Vasyl Kuchabsky (1895-1971) served as an officer in Ukrainian Sich Riflemen units during the struggle for Ukrainian independence. Having emigrated to Germany in 1922, he obtained a doctorate in history and Slavic philology from the University of Berlin in 1930. During the interwar period he commented frequently on political developments and historical issues, publishing several Ukrainian-language books and numerous articles in the Western Ukrainian press. The present work, Kuchabsky's major contribution to historical scholarship, was written in German and published in Berlin in 1934. This complete English translation by Gus Fagan, with an introduction by Oleksandr Pavlyuk, appears in the monograph series of the Peter Jacyk Centre for Ukrainian Historical Research.
