Subject: A Polish-Ukrainian What-If: The Union of Hadiach Date: 24 Jun 2001 00:21:06 GMT From: dtenner@ameritech.net (David Tenner) Organization: http://extra.newsguy.com Newsgroups: soc.history.what-if The Pereiaslav agreement of 1654 has been portrayed by Russian and Soviet historians as the inevitable product of the Ukrainian people's desire for union (or "reunion") with the Russians. However, it is evident that at least some Cossack leaders thought after 1654 that there might still be non-Russian options available for Ukraine. For example, Hetman Petro Doroshenko (ruled 1665-76) attempted a pro-Turkish orientation for a while. And Hetman Ivan Vykhovsky (1657-9) favored a Polish orientation, and signed the stillborn Hadiach (Hadziacz in Polish) treaty in 1658--which Andrew Wilson in his recent *Ukraine: The Unexpected Nation* has called "one of the great 'What-ifs?' of Ukrainian and East European history" noting that "If it had been successfully implemented, the Commonwealth would finally have become a loose confederation of Poles, Lithuanians and Ruthenians. The missing Ukrainian buffer state would have come into being as the Commonwealth's eastern pillar. Russian expansion might have been checked and Poland spared the agonies of the Partitions or, perhaps just as likely, it might have struggled on longer as the 'Sick Man of Europe.'" (p. 65) The terms of the Hadiach union were as follows: the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (Rzeczpospolita) was to be transformed into a federation of three states--Poland, Lithuania and the Grand Duchy of Rus'. The Grand Duchy of Rus' was to consist of the Ukrainian palatinates of Kiev, Chernihiv and Bratslav. (The Cossack negotiators had originally demanded that Galicia and Volhynia be included as well.) Rus' would have its own judicial system, treasury and mint and a Cossack register of 30,000 men to be paid by the government as well as a standing army of 10,000 men under the Zaporozhian hetman. The officers of these forces would be elected by their own members, and the Cossack *starshyna* (officer elite) would be recognized as a social estate equal to the Polish gentry; each year the hetman would recommend to the king 1,000 Cossacks to receive the hereditary patent of nobility. No Polish troops were to be allowed in Rus' without the consent of the hetman. All Cossack and Polish landholdings confiscated after the 1648 revolt were to be restored to their original owners. The Poles made important concessions on the religious issue: the Union of Brest was to be abolished in the Grand Duchy of Rus' and the Orthodox church was to be made fully equal to the Roman Catholic church throughout the Rzeczpospolita. Finally, Kiev's Orthodox Collegium would be raised to the status of an academy; a second Orthodox higher institution of learning would be founded; and as many schools and printing presses "as were necessary" would be established. (Contents summarized in Paul Robert Magosci, *A History of Ukraine*, pp. 220-225; also in Orest Subtelny, *Ukraine: a History* [1988 edition], p. 144) In spite of considerable Roman Catholic opposition, the Treaty of Hadiach was ratified by the Polish-Lithuanian Sejm in 1659. As it turned out, though, the treaty never went into effect. The Muscovites saw it as an act of war, and even before it was ratified sent an army into Ukraine. Although the Muscovites were defeated in the battle of Konotop, Vykhovsky was not able to follow up on his victory. The Muscovite garrisons in Ukraine continued to hold out; a Zaporozhian attack on the Crimea forced Vykhovsky's Tatar allies to return home; and unrest broke out in the Poltava region. Finally, several pro-Moscow colonels rebelled and accused Vykhovsky of "selling Ukraine out to the Poles." Unable to continue the war, Vykhovsky resigned in October 1659 and retired to Poland. The next couple of decades were chaotic for Ukraine, but ultimately it was partitioned between Russia and Poland, with Russia getting the east or "Left" Bank of the Dnieper and Kiev as well. Magosci doubts that Hadiach had any real chance of succeeding. It was, he says, too much a deal that merely benefited the elite of the Cossacks--the "starshyna"--who wanted to be recognized as equal to the Polish nobility. Rank-and-file Cossacks did not care for it, and saw Orthodox Moscow as their natural ally. After the 1648 revolt, Poland was just too hated by ordinary Cossacks for Hadiach to work. Still, what if Russia were much weaker, giving the Cossacks much less of an alternative? Or even if we grant that by 1658 any attempt to solve the Ukrainian (or "Rus'") problem in a Polish framework was hopeless (though Pilsudski was to make a very similar attempt over 260 years later) could some such attempt *before* Bohdan Khmelnytsky's 1648 uprising have been successful, and could it have saved the Rzeczpospolita and checked Moscow's expansion? -- David Tenner dtenner@ameritech.net Subject: Re: A Polish-Ukrainian What-If: The Union of Hadiach Date: Sat, 23 Jun 2001 23:31:00 -0500 From: Rich Rostrom Newsgroups: soc.history.what-if References: 1 In article <90C9C5F6Bdtennerameritechnet@enews.newsguy.com>, dtenner@ameritech.net (David Tenner) wrote: >The Pereiaslav agreement of 1654... The 24 balls of the 12 apostles! Such erudition... I am awed. Really > Still, what if Russia were much >weaker, giving the Cossacks much less of an alternative? Or even if we >grant that by 1658 any attempt to solve the Ukrainian (or "Rus'") problem >in a Polish framework was hopeless ... WI a Turkish threat developed at this time and Polish intervention was decisive in saving Ukraine from Turkish conquest or at least ravaging? Something similar to Sobieski at Vienna, but perhaps at Kiev instead. If the Cossacks lost heavily in the first stages of this war, they would then be more dependent on Polish protection, and less able to stage rebellions. One could also postulate that Moscow was neutralized or paralyzed during the key period by the death or illness of the Czar, with perhaps a succession dispute or a series of palace coups. -- Never consume legumes before transacting whatsoever | Rich Rostrom even in the outermost courtyard of a descendant of | Timur the Terrible. | rrostrom@dummy --- Avram Davidson, _Dr. Bhumbo Singh_ | 21stcentury.net