The Prague-podebrad period of Volodymir Yakovych Shevchenko's Life (1926–1934)

Abstract

The purpose of the article is to reconstruct the biography of the head of the “Czechoslovakian intelligence point” of the SC UPR in exile in 1926–1934, Volodymyr Yakovych Shevchenko, and to analyze the reasons why the “Czechoslovak intelligence point” could not function at full strength. The research methodology is based on the principles of certainty, specificity, recognizability, causality, involving such methods of research into the life and activities of the Ukrainian emigration community in interwar Czechoslovakia as reading into emigration texts (research reflections on the circumstances and conditions under which this or that information was presented in the text); focusing attention on emigration behavior and consciousness (verbal reproduction (verbal reconstruction) of an “active emigrant” who, on the “life-event scene” under given circumstances (temporary, political), vividly illustrates the situation in which he finds himself; who constructs various social roles together with other refugees and fulfills them himself); dialogue with the emigrant using his ego-documents (biographies, memoirs, diaries, letters), research transliteration of the emigrant’s thoughts and words (research concern, empathy, and sympathy), comparison or selection by the researcher of excerpts of texts related to the topic, which are structured according to “facts”, “contexts”, “subjective significance for the emigrant” for analysis of the received formalized material from the point of view of repeatability of information. The scientific novelty lies in the introduction into scientific circulation of information about the Prague-Podebrady period of Volodymyr Yakovych Shevchenko's life; the ways, methods and forms that he used in the development of the "Czechoslovakian intelligence point". Conclusions. The life and activities of Volodymyr Yakovych Shevchenko in 1923(1924)–1934 in the interwar Czechoslovakia are a vivid illustration of the impossibility of cooperation and coexistence between the Wennerites and the Shapovalovites in the territories of this country, which made the work of the intelligence officer impossible. In addition to ideological differences, it was necessary to take into account the achievements of the interbellum period – scientific and technological progress and the cultural revolution, a period when for the once again in the history of mankind life really improved. Under such conditions, the majority of Ukrainian immigrants, former soldiers and participants in the National Liberation Struggle of 1917–1921, tried to realize themselves professionally and socially outside the boundaries of intelligence and counterintelligence.