Between the NKVD and Sigurants: About the Causes of the Collapse of the Underground in Occupied Odesa (1941-1942)

Abstract

In scientific intelligence, a study of one of the most secret topics of the «communist» underground partisan movement in the Odesa catacombs in 1941-1942, which was created and managed by the structures of the NKVD, was carried out. The article examines the fate of the «above-ground-urban»; part of the Kuznetsov-Kaloshin NKVD special detachment of Melnyk group. It has been proven that the Odesa underground did not enjoy the mass support of the city;s residents and had a narrow social base. Melnyk group found itself «in an inactive underground», refusing to fight against the occupiers, already in December 1941, the Romanian special services managed to defeat this group. The behavior of individual underground members after arrests, their «statements» during interrogations, form a general picture of the degradation of the resistance movement, confusion, fear and despair, unwillingness to fight in the underground, desertion and betrayal. The assertion that the hastily created underground partisan units in Odesa did not have the necessary training and experience, there was formalism, chaos, and haste in the formation of units and groups according to the administrative principle, poor selection, violation of the principle of voluntariness, confusion and a lack of clear plans of activity were felt. information, weakness of conspiracy, connection between groups in the structures of underground groups. Studying the activities of Melnyk group, it is possible to draw broader conclusions regarding the entire structure of Kuznetsov-Koloshin NKVD detachments. It turned out that this unit was a victim not only of betrayal, but also of internal competition between local and «central»; workers of the NKVD, which led to the actual self-destruction of the underground partisan unit in the middle of 1942.