WARSAW UPRISING CERIMONY

Seeing that it is the anniversary - yes Red, I ordered the book! Does anyone have any thoughts on soviet motives that helped the Nazis? Anyone know which Soviet army was there and who was in command? Thanks

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"I die for my fatherland. I have a clear conscience." - Admiral Wilhelm Canaris

Good, good! Im reading it at the moment!

2nd Guards Tank Army
8th Guards Army
1st Polish army

under Rokossovsky... I think...

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"Watch that Fu*ker, he'll 'ave someones eye out!" King Harold at Hastings 1066.

WHY DIDN'T THE SOVIETS HELP THE WARSAW UPRISING

This is a very interesting analysis of why the Soviet's "stood" by at Warsaw in 1944 - take a look for anyone who is interested [img]smile.gif[/img]

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"I die for my fatherland. I have a clear conscience." - Admiral Wilhelm Canaris

Any thoughts on the talk of the western governments making an apology not helping the Warsaw people uprising?

Personally I think it is not so easy for a subject.

1. It was a long way to go to help
2. If it was easy why didn´t the Red Army help?
3. The political question- Who to run the country after WW2. The western government or the Moscow-led governemnt
4. Stalin letting the western bombers come to help? Not in time?!

And has the Russian government given its apologies yet? Anyone know? I think they should be listed there, too.

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The soviets didn't want their postwar reign in Poland to be challenged by the largest and most effective underground resistance of WWII, so they were content to sit accross the Wisla and let the AK and the Germans annihilate each other.

Now about the comment "it's a long way to go to help," think about the convoys going all the way to Russia, and suffering huge losses. If my geography serves me well, Russian Ports on the White Sea were about twice as far.

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What does TITO's forces have to do with this?

The Polish Home Army was absolutely not 'the largest and most effective underground resistance of WWII'.

Stalin didn't have why to help the Poles, since they were the traditional enemies of the Russians, Ukrainians and Bielorrussians, and of the USSR. Germans and Poles killing each other was a perfect combination for Stalin. BUT the Red Army, specially marshal Konstantín K. Rokossovskí, made every possible attempt to break through and help the be-sieged capital:

"On The Warsaw Uprising by Col. David M. Glantz

…In late July 1944 the Stavka ordered its II Tank Army to race northward to Warsaw with the XLVII Army and a cavalry corps in its wake. After encountering two
Wehrmacht divisions defending the southern approaches to Warsaw, the tank army tried
to bypass the German defenses from the northeast but ran into a counterstroke by four Wehrmacht panzer divisions, which severely mauled the tank army and forced it to withdraw on 5 August. During the ensuing weeks, while the Warsaw uprising began, matured, but ultimately failed, the forces on the I Bielorussian Front’s right wing continued their advance against Army Group 'Centre' northeast of Warsaw. For whatever
motive, however, the forces on the I Bielorussian Front’s right wing focused on defending the Magnuszew bridgehead south of Warsaw, which was being subjected to heavy German counterattacks throughout mid-August, and the forces on the front’s left wing continued their advance to the Bug River north of Warsaw and attempted to seize crossings over the river necessary to facilitate future offensive operations.
Throughout the entire period up to 20 August 1944, the I Boelorussian Front’s XLVII Army remained the only major Red Army forces deployed across the Vistula River opposite Warsaw. On that date the I Polish Army joined it. Red Army forces north of Warsaw finally advanced across the Bug River on 3 September, closed up to the Narew River the following day, and fought their way into bridgeheads across the Narew on 6
September. Lead elements of two Polish divisions finally assaulted across the Vistula River into Warsaw on 13 September but made little progress and were evacuated back across the river ten days later.

Political considerations and motivations aside, an objective consideration of combat in the Warsaw region indicates that, prior to early September, German resistance was sufficient to halt any Soviet assistance to the Poles in Warsaw, were it intended. Thereafter, it would have required a major reorientation of military efforts from Magnuszew in the south or, more realistically, from the Bug and Narew River axis in the
north in order to muster sufficient force to break into Warsaw. And once broken into, Warsaw would have been a costly city to clear of Germans and an unsuitable location from which to launch a new offensive."

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

Now, some more facts:

The Western Allies diverted 100+ bombers from the air offensive against Germany to drop supplies on Warsaw and help the Polish Home Army, even if they knew that:

1) Losses were going to be high.
2) That many supply shippments were going to be captured by the Germans
3) That 'friendly fire' incidents could take place with the Soviet Forces
4) That the strategic bombing offensive would be affected by the lack of 100 planes with its crews

Still, the Allies sent help and the Soviet Forces helped them by letting them using the Red Air Force's airfields. The Red Air Force itself, dropped several tons of supplies on September 12th.

Stalin, however, cancelled the lending of airfields and the Soviet drops after a week, when it became obvious that it was the Germans the ones who were getting all the supplies.

And let's not forget that 'the largest and most effective underground resistance of WWII' also took some time off whilst fighting the Germans:

On October 20th 1944 the Polish Home Army attacked Jewish Homes (and the very few Jews left) in the just-liberated neighbourghood of Ejszyski, in Warsaw.

Bet you forgot that detail?

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

Yes of course, the AK was a bunch of murderers who took time off.

Zegota did not exist and

of course not, it was the French underground wasn't it? It was the French who smuggled V-2 rocket components to England.

"...The Poles also succeeded in obtaining top-quality information about some of the most highly guarded secrets of the Reich. Thus, in the spring of 1943, the AK received information that the Germans were carrying out experiments with mysterious weapons on Peenemünde, an island in the Baltic Sea. A few weeks later Polish agents had obtained detailed plans of the area of the experiments and had sent them to London. Similarly, at the end of 1943 the intelligence service of the AK detected tests the Germans were making with the V-2 rocket in the area of Sandomierz, following which extensive reports on the secret new German weapon were sent to London. It so happens that the head of this secret investigation, Jerzy Chmielewski, had been under arrest in Auschwitz and had been released on bail in March of 1944. Chmielewski personally flew to London with the reports and several components of the V-2 rocket."

Of course it made sense to free Paris, but not Warszawa.

Soviet forces did NOT allow the use of their airfields! Stalin himself specifically forbade it.

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Another thing you should know about the soviet "help": most of the cannisters of food were simply pushed out of planes, with no parachutes, smashing to pieces on the ground.

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Six weeks after the uprising began, stalin granted American bombers the right to land at soviet airfields, to score a propaganda coup.
By this time, of course, the rising was all but crushed.

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The largest, better trained, most effective underground resistance movement in WWII, dear Polak, was Tito's Army, which fought the Germans in the Balcanic peninsula and which recquiered 19 German divisions to be crushed (unsuccessfully), almost as many divisions as those deployed in the Italian peninsula to fight the Anglo-American armies.

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

Lets not forget the actions of Soviet partisans...

Freddy,

No-one ever tell you its pointless arguing with a patriot?

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"Watch that Fu*ker, he'll 'ave someones eye out!" King Harold at Hastings 1066.

Patriot or cheauvinist?

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

very interesting any fact that seems to defend polish interpratation of history you called cheauvinist !!!

it is some kind of pollacophobia ??? ))

Yes, as a matter of fact it is. Against some members of this forum only, though.

But I guess that from now on I'll be called a xenophobe, no matter if one of the persons I admire the most was a Pole (he has just passed away) and if I have phraised Polish veterans and have been deeply touched by the Polish people's great suffering…

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"War is less costly than servitude, the choice is always between Verdun and Dachau." - Jean Dutourd, French veteran of both world wars

"A mon fils: depuis que tes yeux sont fermes les miens n’ont cessé de pleurir." - Mère française, Verdun

I admire him too but even I am not a catholic

I dont know if you know this story ?

Today will be an unforgettable day for Edith Zirer, a Jewish woman who was born in Poland but who has lived in Haifa for decades. At last, in the Yad Vashem Memorial to the Holocaust, she was able to personally thank Karol Wojtyla, the man who saved her life 55 years ago, she said.

At that time, Edith Zirer said: "I remember perfectly well. I was there, I was a 13 year old girl, alone, sick, and weak. I had spent 3 years in a German concentration camp at the point of death. And, like an angel, Karol Wojtyla saved my life; like a dream from heaven: he gave me something to drink and eat and then carried me on his back some 4 kilometers in the snow, before catching the train to safety."

Edith Zirer tells the story as if it had happened yesterday. It was a cold morning in early February, 1945. The young Jew, who was not yet aware that she was the only member of her family to survive the Nazi massacre, let a tall, strong 25-year-old, tonsured seminarian carry her and give her a ray of hope.

Today, at 66, Edith is the mother of two and lives in a beautiful home in the Carmel hills, on the outskirts of Haifa. She rebuilt her life in Israel, where she arrived in 1951, suffering from tuberculosis and frightful dreams connected with the war.

For many years, she kept this incident to herself. When Karol Wojtyla ascended the Chair of Peter in 1978, she felt the need to tell the story and express her gratitude. The question that arises immediately, of course, is how could she be certain that that seminarian is the Pope? The reporters of Haifa's weekly newspaper "Kolbo," who heard the story for the first time in 1998, say her story is very convincing. "She is not trying for publicity, all the details she gives seem credible."

The story speaks for itself. "On January 28, 1945 Russian soldiers liberated the Hassak concentration camp, where I had been imprisoned for almost 3 years, working in a munitions factory. I felt confused, I was prostrated with illness. Two days later I arrived at a small railway station between Czestochowa and Krakow." At this time, Wojtyla was in Krakow preparing for his priestly ordination.

"I was sure I would arrive at the end of my journey. I was lying on the ground, in the corner of a large hall where dozens of refugees were gathering the majority of whom still wore uniforms with the numbers of the concentration camps. Then Wojtyla saw me. He came with a big cup of tea, the first hot beverage I had had in weeks. Then he brought me a cheese sandwich made with Polish rye bread, wonderful. But I didn't want to eat. I was too tired. He made me eat. Then he told me I would have to walk to catch the train. I tried, but I fell down on the ground. He then took me in his arms and carried me for a long time. All the while the snow fell. I remember his brown jacket, the tranquil voice who told me about his parents' death, and his brother's, the loneliness he felt, and the need not to be overcome by sorrow and to fight for life. His name was indelibly imprinted in my memory."

When they finally arrived at the convoy that would take the prisoners to the West, Edith met a Jewish family who alerted her: "Be careful, priests try to convert Jewish children." She was afraid and hid. "Only later did I understand that all he wanted to do was to help me. Now I got to thank him personally," she said.

Czesc Stanchev!
Ja tez slyszalem o tym


A very touching story.
She met the Pope again in Rome I believe.

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in Jerusalem in Yad Vashem in April 2000

Have to agree on this one, although the Belorussian territories give the Yugoslavs a good run for their money when it comes to tying up German resources. During a few days prior to operation Bagration, these partisans apparently conducted around 50,000 railroad demolitions in German rear areas.

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"Nervous wait for the whistle to blow
Rush of blood and over we go..."
- Iron Maiden, "Paschendale"

This thread seems to be a continuance of the one Otto has just closed....

In defference to Sanchev, he has made me look again at Polands contribution in ww2, ok his stance can be eskewed slightly but we have seen that many times on here, but some of his basic facts are correct, I'll disagree with him on the Polish resistance vis a vis the Yugoslavian model.

My knowledge on ww2 is more in tune and interest lies with political side of the war, its causes, its effects, and the leaders throughout.

I have a great interest in the rest of course, but my interest in Polands efforts is probably similar to many others on here, beginning with the start of the war, and Polands subsequent efforts with the allies in all other theatres, including the Ghetto uprising etc.

But Stanchev has awakened an interest in me regarding Polands own battles in Poland in 39 and its resistance afterwards. He makes a lot of good points in retrospect. Have picked up on Martins figures regarding the Polish kills in the Battle of Britian, and this oft mentioned figure proves to us that revisionism in its purest form is not a bad idea, until it gets into nationalistic trends. Historical facts are always worth revisiting, as Martin proves.

I am amazed now with Polands fight in 39. Am seeing a lot more to this theatre than I previously picked up. One book although written in the 50's describes in great detail Polands fight, a translation from the French, "The War" Not having it with me as it is in a library reference section I will put more details up when I next visit. But it is certainly worth a read, and may bring more information and dare I say it, even more respect for the Polish soldier than he has now with most of us, and with me that it certainly high anyway.

I can also see Stanchevs point on the expected attack that the Poles wished from the Allies on a second front in 39 to help relieve them, ok, as Fried says it may have been a disaster, but I'm thinking again, would it have been such a disaster at that time?

The politics behind it certainly point to the Poles expecting the allies to honour what they saw as their word to physically help them in the West in 39.

All things I have known about, but all worth revisiting, but probably without the nationalist slant that puts a lot of us off debating when being shouted at.

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Prepare to repel borders.
William L. McGonagle, MOH, U. S. Navy, Commanding Officer, USS LIBERTY 1967.

Thanks Mate [img]redface.gif[/img]