact that they were Czechoslovak citizens. As is well known, on 26 November 1944, the first (and last) Congress of People's Committees of Transcarpathian Ukraine was held in a local cinema in Mukachevo, where delegates passed a resolution on the accession of the Transcarpathian region to the Ukrainian SSR, i.e. in fact to the USSR. President E. Beneš appealed to J. Stalin and, after an exchange of views, agreed to a ‘voluntary’ renunciation of Transcarpathia, but on condition that it would formally take place only after the war on the basis of a separate intergovernmental agreement. It was indeed signed in Moscow on 29 June 1945.

It is impossible to say unequivocally when Stalin first conceived the idea of annexing Subcarpathian Rus, which most likely crystallised over a period of time depending on the situation at the front. At the same time, the author points out that this was not an entirely new idea, as such a possibility had already been envisaged by the tsarist foreign policy at the beginning of the First World War. The author further argues that the legitimacy of the First Congress of People's Committees is negligible, but on the other hand, it cannot be ignored that at least among some Ukrainian residents of Transcarpathia, this idea found support.