 | You can helpexpand this article with text translated fromthe corresponding article in French.Click [show] for important translation instructions.
|
DuringWorld War II, some Belarusians collaborated with the invadingAxis powers. Until the beginning ofOperation Barbarossa in 1941, the territory ofBelarus was under control of theSoviet Union, as theByelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic. However, memories ofSoviet repressions in Belarus andcollectivization, as well as of thepolonization and discrimination against Belarusians under theSecond Polish Republic were still fresh.
Many Belarusians wanted anindependent nation and co-operated with the invaders in hopes thatNazi Germany would allow them to have their own independent state after the war ended. Early cases of collaboration with other foreign powers occurred in interwar Belarus, with an example beingRadasłaŭ Astroŭski (who would later collaborate with Nazi Germany) collaborating with theSoviet Union andCommunist Party of Western Belorussia.
Belarusian organizations never had administrative control over the territory of Belarus. The real power was held by the German civil and military administrations. The collaborationistBelarusian Central Council, presenting itself as a Belarusian governmental body, was formed inMinsk a few months before Belarus was retaken by theSoviet Army.
Before the war, theBelarusian National Socialist Party [be;de;it] was formed by a small group ofBelarusian nationalists inPolish-controlledWestern Belorussia in 1933. The group was far less influential than other Belarusian political parties in interwar Poland such as theBelarusian Peasants' and Workers' Union and theBelarusian Christian Democracy. The Belarusian National Socialist Party was banned by the Polish authorities in 1937. Party leaders left forBerlin and became among the first advisers to the Germans at the onset ofOperation Barbarossa.[1][2]
.jpg)
{{cite book}}:|work= ignored (help)