Vasyl Kuk

Vasyl Stepanovych Kuk (Ukrainian: Василь Степанович Кук; 11 January 1913 – 9 September 2007) was a Ukrainian nationalist activist, militant and academic who was the last commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army from the 1950 death of Roman Shukhevych until his 1954 capture by the KGB. From 1960 to 1972 and from 1991 until his death, he worked as an academic, first as a musicologist and later as a historian of the OUN. Born to a family of peasants, Kuk joined the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists in 1929. During World War II, he was a leading advocate for the OUN to fight Nazi Germany, rather than Polish and Soviet guerrillas, and he led the left-wing People's Revolutionary Liberation Organisation, a short-lived splinter from the OUN. After his 1954 capture, he spent six years in pre-trial detention before being released after agreeing to support the Soviet government. After his release, he researched composer Artemy Vedel. Due to similarities between Vedel's internment and the political abuse of psychiatry in the Soviet Union, Kuk's research was supported by members of the Ukrainian intelligentsia. Barred from working in academia after 1972, he resumed his activities as a historian following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, contributing to the Litopys UPA series. Kuk died in poverty in 2007.