User:RusichVladimir

In 1941 the city was occupied by the Nazi Germans who continued exterminating the population by murdering the Jews and sending Ukrainians as forced labour to Germany. In the years 1942-1943 the Polish Armia Krajowa was active opposing Nazi rule and defending ethnic Poles from violence from Ukrainian Nationalists. During the Soviet release in March and April 1944, the city was encircled. In March 1944 the city was declared a fortified place by Adolf Hitler, to be defended until the last round was shot. The stiff German resistance caused extensive use of heavy artillery by the Red Army, resulting in the complete destruction of the city and killing of nearly all German occupants (55 survivors out of 4,500). Unlike many other occasions, where the Germans had practised a scorched earth policy during their withdrawal from territories of the Soviet Union, the devastation was caused directly by the hostilities.[3]