Wait & Seethe Approach – Putin’s Final Frozen Conflicts (The Russian Invasion of Ukraine #327)

For two decades, Vladimir Putin was the master of frozen conflicts. He propagated wars without end in Georgia and eastern Ukraine. Putin used Russian forces and separatist proxies to weaken both nations. Weakness in neighboring states made Russia look strong. In the case of those conflicts, Putin worked off the idea of “if you can’t beat them, just freeze them.” Rather than bringing either conflict to a definitive end, Putin preferred to have them stay unresolved. He used the war-torn areas inside Georgia and Ukraine to destabilize their governments. Putin also inherited a frozen conflict in Moldova where Russian backed separatists in Transnistria formed a breakaway statelet during the early 1990’s. Putin provided financial support and military muscle as needed to ensure that Moldova was not united again.

These frozen conflicts allowed Russian influence to fester in a variety of nefarious manners. The military aspects of each conflict were relatively low intensity. To paraphrase famed Prussian strategist Carl von Clausewitz, “Frozen conflicts are politics by other means.” Russia was able to exert control over these nation’s internal affairs by sowing the seeds of discord. In retrospect, this strategy was prone to gambler’s error. It worked, it worked, it worked and until one day it didn’t. That day came when Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine failed.

From bad to worse – Vladimir Putin address Russia after the mutiny

On The Defensive – No Going Back
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was extraordinary because Putin abandoned the frozen conflict ideal in a bid for total victory. Only after Ukraine fought back with support from the western world, did the discussion turn to Putin possibly freezing the conflict. This would lock Russian gains in place and further his continued efforts to destabilize Ukraine. A strange situation is now taking place where Russia is stuck in what amounts to a frozen conflict both in Ukraine and on the home front. Putin has managed to destabilize his own regime. In Ukraine, Russia’s troops are no longer capable of launching any major offensives. Each Russian offensive is less successful than the one before it. Now the Russian military is stuck in Ukraine. Militarily they cannot go forward and politically they are not allowed to go back. They have been reduced to playing defense.

Holding the line has become the Russian’s main strategy. This is extremely difficult to do over a long period of time. A sporting analogy best explains their untenable situation. Imagine Russia as a sports team that took the lead early in a game. Momentum is soon lost as the inevitable triumph turns into a desperate attempt to stave off eventual defeat. They spend the rest of the game trying to protect a dwindling lead. “Bend but not break” becomes their maxim. In a last gasp of desperate motivation, they try a strategy of “the best defense is a good offense.” This results in miniscule gains at an exorbitant cost. They exhaust themselves just trying to hold on. This increasingly precarious position results in a final collapse and devastating defeat. This is the situation the Russian military now finds itself in. The longer they try to hold their gains, the more these are threatened.

Mutinous behavior- Yevgeny Prigozhin

Dead Ends – Stalling For Time
Putin is playing stall ball, trying to run out the clock on Ukraine and its allies. In the Russian lines, the troops are trying a “wait and see” approach. This could easily turn into a “wait and seethe” situation where the morale of Russian troops plummets even further from its already abysmal level. At a certain point, this could lead to an implosion where Russian troops turn on their own side. To a certain extent, that already happened with the mutiny of Yevgeny Prigozhin and his Wagner mercenary forces. This has led to the other frozen conflict where Putin and his regime are held hostage on the home front.

If Putin purges the military, he will be giving in to Prigozhin’s demands for the removal of Russia’s incompetent senior military leadership. If Putin goes after Prigozhin, then he may find himself with another mutiny on his hands. Putin does have a third option, try to maintain the status quo. In other words, do nothing while appearing to do something. This is largely what he has done so far. In the short term, this strategy is probably tenable, but long term it will erode Putin’s support and weaken his already embattled regime. When doing nothing about a mutiny is the best option, the problem is acute.

Putin is aware that there is no easy way out of a frozen conflict. That is why conflicts in Georgia, Transnistria, and eastern Ukraine (until the full-scale invasion) stayed frozen for so long. Putin has put himself in the worst position possible. He needs to make some extremely dangerous decisions before events control him rather than the other way around. At this point, he looks incapable of doing that. Ironically, Putin is frozen. This is the classic “damned if you do, damned if you don’t scenario.” Each day that Putin’s frozen conflict inside Russia continues, the greater the odds that he will face another mutiny or even worse, a full-blown coup.

Putin is stuck, but so are the Russian elites who could replace him. Putin is the guarantor of their ill-gotten gains. These elites have a lot to lose, and not just in wealth. The fall of Putin could cost them their lives as well as their livelihoods. They are stuck with Putin because there is no better or clear alternatives. Putin’s hollowing out of Russian institutions and squeezing of internal opponents has been so thorough, that he remains the ultimate authority for now. There is nowhere for them to run other than in circles. All roads lead to dead ends or back to Putin, which at this point is the same thing.

The long good bye – Vladimir Putin

Risk Aversion – Caught In A Trap
The only way for Russians to end the frozen conflict on the home front is to get rid of Putin. That entails huge risks. Who and what comes after him is the great unknown. Judging by Russian history, it would not be good. The only way for Putin to end the frozen conflict is by undermining his own regime. No wonder Putin has been dithering since the mutiny. He is now caught in a trap of his own making. This is a situation he has never faced before. He is at the mercy of events, rather than controlling them. It has been this way in the war with Ukraine for a long time. Only recently, has the same thing happened inside Russia. Putin is being forced to react and his main reaction has been inaction. Putin and his regime look out of their depths. This is not surprising. Putin always knew how to start frozen conflicts, but he has no experience ending them. 

Coming soon: The Show Must Go On – Vladimir Putin Version 2020 (The Russian Invasion of Ukraine #328a)

The Front Lines Are Everywhere – Attack On Lviv (The Russian Invasion of Ukraine #326b)

In the early morning hours of July 6^th, Russian missiles struck near the center of Lviv in western Ukraine. Lviv is far from the frontlines, but as a city that is known as “the most Ukrainian city in Ukraine”, it is a prime target for the Putin regime. This was not the first time that Lviv had suffered an attack. Last October, the Russians targeted the city’s electrical and water infrastructure. Compared to other cities in Ukraine, Lviv has suffered less attacks. Much of this had to do with its location. Lviv is further away from the frontlines than any major city in Ukraine. It is also only 70 kilometers east of the border with Poland. The Russians have been reticent to launch missile attacks at the city because they might go astray and land on NATO territory. As the war grows in length, caution has become another casualty. Russia is willing to take greater risks because they are running out of ways to rattle the Ukrainian populace.

Aftermath of an attack – Vehicles & building damage in Lviv from Russian attack on July 6th

Sinister & Pointless – A Losing Proposition
This latest Russian attack on Ukrainian civilians was like so many others except for the change in target Just as they have been doing with missiles launches at Kyiv, Kharkiv and Dnipro, the Russians took aim at residential areas in Lviv. Unlike Kyiv, Lviv does not have the robust air defenses needed to thwart such an attack. Ukrainian air defenses shot down 7 of the 10 missiles targeting Lviv. That was a less than desirable success rate. The missiles that got through struck a residential building, killing 10 and wounding 42 civilians (as of July 8^th). The point of this attack – like all the other Russian attacks on Ukrainian civilians – was to terrorize the populace. It had nothing to do with any semblance of a larger military strategy. The attack was both premeditated and random. In other words, paradoxical. Rather than another show of Russian strength, the attack exposed their weakness.

The only offensive capacity the Russians have left involves sinister attacks on innocent civilians far from the front lines. In the overall scheme of the war, the attack was incredibly pointless. Outside of satisfying a strange, sadistic fetish for wreaking havoc on innocent civilians, the attack did nothing to change Russian prospects in the war. Despite this pointlessness, it did rouse me and many others from war weariness. Lviv was an attack that many took personally, including me. I have a good friend from the city and knew that her family lives not that far from where the attack occurred. Lviv is also well known by foreigners. For many, it is the only city in Ukraine they have visited.

Besides Kyiv, Lviv was the most visited city in Ukraine by tourists prior to the war. There were 2.5 million tourist visits to Lviv in 2019 (the last full year prior to the COVID pandemic). By comparison, the famed seaside city of Odessa had 1.5 million. Lviv’s city center is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Tourism has been an engine of growth that has made Lviv one of Ukraine’s most prosperous cities. It is the most Mitteleuropean city in Ukraine. Lviv leans westward. This makes it a hub for foreign direct investment and mass tourism. Unfortunately, this also makes it a target for the Putin regime which would love nothing more than to wipe Ukraine’s people, economy, and culture off the map. Thus, while the attack was unexpected, it was hardly surprising.

Crime against humanity – Destruction caused by Russian missile attack on Lviv

Constant Stress – Far From The Frontlines
Just before bedtime I learned of the attack on Lviv. There were news reports online of extensive damage to both people and property. Since it occurred not far from the historic center of Lviv, where my friend’s family lives, I sent her a message asking if they were ok. Silence can seem deadly when it comes to communicating with those affected by war. I knew there would be a delay before I would hear back from her. She now lives in Berlin with her husband and young son. Raising a young child in a different country while your family are living in a city under attack is extremely difficult. This is a part of the war that gets very little coverage. The collateral damage of the conflict bleeds across borders, causing the Ukrainian diaspora and refugees in the rest of Europe an intense amount of stress. There is a tremendous feeling of helplessness. Something that well-wishers and ardent trans-Atlantic supporters of Ukraine such as myself can scarcely comprehend, let along understand.

In the afternoon, I received a message that my friend’s family was safe and doing as well as could be expected under the circumstances. While they did not suffer any injuries or property damage, the attack was as close as they had come to being injured. And make no mistake, they were targets. With this attack, the Putin regime was aiming to injure and/or kill anyone in Lviv. The Russians are certainly aware that because so many of their missiles and drones are shot down, that this can lead to a false sense of security. Ukrainians trying to go about their business despite these attacks is understandable.

War does not stop life, but far from the front lines missile and drone attacks infringe upon it. The ubiquitous blaring of air raid sirens is easy enough to ignore until it is too late. There is an element of luck to surviving any war. Taking every precaution possible can only keep a person so safe. When the bullets, drones, missiles, and mortars start flying everyone’s life hangs in the balance. The attack on Lviv is a tragic reminder of how deadly the consequences of Russia’s war on Ukrainian civilians can be for those that live far from the frontlines.

Damage assessment – First responders at the scene of Russian attack on Lviv

Daily Assaults – An Unending War
After 500 days it is easy to forget that the Ukraine-Russia war is just as lethal as it has ever been. Combat rages all along the front in eastern and southern Ukraine. Aerial attacks by the Russians threaten everyone in Ukraine. In modern war, the frontlines are everywhere and that includes Lviv. On the night of the attack, Lvivians went to sleep safe in their homes. Ten of these Ukrainians never saw the light of day again. The only thing they heard was a terrible noise, white hot flashes and the walls of their residences crumbling around them. Another forty suffered wounds and were lucky to survive. Families and friends, confidantes and strangers have had their lives altered by this attack and countless other ones across Ukraine just like it. The war will continue to rage, and Ukrainians will continue to die hundreds of kilometers from the front lines. For those of us who watch our friends suffer, we can sympathize with them, but never truly comprehend what they are going through. The attack in Lviv was not just a reminder, but also a warning. No matter how wearying, this war is far from over. Neither is fear and suffering.    

Click here for: Wait & Seethe Approach – Putin’s Final Frozen Conflicts (The Russian Invasion of Ukraine #327)

From Midnight To Morning – War Weariness & The Attack On Lviv (The Russian Invasion of Ukraine #326a)

I should have grown used to it by now, but I probably never will. Just before bedtime is when I have most often received the worst news from Ukraine. This has been ongoing since Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine began before dawn on February 24, 2022. On that unforgettable night, I decided to scroll through Twitter just as I was about to fall asleep. Within minutes I was staring at the screen on my phone in disbelief. Hours later I was still doing the same thing. The predictions of a Russian invasion of Ukraine had come true. Could this really be happening? This was not a war game or a reality show, it was the return of history to a land that had way too much of it during the 20^th century.

The world changed in the early morning hours of February 24th in ways that we have yet to truly comprehend. This was a geopolitical earthquake on a seismic scale. It caused me to sit up and take immediate notice. That first night, I would be awake many more hours before finally falling asleep a few hours before dawn. The same thing happened again and again during that first week of the invasion. Bedtime became all about bombs falling as the war accelerated. This was historic, but in the worst way possible. The war may have started in Ukraine, but a war in the world’s head had also begun.

The fog of war – Dead Russian soldiers in Easter Ukraine (Credit: ADifferentMan)

Returning With A Vengeance – The Sad Facts
There would be many more nights of sitting wide eyed while reading reports from the frontlines. Some were more memorable than others. These included the executions of Ukrainian civilians in Bucha, the Azovstal siege at Mariupol, attacks and occupations of the Chernobyl and Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plants, victory for the Ukrainians in the Battle of Kyiv, and Russia doubling down on the war in Donbas with a litany of war crimes. Scattered among these were those anecdotal stories that I knew would live with me long after they became yesterday’s news. The young woman whose fingernails were pulled out by Russian soldiers in Bucha, the holocaust survivors who could not survive one final war, the parents whose children were taken from them, possibly forever.

These are the most sickening sides of war, the ones that I can barely stand to read. These stories have nothing to do with strategy and tactics, sneak attacks and psyops. It is people acting out barbaric instincts on the defenseless and innocent. Oddly, these stories did not keep me up at night. Instead, I fell asleep not long after reading them. The difference was that on the next day, next week, next month and next year, they returned with a vengeance. The most unsettling thing is to be haunted during both the day and night about things you can do nothing about. Helplessness is never far away from hopelessness. Sometimes it felt like I was going to wake up one day to find out the world was coming to an end. After a while, the fear faded, and the reality of a long, hard slog set in. I realized that this must be what World War I felt like.

Laid to waste – Result of shelling in Donetsk (Credit: ADifferentMan)

Survival Instincts – Detachment & Distance
The Russians were stuck in Ukraine, much like the Germans were in France on the Western Front. They could not go forward, nor could they turn back. Ukraine, like France, had the best reason for continuing to fight the war. They wanted to liberate their homeland. Along with this realization, came the predictable professions of war weariness from commentators. The worst thing was that for armchair warriors and geopolitical junkies they were true. How much can anyone hear about artillery barrages and missile attacks before they feel fatigued? The answer was not anywhere near the number those who live in Ukraine do. Being exposed to life threatening attacks on a day-to-day basis focuses the mind. For everyone else, the shock and awe of the war slowly erodes. The massive number of images, reports, tweets, and videos from the war was overwhelming. The shock effect was bound to eventually wear off. The opposite was true for Ukrainians. They did not have the luxury of slowly succumbing to indifference. War could hit their homes at any time, no matter how far they were from the frontlines. As for the rest of the world, mass media tended to make less of an impression no matter how horrifying.

While I continued to read news accounts of the fighting, a sense of detachment and distance replaced the rage and rancor. Stoicism had set in. That was the only way to deal with what for the time being was a war with no end in sight. At least not the war I wanted to end in Ukrainian victory with Putin no longer in power and his henchman on trial at the Hague. It began to dawn on me that the war was far from over and sometimes it looks like it never will be. Nothing lasts forever, but this war feels like it. I guess every war feels that way, but this one has been so well documented that it seems to prolong the agony. At a certain point, information overload becomes counterproductive. Mental health suffers and interest in the war wanes. A survival instinct takes hold, but this is prone to change based upon the next news bulletin.

Hitting home – Damage from Russian attack in a Ukrainian city

Hitting Home – Attacking Lviv
From time to time, I would read a headline so shocking that the war would appear front and center again. Two of the more recent concerned the destruction of Kakhovka Dam and the Russians mining the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant for potential destruction. These are events that could change the war. Unfortunately, they only last as long as the news cycle will allow. The one item of news from the war that recently shocked me back into reality happened as it always does, right before bedtime. In this case, I was scrolling through Twitter when I noticed that city of Lviv in western Ukraine was trending. Since the war started, any Ukrainian city trending on Twitter is a very bad thing. Sure enough, I started to see news reports of an attack on Lviv. This hit home. Lviv is my most beloved city in Eastern Europe. The fact that it had been hit was a punch to the stomach. The first thing I thought of was a friend from Lviv. She now lived in Berlin, but her family was still there and in harm’s way. It was time to find out if they were safe.

Coming soon: Front Lines Are Everywhere – The Attack On Lviv (The Russian Invasion of Ukraine #326b)

The War Moves West – Yavoriv & Lviv Under Attack (The Russian Invasion of Ukraine #18)

Anyone who has ever spent time in western Ukraine will recall the devotion people there show to the Greek Catholic religion. The churches are busy with services each day, both women and men enter the churches at will, bow their heads and pray. It is a common site to see people during their lunch hour enter these churches for strength and solace. I have personally witnessed countless people make the sign of the cross as they enter or exit the churches. It is a stunning sight for westerners like me who live in nations where much of the population is indifferent to religion. On Sunday, March 13^th, many in western Ukraine probably planned on visiting a church that church that day, but long before the sun came up and anyone could prepare for even the earliest church service, sirens began to scream out across the cities and towns in the region. Warnings that a bombardment from the air was about to begin.

Back in the United States, it was still Saturday evening, when I noticed the warnings cast across Twitter. When I saw Lviv was one of the cities I could not help but feel an even more painful lament than usual. Lviv was where I first set foot in Ukraine. Where I returned not once, but twice. It is said to be the most Ukrainian city in Ukraine and I would agree. Now it was joining a long list of Ukrainian cities under attack from Russian bombardment. I messaged one of my friends from there who now lives in Berlin a message about the attack. Her family lives in the city. There was no reply. I understood perfectly well why. This attack was hitting too close to home. Or was it? It turns out that Lviv was spared. Instead, missiles from Russian warplanes struck even further west, close to the Polish border, opening a Pandora’s box of sinister possibilities that the war might be spreading westward.

Aftermath of an attack – Damage at the Yavoriv Military Base

Fiery Flashes – Attack on Yavoriv Military Base
Silence and darkness engulfed much of western Ukraine as late night gave way to early morning. The sirens may have been screaming across western Ukraine, but Lviv and Lutsk were not the targets this time. Several hours earlier, Russian aircraft had taken off from Saratov in southern Russia. Once a Soviet secret city on the Volga, it was the embarkation point for a mission that would strike closer to Ukraine’s border with a NATO country than ever before. The aircraft skirted the Sea of Azov and Black Sea. Their pilots may have looked down at the flames consuming parts of Mariupol, a city where civilians are suffering gravely from artillery and airstrikes. The planes moved further west and north. Soon they would be within range of the Yavoriv Military Base which held their specific target, the International Center for Peacekeeping and Security which housed foreign fighters who had signed on to fight for the Ukrainians.

The Russians were looking to send a message. They were going to strike the base at Yavoriv because of the foreign fighters.  A video of the ensuing missile strikes showed total darkness, then a rumble, followed by the scream of a missile descending and the resulting fiery explosion. Eight missiles struck the base, killing 35 and wounding another 134. Those on base never saw the attack coming, neither did many analysts. It was a chilling signal, as much as it was a deadly blow. The message was clear, foreign fighters are prime targets no matter where they are located. And in this case, they happened to be located a mere 15 kilometers from the Polish border. Poles on the other side of the border heard the rumble, that distant sound of thunder that acts as the precursor to a breaking storm. Some may have seen fiery flashes in the early morning sky.

Always aglow – St. Andrews Church in Lviv

Too Close For Comfort  – Ever Closer To NATO
Fifteen kilometers is the closest Russia has come to bringing a full-scale war to Europe. The Ukraine-Russia war keeps creeping ever closer to NATO territory. If one of those missiles that targeted Yavoriv Military Base had gone a bit astray and landed on the Polish side of the border there would likely have been hell to pay. And hell is just what this war has brought to NATO’s doorstep. The Russians show the will, if not much skill, in breaking norms. Bombing civilians, targeting non-vital infrastructure, firing on humanitarian corridors, accusing Ukraine of genocidal plans, and harboring chemical weapons labs is all in a day’s business for the Russian political and military leadership. Do they want a wider war involving NATO countries? That is probably not the correct question. A better question is do they (Vladimir Putin and his closest confidantes) believe war with NATO is inevitable? If so, they might just make it happen. By any standard, a war with NATO would be a disaster for the beleaguered Russian army. That never stopped Putin from starting a war anyway.

Truth be told, a war is already being fought between NATO and Russia. Currently, it is a proxy war. Make no mistake, the weapons pouring into Ukraine are an attempt to bring Russia to its knees. The NATO policy towards the war thus far can be summed up as better to fight and defeat (or irreparably weaken) the Russians in Ukraine, than be forced to fight them on NATO territory. The Russian perspective is that they are already at war with NATO. If not, then the Ukrainians would not stand a chance. The Russians are very wrong about that, as they have been about so many other things during this war.

The missile strike on Yavoriv was a shot across the bow aimed at NATO and for that matter, any other foreign nation that might try to intervene in the conflict. It was a calculated risk which worked as planned. The attack was also an outlier, not because of its location, but because it is just about the only thing that has gone according to plan during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The situation from Russia’s perspective is bad and getting worse. Frustration is mounting among both soldiers in the field and the upper echelons of leadership. The war has become toxic and unwinnable. Bolt out of the blue air strikes like the one that hit Yavoriv will not change that.

Too close for comfort – Map showing location of Yavoriv Military Base proximity to the Polish border

Keeping The Faith – Prayers For Peace
On the same day of the Yavoriv attack the sun still rose, the churches still opened, and Ukrainians prayed for peace. One day church bells will be the only sounds that pierce the Sunday morning calm across the country. Until that day arrives, the war will continue. It may spread beyond Ukraine’s borders. Let us pray it does not. Let us also pray that war ends within Ukraine’s borders and its citizens can once again live in peace. In the meantime, they will keep the faith.

Click here for: Unseen Forces – Ukraine & The Logic of War (The Russian Invasion of Ukraine #19)

Going Back & Going Beyond – The Power of Pecs, Lviv and Thessaloniki (Part Two)

The delights of a provincial rather than a capital city is an acquired taste, one that I have been lucky enough to gain in an Eastern European nation on three memorable occasions. My experience was all the better for it and not just with my first love in Pecs, Hungary. The first time I traveled to Ukraine, I did make it a point to visit the capital, Kiev. That was my second stop though. My first one was Lviv, a sparkling jewel of a city in western Ukraine. Lviv colors my opinion of Ukraine to this very day, even nine years after my first visit I cannot help but have a fondness for Ukraine because of that initial experience. It pains me when I hear people discuss Ukraine as though it is a dangerous country that should be avoided. Ukraine may have dangerous regions (the Donbas where an asymmetric war continues to rage is to be avoided by tourists) and endemic corruption (signified by the national government in Kiev), but Ukraine for me is a charming place full of magic rather than malevolence.

Street Art – Lviv

Lusting After Lviv – Falling For A Ukrainian Super Model
Lviv was then, what it still is today, the historical hub of Ukraine, a place where I could reach out and touch the past. On my return trips to the city I felt a sense of nostalgia, not just for Lviv’s past, but my own past in the city. The friends I met and kept over the years, the mystical churches that deepened my curiosity for the mysterious sensuality of the eastern world and the sheer exoticism of finding renaissance architecture in far eastern Europe. Kiev on the other hand, was a raucous and at times, menacing metropolis. I am fortunate that I avoided making it my first stop in the country. I have never been back and have no plans to go there again. I enjoyed certain aspects of the Ukrainian capital and the city center was well worth visiting. Conversely, there was something impersonal and at times outright inhuman about Kiev.

Perhaps it was the Stalinist architecture to be found on its most famous avenue or the hectic pace or the pushing and shoving on the metro that remains so vivid in my memory. Whatever the case, I could hardly wait to leave. I sensed then what I can still feel today, I would be unlikely to come back for a visit. If I did, it would only be to pass through the city. Bigger is rarely better and Kiev bore that truth out for me. Lviv is my idea of a Ukrainian super model, sleek, seductive and spectacular. Voluptuous in its charms, my eyes ogled its many beautiful buildings. I felt a pathological sense of romance in its city center. If there is such a thing as lusting after a city, then I fell for Lviv with uninhibited inclination. And I hope to get back to Ukraine, to visit Uzhhorod and Mukachevo, the type of provincial cities that are likely to give me a Lviv sized experience. Now when I look at a map of Ukraine, Kiev has vanished and all the smaller cities in the country are magnified. To lust like this, is to live travel forever.

The Dawn of a New Day – The Old Byzantine City Walls in Thessaloniki

Anywhere But Athens – Beyond The Obvious
My first visit to Greece last year was made with one thought in mind which can be summed up as “anywhere but Athens.” The capital of the classical world has never appealed to me. Perhaps it comes from disappointment at its failure to host the 100^th anniversary of the Olympic Games. When Athens lost out to Atlanta, it lost something else, my respect. Then there are the stories I have read about the congestion and pollution that clogs and clouds the city. I have never heard a single person ever say anything nice about its modern iteration. The Parthenon, the Acropolis and a clutch of world class museums filled with astonishing artifacts do not provide enough an allure for me. This is snobbery in reverse, I find a perverse pleasure in the provincial when it comes to Greece. I cannot see the appeal of Athens. That is likely the product of my imagining throngs of tourists crowding me out. These feelings and an affinity for Byzantine and Ottoman history led me to first set foot on Greek soil in Thessaloniki, a city whose modernity is unsightly in the extreme.

What I found was another Greece mostly unknown to the western world. One with deep multi-cultural roots. Thessaloniki had more in common with Balkan culture than modern Greece, a place where digging in the dirt had unearthed entire worlds that existed before the blight of fires, wars and unchecked development smothered whole swathes of antiquity. Thessaloniki was an acquired taste, one that did not come easy. It asked visitors to look beyond the obvious or the famous, to the obscure and the infamous, to the Ottomans, the Sephardic Jews, the Byzantines and to the Rome of late antiquity. I want to believe that the difference between a visit to Athens and one to Thessaloniki, is like the difference between staying in a former five star hotel and staying in someone’s home. There is hospitality in search of your wallet and hospitality in search of your heart. Thessaloniki for me, was all about the latter.

A Lasting Memory – Pecs Cathedral

Crossing Frontiers – My Wildest Imagination
At some point during my visit to Thessaloniki, I began to look further afield. My eye was not drawn to the obvious in Greece, neither islands nor Athens caught my attention. Instead, it was the hinterlands that I began to focus on. Those provincial outposts of interest that no sane tourist would take time to visit. This would be my Greece in the future. Thessaloniki made all of Thrace suddenly seem possible. The region, a Balkan borderland holds a magnetic attraction for me. I know not a single person who has traveled in its more obscure parts. I have not been back to Greece since my visit to Thessaloniki, but I already know what will come next. Crossing frontiers in my mind, as much as on the land.

The frontier between Greece and Bulgaria, Greece and Turkey, Greece and North Macedonia, the frontiers that only exist on a map and now appear in my mind. At one time these frontiers were as unfamiliar to me as any other lines drawn upon a foreign land, now I want to become as familiar with them as the lines on my hand. My future travels in Greece, will be like my past ones in Hungary, my future travels in Ukraine will be like my past ones in Hungary and my future in Hungary will be a place like Pecs, and in Ukraine a place like Lviv and in Greece a place like Thessaloniki. I could never have imagined the day I set foot in Pecs, that I was entering a whole new world, one that led the way down a path of endless possibilities. Soon it will be time to go back and go beyond my wildest imagination.

Facelifting Lviv – Where The Streets Had So Many Names (Lviv: The History of One City Part 52)

In 1991 Ukraine became an independent nation. For the first time ever in its long and conflicted history it had finally achieved statehood. Casting aside the yoke of foreign rule led to many changes in the nation, nowhere more so than in Lviv. Soviet symbols were quickly removed. Tourism became one of the major economic engines. The historic Old Town was renovated, along with several other areas in the city. The changes have accelerated since those heady days following the Soviet collapse. The Orange and Maiden Revolutions were acutely felt in the city as citizens spilled into the street, protesting for weeks on end to combat bad governance and corruption. Lviv gained a nickname, “the most Ukrainian city in Ukraine” due to its role as a major force in creating a national identity. One transformation brought about by Ukrainian statehood and that has surprisingly lasted has been street names. The fact that most of Lviv’s streets have kept the same name given them following Ukrainian statehood is characteristic of a degree of stability lacking in other areas of the nation, especially the East. It also just might signal the end of a centuries-long process – accelerated during the chaotic 20^th century – where Lviv’s streets underwent a withering number of name changes.

All signs point to change – In Lviv the names have rarely stayed the same

War Changes Everything, Especially Street Names
It has been said that war is a great innovator. In the case of Lviv’s street names, war has been both a great degenerator and regenerator (portmanteau words). The degeneration occurred when street names were changed to reflect the heroes of Nazism and Stalinism. The regeneration took place as new names reflecting the dominant Ukrainian presence in the city came to grace the streets.  These name changes were far from the only ones. The situation regarding name changes has been fluid over the last couple of centuries as conquerors, whether by treaty or military force, occupied the city and proceeded to put their own superficial stamp on the city. Nowhere has this been as true as in heart of the city center.

Prospekt Svobody, the grandest boulevard in Lviv has undergone no less than 17 name changes over the past 200 years. Transliterated the current name means Liberty Avenue which seems appropriate since the boulevard was the setting for mass protests to liberate Ukraine from cronyism and corruption twice in the last twelve years. Yet for thirty-one years (1959 -1990) Prospekt Svobody was named Lenin Avenue, after a man who stood for the opposite of liberty. The same was certainly true of Adolf Hitler. The Nazi dictator’s name was given to the boulevard for much of the German occupation of Lviv during World War II. The names of these blood soaked ideologues were added to the boulevard in due course as a symbolic reminder to Lvivians of the ideological force exercising control over the city. The first German names given to the boulevard following the invasion, Museumstrasse then Opernstrasse, were likely dropped because of their banality.

Name Calling – The Forgotten & The Famous
In prior decades the Polish presence in the city informed two martial names for the boulevard, first Hetmanska then Legionow. While both were serious and forceful names, they were much more ideologically moderate than the names of those tyrants that were to soon follow. The Habsburgs named the boulevard after a lesser light of the ruling family, a figure who today is all but overshadowed by his son. Archduke Karl Ludwig was once a name on the lips of every Lvivan who strolled along Karl Ludwig Strasse. He was the brother of Emperor Franz Josef and for a short time was part of the Galician provincial government that called Lviv home. If Karl Ludwig is remembered for anything today, it is as the father of Franz Ferdinand, the man whose assassination sparked the First World War.

Another famous street in Lviv has managed to have more name changes than Prospekt Svobody. Ivan Franko Street, including separate parts of it, has gone by no less than 28 names since the late 19^th century. Today it is named for one of Ukraine’s most beloved sons. It is fitting that Franko, who was born in Galicia and spent part of his life in Lviv, ended up with one of the city’s most important streets named after him. Less known is the fact that Franko died lonely and impoverished in the city. Interestingly the street was named for him not after Ukrainian national independence, but following the Soviet reoccupation of the city in 1944. Franko was one of the few individuals considered a hero to both the Soviets and nationalistic Ukrainians. The Soviets recognized him for his promotion of socialism and worker’s rights. Ukrainians revere him today because he advocated for their rights, against the oppressive rule of aristocrats, capitalists and Polish elites. He received the honor of having the entire street named for him. This is unlikely to change.

One thing that has never changed – Sign for Ruska Street in Lviv (Credit: Yarema Dukh)

The Unchanged – A Place & A People
Speaking of street names unlikely to change, the endurance of Krakivska Street in the Old Town goes against the trend of name changes in Lviv. Despite the virulence of anti-Polish forces during World War II, culminating in the expulsion of ethnic Poles from the city in the war’s immediate aftermath, the street has maintained this name since the mid-15^th century. In medieval times, the name denoted that this was the street which led to Krakow. The only changes to the name have been the various transliterations of it into the languages of the ruling authorities. Even the Germans called it Krakauerstrasse.

One other Old Town Street that has only experienced a bare minimum of changes is the short – both literally and physically – Ruska street, which extends from the southeast side of Rynok Square to Pidvalna Street. The name was first given in 1472. This was the main street going through the Ruthenian (a pre-20^th century term for Ukrainians) section of the Old Town. There is poetic justice in the continual use of this name. It staying power is representative of the unbroken presence of the Rus’/Ruthenian/Ukrainian people throughout Lviv’s history and their ability to survive the changes both superficial and geo-political which have transformed the city. Though names, loyalties and identifications have constantly changed in Lviv, the Ukrainian people have always remained.

A Transcendent Vision – Lwów’s Ossolineum: Triumph of the Intellect (Lviv: The Story of a City in Ukraine #6)

The cultural destruction wrought upon Eastern Europe by war and revolution is not well publicized in the west.  Hundreds of thousands of books, manuscripts, maps and artifacts have been stolen or destroyed as a direct result of conflict. Consider for instance, the successive Soviet, Nazi and Soviet occupations of Lviv during World War II. While the human destruction has been largely documented, the loss of cultural wares and institutions has been almost forgotten. In the aftermath of World War II, the city’s Polish culture, like its majority ethnic Polish population was uprooted. Much was lost in the upheaval, but fortunately some parts of the Polish intellectual legacy were so important and prominent that they managed to be at least partially saved. Chief among these was the renowned Ossolineum (National Ossoliński Institute), an intellectual powerhouse of Polish literature and learning.

Statue of Józef Ossoliński on a buidling in present-day Lviv

The Immense Legacy of What Was Almost Lost
Prior to World War II, the Ossolineum held hundreds of thousands of books, manuscripts, autographs and maps, many of which were the rarest of their kind. The material losses of the Ossolineum in Lwów (the Polish name for Lviv) can be somewhat quantified, but the intellectual loss was incalculable. The library survived in another form, in another city, in a new part of Poland. Today it is a storehouse of Polish culture in Wrocław (formerly Breslau, Germany). Meanwhile a new institution was created in the exact same place where the Ossolineum once stood, the Lviv National Vasyl Stefanyk Scientific Library of Ukraine. The library, like the city, became Ukrainian focused.  Nevertheless, it is something of a miracle that both Ukrainian and Polish intellectual traditions still survive at these institutions today. This would not have been possible without the immense legacy of the original Ossolineum and the strong vision of its founder, Józef Ossoliński, a man who had also lived through geo-political changes which his love of learning had managed to transcend.

Józef Maksymilian Ossoliński was the scion of Polish nobility. The Ossoliński family’s aristocratic roots stretched all the way back to the earliest days of the Polish Kingdom. Over the centuries they acquired estates across the eastern parts of the kingdom. One of these, Krzyżtopór, was home to the largest castle in Europe before the construction of Versailles. The family’s wealth and splendor was threatened by the late 18^th century in one of the most turbulent periods in Polish history as the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth disappeared during three partitions. The Ossoliński family estates were now in lands ruled by the Austrian and Russian Empires. It was during these times that Józef Ossoliński came of age. Because of his homeland’s geopolitical situation Ossoliński developed hybrid loyalties, straddling the lines between Polish nationalism and adherence to Austrian rule.

Józef Maksymilian Ossoliński – the visionary who founded the Ossoliński Institute

A Gift Of Knowledge – Creating the Ossolineum
At the time when the Commonwealth suffered through its third and final partition in 1795, Ossoliński was living in Vienna where he was head of the Austrian Imperial Library. He was known to be a voracious reader and researcher with a love for learning that has rarely been surpassed in Polish history. Ossoliński was able to use his cleverness to great personal advantage, co-opting Austrian policies to expand his own personal library holdings. When Emperor Joseph II dissolved the monasteries, Ossoliński took the opportunity to expand his holdings through acquisition of many rare books and manuscripts. In his later years, he decided to transform his personal library into an institution to promote Polish literature, learning and history.

Ossoliński had earlier been involved in the reestablishment of the University of Lwów in Austrian ruled Galicia. This helped lead him to a decision years later that the city would become home to the Ossoliński National Institution (Ossolineum). To house the institution he acquired another asset from a shuttered monastery, an abandoned convent building. Within these walls, where spiritual enlightenment had once taken place, the enlightenment of intellect would now take precedence. Sadly Ossoliński did not live to see this happen. As a matter of fact, during the last years of his life he could not see at all. Ossoliński had lost his vision, but his love of learning was so great that he employed Polish students to read aloud to him. Ironically, this took place far from Lwów and Poland, Ossoliński lived out his finals days in Vienna where he died in 1826. The Ossolineum opened the next year.

The Ossolineum Institute in its pre-World War II heyday in Lwów

From Polish Intellectual Resistance to Renaissance
At the time of its founding, the Ossolineum was an island of Polish culture beset by sweeping tides of Germanism. The Austrian authorities had imposed the German language on Polish Lwów. The city’s was given a German name, Lemberg. The language on public signage was changed from Polish to German. The professional classes were completely dominated by Germans. The Poles were reduced to second class status in a city where they held a majority. The Ossolineum acted as a bulwark of Polish intellectual resistance. This alarmed Austrian authorities to the point that they took harsh measures against the Ossolineum during its early years. A director and his closest associates were imprisoned for treasonous activities. At times the entire facility was shut down and catalogs of its holdings taken away.  During the Revolution of 1848, an Austrian general openly regretted that the building had not been subjected to artillery fire.

It was only in the late 1860’s, following the Austrian loss in the Austro-Prussian War and the Habsburgs historic compromise with Hungary, that Polish culture was finally given room to blossom in Galicia. The Ossolineum was in the vanguard of this Polish intellectual renaissance. Illustrious Polish aristocratic families, such as the Lubomirski’s, bequeathed their entire personal museum collections to the institution. A famous publishing house developed, known as the Ossolineum Press. World War One delayed progress, but this turned out to be only a temporary setback. During the interwar period, the Ossolineum’s holdings expanded to over 220,000 works with everything from rare tapestries to coins to the largest newspaper collection in Poland. It was an incredible accomplishment of Polish intellectual achievement, but then the World War II began and everything changed.

Vasyl Stefanyk Library now on the former site of the National Ossoliński Institute

Worst Was Yet To Come – The Ossolineum on the Brink
In 1928 an article entitled “The Centenary of a Great Home of Research in Poland, The Ossolineum, 1828 – 1928” in The Slavonic Review by Roman Dybosko stated, “the Ossolineum, now entering, in a free and reunited Poland, on the second century of its existence, we behold – and I think must admire – a house which has outlasted the earthquakes of a tragic national history, and proudly stands as a monument to the power of self-sacrifice and endurance, in the service of high ideals of culture and progress.” The author wrote this a little too soon because the worst earthquakes, from both east and west, were yet to come.

A City Created By Flames Of Fire (Lviv: The Story of a City In Ukraine #1)

Fire has brought more cities to an end, than to a beginning. The opposite is true for the western Ukrainian city of Lviv. Fire brought the Lviv into historical existence. Yet multiple times fire threatened to extinguish the city forever, only for Lviv to rise from the ashes, created anew.

No one can say with certainty when the area that would become Lviv had enough population to be called a settlement or village. Archaeologists have found traces of human habitation in the boggy valley of the Poltva River going all the way back to the 5^th century AD. Excavations have yielded a vague outline of early settlement in the area, but they only offer fragments of evidence rather than a clear picture. It would not be until the late Middle Ages, in the middle of the 13^th century, that the city known today as Lviv was formally created. As the story goes, King Danylo Romanovych (Daniel of Galicia) founded the city and then bequeathed it as a gift to his son Lev (Lev I of Galicia), from which the name Lviv comes, meaning belonging to Lev. While this story is often repeated as the beginning of Lviv it was not what confirms the historical existence of the city. Instead, the actual historical beginning of Lviv starts in 1256 with a fire seen in the distance. This is ironic considering that on numerous occasions fires brought the city to ruin.

A flame of pure fire – creator, destroyer, illuminator & Transformer of Historic Lviv

Coming Into History – The Emergence of Lviv
Lviv surfaces into history not through deeds but words, specifically written words. The Galician-Volhynian Chronicle mentions that a major fire was seen “from Lviv” in 1256. This must have been quite a fire to be seen from afar. Witnesses of this conflagration may well have been standing on the High Castle or Lysa Gora areas, a couple of prominent hills which rise on a ridge that can be found to the east-northeast of today’s Rynok Square. Wherever the blaze was spied from, it would be the first of innumerable occasions in which residents of Lviv would witness major fires. Unfortunately, these fires were found in the city itself, with often disastrous consequences. Almost all the structures in Medieval Lviv were constructed out of wood. The threat of an all-consuming fire was a constant danger. Several safeguards were put into place to mitigate the possibility of a raging inferno.

Watchmen walked the city streets throughout the night to make sure that the citizenry did not leave a single light on in their homes. Obeying these watchmen was a matter of both structural and self-preservation. If someone was found guilty of causing a fire that resulted in deaths, they could end up having their arm severed. Even worse, some accidental arsonists were tossed into the flames and burned alive, in a bit of retaliatory justice. Such cruelty seems excessive, but in light of the calamitous destruction that could result from a fire the city needed the strongest deterrent possible. Stopping people from causing fires was one thing, but nature also threatened fiery destruction. In 1510, three bolts of lightning struck the city in succession. This led to many houses burning down in residential areas.

Lviv in the 17th century – a product of reconstruction

All Consuming Fires – Destructions & Reconstructions
The famously destructive fire of 1527 illustrates how a conflagration could lead to both utter ruin and paradoxically the re-creation of Lviv. Following an inordinately, dry spring season the city was a virtual tinderbox. A hot, windy day in early June set the stage for what would become the worst fire in Lviv’s history. The blaze began in of all places, a small brewery situated in the heart of the walled city on Virmenska Street (Armenian Street). Soon the flames spread out in every direction. Nearly every wooden structure in the city burned to the ground. Only two buildings were left intact, the City Hall and a house in an outlying suburb. Church bells and artillery pieces were melted by the extreme heat. Even stone buildings were destroyed. Lviv was left a smoldering ruin. Interestingly, this turned out to be a watershed moment in the architectural history of the city. Gothic Lviv was forever gone.

New buildings were raised in the Renaissance style and made mostly of stone. In 1540 wooden construction was banned. And yet the fires still continued. In 1556 another conflagration burned parts of the city. A mere fifteen years later, the entire Jewish district of the city was totally destroyed by a fire. It was not until the mid-19^th century after the city was firmly under Austrian rule that a professional firefighting squad was created. Modernization brought the development of city fire departments. Eventually fires became rarer, just as building materials had become less flammable and more permanent. If not for such changes Lviv would be devoid of the stunning architecture which garnered the old city center protection as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Conversely, if not for fire the Lviv of today would not exist.

Putting Out Flames – The Fire Department in Lviv

A Fire In The Distance
The city’s unique Renaissance and Baroque, architectural styles rose from the ashes of many different Lvivs that existed and were subsequently extinguished. Fire reshaped Lviv in ways that would have been impossible to imagine when the city was first conceived. Fire also brought Lviv into the historical conscious. A fire in the distance brought the city that was rising from the valley of the Poltva into the pages of history. Lviv and its history started, but never ended with fire. Instead it was to be consumed, transformed and illuminated by fire.

How A Resurrection Really Feels – Lviv’s Lychakiv Cemetery

The most instructive textbook covering the last two-hundred and twenty-five years of Eastern European history is not written on paper, but in stone. The western Ukrainian city of Lviv, home to some of the most atmospheric architecture in all of Europe, is also the location of one of its most fascinating necropolises, Lychakiv Cemetery. Cemeteries are built to memorialize the dead and Lychakiv is full of mournful statuary and sculptures, but it is also a place filled with the passions of life. These passions exhibited good and evil, idealism and radicalism in unwavering fervor to the most extreme ends. There are perpetrators buried here who were party to unspeakable crimes in the service of empire, royalism, nationalism, fascism and communism. There are victims buried here who suffered in the name of these same ideologies. Heroes and villains, the famous, infamous and anonymous all ended up together in Lychakiv. Their lives and deaths have become a lesson to the living of what human beings can become. A walk through Lychakiv is not just a stroll through the past two centuries of this fated city’s history. It is also a window into the soul of humanity, for better and worse.

You will never walk alone – into Lviv’s past at Lychakiv Cemetery

Where A Whole World Resides
The arched neo-Gothic entranceway to Lychakiv is a portal into a world of kaleidoscopic diversity. Plots and graves, tombs, chapels and mausoleums of every size, shape and configuration imaginable are packed together as thick as the foliage which consumes many of them. Many of these graves are architectural wonders in their own right. The juxtaposition of good and evil, vanished magnificence and depraved fanaticism can often be found interred and sometimes memorialized within a whisper’s distance of one another. Up and down uneven pathways, shaded by gigantic trees, illuminated by shafts of sunlight are the graves of Polish aristocrats and Soviet apparatchiks, Polish and Ukrainian nationalists, Ukrainian soldiers past and of the near present, soldiers of the SS Galician Division and the Red Army, all opposing each other in silence. Ukrainian and Polish literary heroes, Armenians, Orthodox acolytes, Greek Catholics, Roman Catholics and the Lwow Eaglets, that flower of Polish youth who fought for Lwow in the hopes and dreams of the Second Polish Republic. Victims of Fascism and Communism now rest side by side with little to distinguish them. For all of this haunting presence there is also the disturbing, ever present absence of Lviv’s once thriving Jewish community. And so it goes on and on. This is the way of Lychakiv, a way the world of Lemberg, Lwow, Lvov, Lviv once was and still is to a limited extent. The diversity of souls is much like itself, where patterns appear and disappear. A world where colleagues became enemies and cowards were turned into heroes, a space filled with dashed hopes and soaring dreams. Lychakiv is a place that is present inside all who live and breathe. This is where a whole world resides.

Stepping out of death and into life at Lychakiv

Beginnings Of An End – The Creation Of Lychakiv
Lychakiv, like all cemeteries is supposed to be about ends, but what separates it, is that it can cause an examination of the means that were used to achieve those ends. Yet this cemetery also had to have a beginning.  Despite its ancient and timeless feel its start occurred in neither medieval nor renaissance times. This seems a bit odd in a city that is known for its antiquated, rustic architectural aesthetics. Central cemeteries for the city’s dead were first conceived in the early modern age of the late 18^th century. Up until its conception, the dead were buried adjacent to churches. The idea of large cemeteries away from the city’s urban areas was conceived to help protect the living from the dead. Bodies left in the open or given improper burials often lead to periodic epidemics which could demographically devastate the populace. At this time Lviv (then known by its German name Lemberg) was under the rule of the Austrian Habsburgs. They had taken control of Galicia in 1772. One usually does not relate cemeteries to modernity, but Lychakiv was a way to clean up and modernize Lviv. It would help bring the city up to standards of urban hygiene that were the rule in central and western Europe. In 1783 a decree was issued by Lviv’s authorities that banned burials within the city limits. Three years later, designated areas were set aside for burials, one of these was Lychakiv. In 1787 the first burials took place at what was then known as Lyczakowski Cemetary. The name was Polish, as were most of the inhabitants of the city at that time. Poland was in the process of being partitioned and would no longer exist as a political entity by the end of the 18^th century. The city and cemetery were overseen by Lviv’s authorities. Many of these authorities would be Poles themselves, they continued to dominate the city even after Poland ceased to exist as a political entity.

In silences they speak – statuary outside a tomb in Lychakiv

Speaking In Silence
Death of empire, republic and ideology has been as much a part of life in Lviv, as the Lychakiv cemetery has been part of death in the city for over two centuries now. Poles may have been a majority in the city for much of this time, but they like so many others have now all but vanished from Lviv. This is nothing new or out of the ordinary for this place. No one ethnic group or nationality has been able to hold sway over Lviv in either living or dead form since Lychakiv came into existence. Just the same as no one group holds power over the past here. In this cemetery, permeated by so many silences, everyone seems to have a say. In Latin or Cyrillic, in German, Polish, Armenian, Ukrainian and Russian the names engraved in stone are what is left of the dreams, passions and folly from the vast waves of humanity who tried to control this astonishing city in an accursed region. Lychakiv today is a testament to the fleeting nature of power and passion. It exists, not so much to memorialize death, but to remember and contemplate life. Here in Lychakiv, is how a resurrection really feels.

Buried Beneath – Lviv’s Underground River: The Poltva

The old city center of Lviv seems to have it all. Medieval  and Baroque architectural wonders, a magnificent Neo- Renaissance opera house, cobblestone streets, fashionable coffee houses and eye popping, colorful buildings. This ensemble was deemed worthy of UNESCO World Heritage Site status. The cliché that you have to see it to believe it holds true for this marvelous city. The beauty, romance and delicious architecture also serves as a distraction. It keeps visitors from noticing the one thing that is actually missing in Lviv, flowing water. Search all over Lviv, but a river or a creek will not be found. This is quite strange, since the landscape surrounding the city is lush. A climb up Zamkova Hora (High Castle Hill), the city’s highest point offers a commanding view over the city, but no water source can be spied from this prominence. Where is the stream which quenches the city and the surrounding landscapes thirst?

The Poltva River – buried beneath Lviv

The River That Gave Life To Lviv
A surface glance demonstrates that Lviv is an outlier among central and western Ukrainian cities when it comes to waterways. Kiev, Dnipropretrovsk and Zaporizhia were built up along the Dnieper River. Smaller cities like Chernivtsi and Ivano-Frankivsk are set on banks of the Prut and Bystrytsia Rivers. It is fascinating to imagine how Lviv could have grown to such size and stature without being on or near a river. Such a leap of imagination is not required, because Lviv is set on a river, one that is now buried just beneath the city. The Poltva River can neither be seen nor heard along the streets and squares of Lviv’s old town. There is no trace of its existence. This is deceptive because the river is still an important part of the city today, just as it has been since Lviv’s founding in the 13^th century.

Medieval Lviv grew up along the banks of the Poltva, a short yet important river in western Ukraine. While the Poltva is a mere 60 kilometers in length, it drains over 200 creeks and streams before entering the western Bug River. It is hard to imagine the modern urban environment of Lviv once had a river flowing through the middle of it. The river was a lifeline for security, commerce and trade. The Poltva delineated the northern boundary of the city, its waters creating a natural moat. Ships would ply the river while bringing loads of goods from as far away as the Baltic Sea. Mills once lined the river banks. Conversely, the Poltva brought many natural, but undesirable things to the city in the form of disease. Its murky waters were a breeding ground for pestilence. Swarms of mosquitoes and flies were often accompanied by an unbearable stench. The fetid waters caused mildew and rot.

Vault of the Poltva River on Mickiewicz Square (Credit: Lviv Historical Museum)

The Lifeblood Of A City Goes Underground – Burying The Poltva
By the 19^th century Lviv was a fast growing hub city for the eastern fringes of the Habsburg Empire. As the city began to modernize, officials decided that something needed to be done with the Poltva. It had long caused public health problems, such as outbreaks of malaria. It was thus decided to encase and cover over the Poltva, routing the river through the city sewer system. By 1870, fifteen kilometers of the river flowing through the main part of the city had been covered. Despite World War, revolution and the city falling under the rule of multiple empires and nations, work on covering the Poltva proceeded apace. Just before the turn of the 20^th century designs were vetted for a grand opera house in Lviv. Due to space concerns in the inner city it seemed all but impossible to locate the building in that area. The buildings designer, Zygmunt Gorgolewski, struck upon a novel idea. In his proposal, the Opera House would be located where the Poltva flowed, but the river would be covered over. The building would have a concrete rather than earthen foundation, which would allow the necessary stability.

Gorgolewski’s idea was a stunning success. In 1900 the magnificent new Grand Theater (known today as the Lviv Theatre of Opera And Ballet) was opened. There were reports that the building sunk in the years that followed its opening, but finally stabilized. Local legend says that the Poltva can be heard flowing from the orchestra pit of the opera house. The covering of the river throughout the greater Lviv area continued in the decades that followed. By the outbreak of the Second World War, 150 kilometers of the Poltva had been covered. Famously, the Poltva tunnels became a hiding place for a handful of Jews who had escaped the Nazis during the war. They survived by hiding in these tunnels and through the efforts of two Polish sewer maintenance workers Leopold Socha and Szczepek Wróblewski. The 2011 award winning film, In Darkness, by the Polish director Agnieska Holland was an award winning recreation about this story of survival in Lviv’s sewers. After the war ended work on covering the Poltva was renewed. By the end of the 20^th century the river was completely covered throughout nearly all of the Lviv area.

The Poltva River outside of Lviv as it looks today (Credit: Mykola Stepaniv)

An Invisible Presence
The Poltva River is now underground, an invisible presence in the life of the city. Modernity demanded that the river be subdued. Technology and the minds of man completed the process. What once gave life to Lviv has been reduced to a collection point for rainwater and sewage flowing through a labyrinth of tunnels. The river still exists, only now it is out of sight and out of mind. Imperceptible in the consciousness of the city it helped create.