greetings, you are watching the espresso tv channel, my name is lesya vakulyuk, and we are continuing the series of interviews with people who make ukraine better on the espresso tv channel. today, i am visiting a person who makes ukraine better in two ways, in the historical plane and in the plane when he himself writes the current history with a weapon in his hands. volodymyr birchak. volodya for me, because i have known volodya a little longer, when i asked how to introduce you, volodya answered me: you can just be a sergeant of the armed forces of ukraine, but from civilian life, historian, archivist, head of academic programs of the liberation movement research center, you can also mention that the editor of historical truth, if it is not too much, i believe that it is not too much, and there are still many different pages from your life that we will remember today, and also i want to tell our viewers that i have actually known volodya since the summer of 2021,

a little more than six months before the full-scale invasion, and we just worked with volodya in the same documentary project, 10 days of independence, where i was one of screenwriters, and volodya was my consultant, and actually explained what and why, how everything happened over the last 100 years in the history of ukraine and why we chose these 10 days of independence, because these are the days when, in a century, ukrainians from... . gained independence, gained statehood, but then something, something happened in our history, and the gaining of independence did not end in 1991, and now you, my lord, are literally celebrating our 11th day of independence, did you, as a historian, foresee and knew that you would have to go to war, well, actually, in fact, that is, before... a large-scale

conflict, i was preparing myself and actually i was preparing my relatives and friends that it is most likely inevitable, and that is , i am not the only one, i am not unique in this, i know there are many of my brothers who analyzed the international situation, who analyzed the things that country 404 is doing, can we call it that today, so as not to talk like fools, and that all this leads to a full-scale conflict. after all, you have very aptly mentioned this documentary series, which we worked on, 10 days of independence, and the viewers of espresso, as far as i know, had the opportunity to watch it, because it is still available on youtube, absolutely, absolutely, and simply, if we analyze the history of the 20th century, actually the ukrainian 20th century, of the struggle ukrainians and ukraine for their independence, and we will see that the one that is now full-scale, well , that is... the war that began in the 14th year,

which we now call the modern russian-ukrainian war, it obviously began much earlier, even in 20th century, and it is already such a full-scale stage or a full-scale cycle, it was inevitable, and perhaps we will touch on this issue somewhere today in the conversation, this is a very important issue for understanding that you can never trust russia, you can never trust any ephemeral... peace or peri-peace, in which russia offers you, and, at the same time, one cannot admire russia's democracy. why am i talking about this? actually, once again, i appeal to our series, when we prepared a series just about independence day, and later about the referendum, there was once such a president in of the russian federation, whose name was boris yeltsin, and the world admired him because he was

a democrat and so on, but if we look at the press of that time, the great democrat yeltsin at the beginning of 1992 had already openly threatened the state of ukraine, that if it does not get rid of its nuclear status, then he will make a preventive nuclear attack on ukraine, and this is the year 92, well, that is, the great democrat yeltsin threatens the neighboring already independent state that he will strike with nuclear weapons if... and not will perform his protection, and that's all this is the history of russia, and the history of russia and its relations with ukraine, that is, this failed state that exists on the north-eastern border with us, they will never come to terms with our independence, they will never come to terms with our independence, so if we jump a little ahead, you celebrated the 11th day of independence, actually this 11th day of independence. it will either happen in us, or,

in my opinion, in my personal opinion, or we will cease to exist as such if... the orange revolution or the revolution of dignity, these were our days of independence and our victories, but we obviously could lose in them, well, in fact, there were various factors that contributed to the fact that we could lose, but then we still had some perspective, well, that is, we can only stay in ukraine where yure, and well, we will, i repeat, another fail state like belarus, and which, unfortunately, its... self-proclaimed dictator is now who they are, but we won then, now there is no longer a question of whether we will remain ukraine somehow ephemeral, in fact the question is whether we will to exist, or we will not exist as such, and therefore this day will either happen, it will really

be the day of independence and the day of our victory, or we will cease to exist, i very often analyze these things that happened in the 20th century. summer, i used to work a lot in the archive of the sbu, in various positions, for about six years, my last position there, i was the deputy director of the archive of the sbu, the branch state archive of the sbu, and now during my treatment, because i am on vacation and health condition due to a combat injury, and i remembered that in a previous life before the full-scale invasion i was a historian and began work on a book, now that. and once again i distort the materials i wrote before, i raise new ones, again i raise the documents of the nkvd, mgb, kgb, and they are very illustrative, because they very clearly show what can happen to us if we

lose, and this is conditional , let's say, with the active army of the ukrainian people's republic, or as the soviet special service called them the spetliurivtsi, and this is the vast majority of the personnel of the army. i mean now there will be armed forces of ukraine physically eliminated, even if not on the battlefield, then later tracked down and eliminated by the special services, a large part of ukrainians who fought for independence in other armed ways, i mean ukrainians in the body, who help, who volunteer, who donate, who hurt ukraine, they , accordingly, as supporters, like the soviets , called it the ukrainian counter-revolution. and here, that is, as supporters of, say, the ukrainian people's republic there, they will be convicted, sent to siberia, but they will remain, actually that part of the collaborators and that part pochekuns or zhduns, which unfortunately still exist in ukraine and still exist, moreover, they exist

in different parts of ukraine, such as here in lviv, where we are now having a conversation, or in odesa, or in kyiv, or in kharkiv, that is, i don't want to say that we have a sad outlook, because... that we are now an independent country that has a fairly strong and professional army, and that is helped by the west, and we have a chance to win this war, just because for us to win this war, this war must become a people's war, it must not be a war of units, it must be a war to the majority, when i talk about the people's war, that is, it is not only that somewhere there is, you know, as it unfortunately happened, somewhere... in 2016, 17th, 18th, when the news from the ato zone, and then from the zone of operation of the united forces, we were already going through a decline, decline, decline, well, somewhere there are some guys and girls, somewhere they are going out with someone, they are fighting there, we are okay here,

we have life here, but i i have nothing against a peaceful life, even though i am a military man, but a peaceful life, it is a peaceful life, it is good, because actually you can come on vacation to a peaceful city, where is it? is waiting for you, or your wife, or your lover, or your mother, and there to spend those 10 or 15 days of vacation, but this war must not go astray, and it should never be forgotten, but in civilian life, in fact, when it will be a people's day, when the whole people will fight, then we will be able to win, and on february 24, 22, it looked like a people's day, everyone mobilized then, what was your day like on february 24? oh, i had a very funny one, well, i don't want to look like a clown, of course it was not a funny day, not a funny day at all, but it started interestingly for me, that is, i had a premonition of something, and we had a meeting there in the evening with the director of the tsdvr, we were supposed to make a presentation

of a book there, i say: listen, it's all good that we we are planning, but it seems to me that it will start from day to day, and i will not be in this event, but they convinced me that nothing will start, well, okay. and then i sat down in the middle of the night to finish the book, just then, with my colleague from the institute of history of ukraine, national academy of sciences, tetyana pastushenko, we were working on a book about hearts the isd security police camp, that is , it is a nazi camp on the territory, on the territory of kyiv, which existed from 1941 to 1943, and where a lot of people were actually murdered by the nazis, and we were working on a collection of documents by order of the university of jerusalem, that's why i mentioned it for a reason, because - putin came to de-nazify us, and i was sitting, working on a collection of documents about the nazi camp, well, i don't know. did he know about it, he probably did n't know, and i was working somewhere, though until

1:40, and then i simply fell asleep on computer, and, well, that is, the beginning of a full-scale i overslept, and i was woken up by my good friend from the states, this is bohdan gavraliuk, he is from the organization for the defense of the four freedoms of ukraine, and he called me, i was sleepy, picked up the phone, i say what happened , he says, you have a war, i say, i’m either sleeping, or something seems to me, he says, the war is in the news , go to the news, and... then i went to ukrpravda, saw that a full-scale invasion had really begun, and then everything turned upside down , military, non-military, territorial center of staffing and social support of tsk known more distribution the first the first month is the defense of the ternopil airport, i was anti-aircraft calculation, banally

speaking , so as not to name... reconnaissance company, well, and then since the summer of 22, this is direct participation in the battle line , this is donbas, the north of donbas, the izyum direction, later the south of kharkiv region, then the kharkiv counteroffensive, then kupyansk, and now. sumyshchyna er, is it a long way from ternopil? 1200 km. eh, you now on recovery? yes. in recovery after injury? it is a combat injury. yes, well, it is, well, called a combat injury, yes, somehow. well, we like to joke with our brothers. somehow it happened. jumped and broke his knee. well, it happens. aha. was he just jumping like that or was he still saving his life? measures were taken to demining positions, and unfortunately, we were, you can use slang

, we were burned, slang is possible, yes, slang is possible, okay, it is possible, we were burned by the ork, that ork hall, well, this is their reconnaissance drone, and after what, after when they saw us, mortar shelling started from their territory, and it was necessary to urgently take a position not... on the ground, there is such a position below the ground, and i was in this ammunition, i unsuccessfully jumped from a height of 3 m, and so on , it so happened, it happens, this injury is the first injury of some kind, this is already the second, the second, eh, and that's it, everything is mine luck, all the same 82nd, because there was also an 82nd near kupyansk, but she hit the wall, the dugout was above my head, but there was this one, there were also well... such scratches, as the boys say, hey, guys who are with you, did any of

them have a question for you, or a question with a claim, like a historian, they say, if you knew that there was going to be a war, why didn't you warn, or what did you historians not warn all of us, no, well, we warned, well, the truth is, i’m asking if people do this, can i drop the article, where we warned about it, no, the guys didn’t ask such a thing, well here... er, there is probably one here, well, i am now i won’t reveal some big secret, there is m-m here, just like in ukrainian society, i see it, and among my brothers and sisters, there are such a certain question is probably somewhere in the authorities, i.e. that for a certain period it went according to the principle, like this goll film with leo decaprio don look up, i.e. don't look up, but it was a dangerous tactic, really many did not... believe what would happen , well, but everything indicated that, and our western partners indicated

that, the guys do not have such questions, we are there, when someone has time and mood, then we talk about other historical issues, and what interests the people who are with you in trenches that are shoulder to shoulder with you, but they have no historical of education, what they are interested in is history, it is from the history of ukraine, er, i apologize, well, it depends here, that is, someone is interested, well... my brother actually fights in the same platoon with me, he is a historian and graduated from the same faculty that and i, well, that is, he and i sometimes stick our tongues, so we can talk for a long time, but not only about history and... and about international relations and about other things, it depends on who has what request, well, that is, i have my platoon , he is interested in history, and when it was more or less quiet in our positions there, well, it is always podkupyansk comparatively more or less quiet, but when it was possible to talk a little to himself there at the sp, here

he was forever asking questions, and tell me about that, and tell me about that, and tell me about that, and then he even this one... in who i was, now this is my brother, because we are two commanders of the department, and even then i was a brother, so he even told him, he says yes, i did not understand, but why am i not on night duty together with the guard, he says, what are you doing to me moved, well , i have a call sign, he says, why are you me, and we have already found out why he is like that, he says, why did you transfer me, we are talking about the story at night, and you transferred me, he says no, no, put me back on duty with him, and even this one, there are different, there are different stories, that is, in... basically the guys have a request for this, and even here, maybe i will even say more about the entire structure of the armed forces, that there is a request, a request for this, a request for this, as simple as one of the guys being interested in history, asking for something to be explained more, and the second point is that

in 2022 you mentioned that there was a people's war, but really, when joined the army mate, on the 24th, tsk, i passed there for a long time, the military medical commission and so on, and the very next day, the 25th, i came, i was supposed to be assigned to a brigade, and i saw already on the 25th on the th number of days, as if the doors, the doors of the tsk were being broken down by volunteers, and then somehow a very, very great peace came to me, that is, i saw, yes, then if... such a number, then we will persevere, i know from others there to their friends who were also in kyiv, that is, when they saw the number of people left, i.e. there from itishniks, businessmen, millionaires there to simple guys from borshchagivka or from troeshchyna, i.e. everyone united and when they left, there was also some kind of calm, well, although they were already coming quite close, but we know

that they they came quite close, there was vorzel later, irpin, later bucha is close to you, well... that is, moschun or others, but there was a certain peace because of that, and what i am referring to, now and then there were volunteers, ugh, that is, people , who had a very clear argument, why, why and for what, well, having families at the same time, having three children each, three minor children each, i have several brothers who serve with me, who still have all the grounds for dismissal, they still continue to serve for 2.5 years, eh, now... mobilization is underway, is it necessary , obviously yes, is this kind of moral-willed argumentation in front of itself, does it exceed the one that was in the 22nd, i think, no, i think it is even a little lower, yes, so the question of history must be raised, it is necessary to raise with personnel, and it actually has

to carry out moral and psychological support of the unit. moral and psychological support, we have very cool examples of this, we have for example the third assault brigade, uh, where our colleague, historian oleksandr alfiorov also works, he is just engaged in moral and psychological support, i know examples of brigades that are currently implementing such and such units in itself, and that is, there are such units, but they are not developed, that is, they, they are according to the internal instructions of the armed forces, but... they are not developed to the scale to which they should, that is, you need to talk to the personnel why this war did not start on february 24, that is, i always correct the interlocutor, well, you probably also had this happen, but when the war started, friends say, this war started on february 20 on the maidan of the 14th year, and not this one from the execution of the heavenly hundred, and not february 24

, 22nd year, yes, well, if we look deeper, it is actually this war, as our colleague says. vyatrovych, she, this is our century-old war, it began at the beginning of the last century simply because of the fact that the formation as the ukrainian people's republic is actually ours, our truly ukrainian state, if you look at it from a historical point of view and we are talking about the cossacks, then yes, these are ukrainian national entities, but still they are considered proto-states, and the ukrainian people's republic is what we have already the entire state with all its attributes. and here, she just stood across the throat, both white and red, but she was evil, so orc, so or, well, she survived. not long, this is the ukrainian state of that time, and it existed due to several factors , firstly, there were some disagreements in

leadership, some were pulled there, others here, and secondly, the people themselves did not really want to go and fight, because they did not understand what they were fighting for, we still draw some historical parallels from time to time, you have the feeling that it echoes somewhere, or what we now distinguish. maybe we did some work on bugs? i think so, well, that is , in general, i am such an ardent optimist, and i think, and see, and know, and believe that we have done the work on mistakes. the first point, which the unr lacked, we have, is support for the event. the unr did not have that, that is, they, they were actually alone, there, and it was very difficult. if we take the entente itself, that is, france and great britain, they supported it. wanted to go west, capture kyiv, because he explained to his allies that kyiv is a city of the russian empire, well, they said, okay, well, like,

well, it’s there and now we have the support of two, we have a really strong army, that is, we have , the armed forces of ukraine, not only the armed forces of ukraine, i do not want to offend my brothers and sisters of the defense forces of ukraine, i.e.... the national guard, this is the state border service, this is also the security service of ukraine, the national police, and we have really strong defense forces of ukraine, really strong, well-armed, maybe not all units are there to the end, but in the end, work on it goes, we have, in the vast majority, i will not talk about 100% there, but we have in the vast majority of consciousness. the population that they are ukrainians, they have the state of ukraine, and here are these orks, and okay, here are russians, and russians, they don’t want here, and

they don't want to see them, hear them, don't need their history, culture, well , we can still talk about it, because not everyone, unfortunately, is so convinced of it yet, but, that is, we have a lot of winning things , we have a strong army, we have... the awareness of ukrainians that they are ukrainians, they need this state, and we have the support of the west, unfortunately, this was not the case in the ukrainian people's republic, that is , the propaganda of the bolsheviks really worked very well there, power was divided there, let's remember how we worked, how vynnychenko sometimes fled, then returned to kyiv, only later, when konovalts' snipers defended poltava there, he did stay in kyiv, but, well, before that , he wanted to run away several times and why did he leave. there were such things, now, well, now we have much more prospects and much more opportunities to defend our state and our right to exist. er,

our conversation is coming to an end a little bit, i will tell you one more such moment from your biography, if you google the name volodymyr birchak, it gives such information that he was born in 1881 year, i was very well preserved, yes, but your picture, and it says that... you are a ukrainian writer, a literary critic, a soldier of the ukrainian sich riflemen, er, this is a relative, this is a relative, but he, well, first of all, that this is a distant relative, that is, i researched his biography, i have an archival-investigative file, because he was once detained in was detained in prague, then imprisoned by the nkvd, but we have him and me, apart from the fact that we are relatives , we have several things in common with him, he is a soldier of the sss, i am an armed soldier. forces of ukraine, in principle two-two of two formations that are fighting for freedom and independence of ukraine. he, like me, was once an archaeologist, he is true, a cooler archaeologist

than i, although i was also engaged in archeology, but, well, i am not a writer, i am actually a historian, although he is also a historian, as it is, and we also have similarities, that we have the same ears, well, i really hope that his life is over after all. tragically, tragically, that is, here too the moscow boot trampled and shortened the life of a person who could do something for this country, absolutely, i really want you to succeed in realizing all those plans that you have you have, i know what you want, that you are actually finishing this book right now, yes, and what it will be about, announce it, well, this is actually a book, these are stories from... these are stories from the kgb archive, that is, this is the ukrainian 20th century, and it is something that we do not know, and this is something that we know very poorly, maybe so, maybe so, that is, it is

because of how ukrainian nationalists. cooperated with the british mi-6 special service, underwent special forces training and were dropped on landing planes on the territory of ukraine, perhaps someone does not know much about this, before the participation of jews in the ukrainian rebel army, yes that one of them was actually a political consultant to the chief commander of the upa, and many such things about which we either do not know enough or know little, can we already talk about any plans when this book appears? i think it's still too early, everything will depend on how quickly i will work on vacation due to the state of health i am in now, and when the vacation ends, in september and beyond, what's back front, front, lord, thank you for this conversation, thank you for what you do both on the battlefield and on the battlefield, so ideological, you return to people the historical truth,

of which you were the editor... our guest was volodymyr birchak, sergeant of the armed forces of ukraine, historian, archivist, head of academic programs of the center for the study of the liberation movement, and the editor of the historical truth, and we talked with him about history and about the war and about how history, how to make it so that... the history of our previous losses is not repeated. stay with espresso. thank you for being with us, my name is lesya vakulyuk. there are discounts until independence day on decatelen, 15% in psyllanyk, bam and oskad pharmacies. there are discounts up to

independence day on and 15% at the pharmacies of psyllium bam and ochad there are discounts until independence day on carsil tablets 10% at psyllium bam and ochad pharmacies. exclusively on the air of our channel. congratulations friends, the politclub program is on the air on the espresso tv channel. the most relevant topics of the week: nato member countries. huge arsenals, and russia is already on the approach to exhausting its resources, topics that resonate in our society, this is the question of trump's victory, what it is, an analysis of the processes that change the country and each of us, what else can the russians do, are they able to use, let's say, the resources of the lukashenko army allied with them, vitaly portnikov and guests of the project, read the entire condemnation, accept my union, thank you, it

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what is happening in ukraine and the world. vitaly portnikov, khrystyna yatskiv, andriy smoliy and invited experts based on facts give their assessment and forecast of the development of events. do you want to understand how our today will affect ours tomorrow, watch saturday politics club every saturday on espresso. today i have olenka cherninka as a guest, a writer, photographer and mother of the hero. olenka, i congratulate you, today you are visiting us, and you know what i want to talk to you about today. the war changed us all. we will never be the same again . and we got this...