Page - 143 - in Österreich-Ungarns imperiale Herausforderungen - Nationalismen und Rivalitäten im Habsburgerreich um 1900

© 2020, V&R unipress GmbH, Göttingen ISBN Print: 9783847110606 – ISBN E-Lib: 9783737010603 European languageswhose aimwas topromoteandpopularise its intention to establish aUkrainian state independent fromRussia. These appeals paved the way for further propagandawork, carried out through the German-language newspaperUkrainische Nachrichten (Ukrainian News), brochures in German andother languages, andspecial emissaries inneutral countries. Inadditionto popularisingtheUkrainiancauseabroad,theULUalsoreleasedanappeal‘Tothe Ukrainian People’ in Lemberg and began publishing the Ukrainian-language VistnykSoiuzavizvolenniaUkraini (TheHeraldof theUnionfor theLiberation of Ukraine) twicemonthly. Part of the 5,000 copies of each issue were to be smuggled intoRussiaby8migr8Ukrainiansmaking theirwaybackvianeutral countries, especially Bulgaria and Romania; the rest were distributed among Russianprisonersofwar.8 As the Russian army approached Lemberg in late August 1914, the ULU relocated its headquarters toVienna.Although theAustro-Hungarian Foreign Office continued toprovide limited financial support to theUnionanduse its activists inPOWcamps,itgraduallygrewwaryofofferingit full-blownsupport. AslongastheRussiansoccupiedalmostallofGaliciaandHabsburgforceswere onthedefensive,therewerefewimmediateprospectsoffomentingrevolutionin DnieperUkraine.Inthemeantime,theHabsburgendorsementandmobilisation ofUkrainiannationalismhadthepotential todestabilise the intricatesystemof interethnicrelationsintheDualMonarchyand,mostalarmingly,antagonisethe Poles.Consequently,ViennabegantopresstheULUtomoveitsheadquartersto thecapital of aneutral stateor toConstantinople. Fearingmarginalisation, the UnionleadershipresistedandchoseinsteadtorelocatetoBerlininthespringof 1915.9 ThemoveoftheULUheadquartersfromViennatoBerlinmarkedthegrowing ascendanceofGermanpolicyontheUkrainianQuestion.UnlikeAustria-Hun- garyandRussia,GermanydidnothaveaUkrainianpopulation,whichgave ita freehand inmobilisingUkrainiannationalism. It did sobybecoming thepri- marysponsorof theULUin1915andbysettinguptheHelsinki-based,8migr8- run Liga der Fremdvölker Russlands (League of Russia’sMinorities) in 1916, whoseaimwas topubliciseRussia’s allegedmistreatmentof its subjectnation- 8 DerBundzurBefreiungderUkraineanUrbas:Berichtüberdieorganisatorische, literarisch- informativeundaufklärendeTätigkeitdesBundesinÖsterreichundimAuslandefürdieZeit September–Dezember 1914, Zusammenstellung der Kosten, 16.12.1914, in: Hornykiewicz (ed.),Ereignisse inderUkraine (seenote5), vol. 1,p. 170–190,herep. 170–183. 9 OlehS.Fedyshyn,Germany’sDrivetotheEastandtheUkrainianRevolution,1917–1918,New Brunswick1971,p. 30–41. TheHabsburgMobilisationofEthnicity 143