In May 1945, the leadership of the OUN issued an official statement, in which it denied its engagement in fascist politics before and during the Second World War: “The Ukrainian liberating-revolutionary movement was not and is not a term equivalent to Italian Fascism and German National-Socialism.”[1560] Shortly before the statement was published Bandera had left Vienna for Innsbruck, in the French occupation zone of Austria. On 18 April 1945 Bandera met Ievhen Stakhiv there and ordered him to go to Zagreb, to find Lebed’ and return him to Austria. Lebed’ had gone to Croatia as the representative of the OUN-B and the UHVR, in order to establish contact with Allied troops. Stakhiv accepted the order but asked Bandera to find somebody to take care of his wife and baby, but his Providnyk refused to do so. Bandera’s lack of empathy angered Stakhiv, but with the help of a friend he carried out his order.[1561]
When Bandera came to Innsbruck, the city was filled with Ukrainian émigrés, in particular OUN-B members. In the summer of 1945, Bandera attended the wedding of Natalia Kovalivs’ka and Osyp Tiushka, with whom he lived together in an apartment during his student days in Lviv. Vienna was controlled at that time by all four Allies and, because of the presence of Soviet troops, was not safe for Ukrainian political émigrés. In the second half of 1945, Bandera moved to the Tyrol, to the alpine resort of Seefeld, which was, close to the German border. He rented the whole floor of a villa, where he lived for several months with his security guard Mykhailo Andriiuk, his driver Miklosh, and his secretary Marichka.[1562] One of the names Bandera used at this time was Karpiak, under which he was registered in Innsbruck and Seefeld.[1563]
In 1945 the ZCh OUN began to organize its new center in Munich, the capital of Bavaria, which was located in the American occupation zone of Germany.[1564] Munich became the heart of Ukrainian émigré activity after the Second World War. Ukrainian social and political organizations were based in a two-story building at Dachauer Strasse 9. The first floor was occupied by a Ukrainian church, and the second by such organizations as the ABN, the editorial office of Ukraїns’kyi samostiinyk, the League of Political Prisoners, the Ukrainian Red Cross, Plast, and the ZCh OUN.[1565] For a time, the office of the ZCh OUN was at Lindwurmstrasse 205. In 1954 the ZCh OUN and the ABN moved to Zeppelinstrasse 67. The ZCh OUN opened a publishing house in the basement of this building and began to issue its newspaper, Shliakh peremohy. The basement and an apartment in the house would belong to the OUN at least until the time of writing this book.[1566]
After the war, Bandera and his family moved several times. He had more than one address at a time, and frequently changed his place of residence. In August 1945, he came to Munich without his family to organize the ZCh OUN center. He registered himself under the name Michael Kasper, at Franz-Niessl-Strasse 14. In February 1946, his wife and daughter moved from Innsbruck to his apartment in Munich and also registered themselves under the name Kasper. When Bandera learned that Soviet intelligence had seized a courier he had sent to Ukraine, he moved in May 1946 to Söcking, a village about thirty kilometers from Munich, close to the town of Starnberg. He lodged with Mrs. Schwandtner at Hanfelder Strasse 1 and registered himself under the name Stefan Popel. Although he was registered at Hanfelder Strasse 1, he also lived with his family in a house that was hidden in the forest, close to Starnberg.[1567] While living in Söcking, Bandera frequently went to Munich and sometimes stayed overnight in an apartment which he rented or had at his disposal, possibly from the American authorities.[1568] Bandera lived in the house in the woods until 1950.[1569] From late 1949 until May 1950, his family stayed in a DP camp in Mittenwald. At this time, Bandera hid in various places because the MVD was looking for him.[1570] From mid-1950 to 1954, he lived in Breitbrunn, a village by Lake Ammersee, about thirty-five kilometers from Munich. During this period, his daughter Natalia attended high school in the nearby town of Herrsching.[1571] While living outside Munich, Bandera traveled to work by car. He had a motor accident in 1953 but was not injured.[1572] In 1952 Bandera’s family lived in Oberau for some months, close to Garmisch-Partenkirchen, a village in the Alpine region.[1573] In summer 1954, he moved with his family to Munich, where he lived at Rosenbuschstrasse 6 until 1956, and then at Kreittmayrstrasse 7.[1574]
False documents obtained by Bandera helped him to expunge his ambiguous relationship with the Nazis. On 6 June 1945, for example, he received an ID card bearing the name “Stefan Popel” from the Camp Committee (Lagerkomitee) and the commandant (Lagerkommandant) of the Mauthausen concentration camp. According to this document Bandera was a person “who was kept from 15.9.1941 to 6.5.1945 in Nazi-German concentration camps and was liberated from the concentration camp at Mauthausen”—where he was never a prisoner. (Fig. 23).[1575]