РОЛЬ САМОСТІЙНИКІВ У ФОРМУВАННІ НАЦІОНАЛЬНИХ ЗБРОЙНИХ СИЛ ПЕРІОДУ ЦЕНТРАЛЬНОЇ РАДИ

The article examines the prerequisites for the creation and organization of the Ukrainian national army during the Central Rada. The process of creating the Armed Forces during the Ukrainian Revolution was hampered by serious contradictions that existed between two political groups: supporters of the immediate declaration of Ukraine’s independence on the one hand, and politicians who sought Ukraine’s autonomy in a federation with Russia on the other. The Ukrainian independents (Ukrainian People’s Party, Brotherhood of іndependents, Union of Ukrainian Statehood, Party of Socialists – іndependents) advocated the revolutionary way of creating a Ukrainian army to defend the national revolution and the Ukrainian people, and considered the Ukrainisation of the army to be the main initial stage of this process. The autonomists (Ukrainian Social Democratic Party, Party of Social Revolutionaries, Union of Ukrainian Autonomists-Federalists) were against the creation of a permanent army, reducing everything to Ukrainisation and the creation of a national army – the militia. The article highlights the role

of the self-determinists in the formation of the Ukrainian army, which became a sphere of acute political struggle in the context of the revolutionary crisis of society, and reveals the national liberation movement that manifested itself in the Ukrainisation of military formations. An important achievement of the independents in the creation of a national army was the organization of the First Ukrainian Regiment named after Hetman B. Khmelnytsky, the election of the Ukrainian

Military Organizing Committee, which included independents: Colonel M. Hlynskyi, head of the reserve brigade in Kyiv, Colonel P. Voloshyn, and Lieutenant M. Mikhnovskyi. In order to achieve the strategic goal of the Ukrainian Revolution, it was necessary to create combat-ready formations capable of defending state independence and repelling any external encroachment. That is why the organizational efforts of the independents in the political and military spheres

require a thorough systematic analysis and conceptual coverage.

Ukrainian People’s Republic, Ukrainian army, Military Congress, independents, military and political activity, Ukrainian revolution, public activity.