Fałszywy pieniądz wypiera prawdziwy z obiegu. Iwo Cyprian Pogonowski
Prawo ekonomiczne „Fałszywy Pieniądz Wypiera Prawdziwy z Obiegu" Kopernik ustalił w czasie jego patriotycznej walki w obronie waluty polskiej fałszowanej przez Niemców, przy pomocy Żydów. Kopernik wielokrotnie dał dowody patriotyzmu polskiego i dumy z faktu, że Królestwo Polskie w jego czasach było krajem największych swobód obywatelskich i tolerancji w Europie.
W 1523 roku Erasmus z Rotterdamu był pod wrażeniem osiągnięć polskich i napisał: „Gratuluję temu państwu... które w nauce, wymiarze sprawiedliwości, moralności i religii oraz we wszystkim co oddziela nas od barbaryzmu, jest w takim rozkwicie, że może współzawodniczyć z najbardziej przodującymi i chwalebnymi państwami."
Zdziwiłem się, kiedy niedawno stały czytelnik Gazety Wyborczej powiedział mi, że „Polacy ukradli Kopernika Niemcom." Wypowiedź ta miała chyba wyrażać pogląd liberalny i jakby na wyższym poziomie niż poglądy nacjonalistów, które to poglądy nie są modne wśród inteligentów „galicyjskich." Dowodem na to twierdzenie miał być fakt, że jakoby Kopernik nie pozostawił po sobie ani jednego słowa napisanego w języku polskim.
Wiemy, że nazwisko Kopernik wywodziło się z wsi Koperniki na Śląsku a sam Mikołaj Kopernik był nie tylko polskim naukowcem, ale również działaczem politycznym jak też dygnitarzem, zarządcą Warmii. Korespondencja Kopernika z rządem w Krakowie wyjaśniała oszustwa monetarne dokonywane przez Niemców, zwłaszcza Hohenzollernów, była w archiwach w Szwecji, wywieziona w czasie „potopu." Pod koniec dziewiętnastego wieku została ona skradziona prawdopodobnie przez Prusaków, którzy chcieli udowodnić światu, że Kopernik był Niemcem.
Liczna łacińska korespondencja Kopernika dotycząca jego teorii heliocentrycznej, twierdzącej, że ziemia obraca się, co dzień na swojej osi, czyli raz dziennie i że planety krążą w orbitach wokół słońca znana jest od 1510 roku w jego tekscie „Comentariolus" i była opublikowana w 1543 roku pod tytułem "De Rvolutionibus Orbium Coelestium." Żadnego ważnego dokumentu Kopernik nie pozostawił w języku niemieckim, choć na pewno ten język też znał.
Natomiast twierdzenie, że języka polskiego Kopernik nie znał nie ma sensu w obliczu jego czteroletnich studiów w Krakowie i długich lat administracji Warmii, zamieszkałej przez Mazurów, nie mówiąc o przeprowadzaniu przez niego w sejmie przez ponad rok reformy monetarnej, w której wprowadził on słowo „złoty" jako jednostki monetarnej w Polsce w 1526 roku, w Prusach w 1528 roku. (Litwa przyjęła „złotego" dopiero po Unii Litewskiej w 1569 roku.)
Kopernik pisał po Łacinie, co było normalne w jego czasach. Z koniecznością porozumiewania się Kopernika po polsku wiążą się jego słowa napisane po łacinie: „Fałszywy Pieniądz Wypiera Prawdziwy z Obiegu." Napisał on te słowa w traktacie dotyczącym reformy monetarnej w Polsce potrzebnej z powodu fałszowania polskiej waluty przez Niemców z pomocą Żydów, na przestrzeni długiego okresu czasu. Latami fałszowane przez Niemców i puszczane w obieg przez Żydów fałszywe monety, destabilizowały i okradały gospodarkę Polski, szczególnie destabilizowały handel rzeczny Wisłą do Gdańska i dalej drogą morską.
Wrażenie „Fałszywy Pieniądz Wypiera Prawdziwy z Obiegu" było obserwacją skutków fałszowania pieniędzy polskich przez Niemców, w analitycznej w pracy Kopernika mającej na celu reformę i stabilizację polskiej waluty, atakowanej za pomocą puszczania w obieg fałszywych polskich monet, bitych przez Niemców, na przestrzeni wielu lat.
W historii długoletnich stosunków Polski z Niemcami, Hohenzollernowie berlińscy i pruscy odgrywali wielokrotnie, przez długie okresy czasu, rolę pasożytów. Jest to bardzo dobrze udokumentowane. W swoich czasach Mikołaj Kopernik zwalczał to pasożytnictwo, za pomocą pionierskiej pracy nad reformą monetarną, którą zaczął prowadzić wcześniej nim urodził się bankier angielski Thomas Gresham (1519-1579), którego nazwisko Anglicy wiążą z prawem ekonomicznym ustalonym przez Kopernika. Gresham nigdy tego prawa nie formułował i był dzieckiem, kiedy w 1526 roku Kopernik opublikował swoją książkę pod tytułem „Monetae cudende ratio," w której to prawo jest opisane po raz pierwszy w literaturze światowej.
Przywłaszczanie sobie przez Anglików prawa ekonomicznego sformułowanego przez Kopernika jako „Prawo Gresham'a," przypomina ostatnie czasy, kiedy Anglicy twierdzili w literaturze swojej, że to oni, a nie Polacy rozwiązali niemiecki system szyfrów „Enigma."
Polska w dniu 25 lipca, 1939, dała za darmo Anglii i Francji, w ramach wspólnej obrony przeciwko niemieckiej agresji, rozwiązanie niemieckiego systemu szyfrów i elektro-magnetycznego aparatu, wraz z szczegółowym opisem technicznym, perforowanymi kartami oraz rozwiązaniami na coraz bardziej skomplikowane możliwości stosowania systemu „Enigma."
Dzięki polskiemu rozwiązaniu brytyjski projekt „Ultra" rozszyfrowywał niemieckie tajne rozkazy w czasie całej wojny 1939-1945. Rozwiązanie systemu „Enigmy" było jednym z najważniejszych wkładów Polski w zwycięstwo nad Niemcami w Drugiej Wojnie Światowej. W 1999 roku czołowy ekspert amerykański w łamaniu szyfrów, David A. Hatch. z Ośrodka Historii Szyfrów, National Security Agency, w Fort George G. Meade w stanie Maryland, napisał: „Rozwiązanie Enigmy przez Polskę było jednym z kamieni węgielnych zwycięstwa Aliantów nad Niemcami."
Wiadomo, że Kopernik był dowódcą obrony Olsztyna przeciwko Niemcom w latach 1519-1521. Wówczas Kopernik zapisał się w historii medycyny, ponieważ po raz pierwszy zastosował studium epidemiologiczne, dzięki któremu pokonał epidemię w oblężonym mieście.
Kopernik przeniósł z Włoch na północ Europy czołówkę rozwoju myśli filozoficznej za pomocą swoich podstawowych odkryć. Rewolucja kopernikańska położyła kres przekonaniu, że ziemia jest stojącym w miejscu środkiem „płaskiego wszechświata" i jest ciałem niebieskim pędzącym z wysoką szybkością nie wyobrażalną w skali ludzkiej.
Kopernik korzystał z wyjątkowo zaawansowanej na arenie europejskiej wolności słowa w Polsce jego czasów. Na przykład, Martin Luter zwalczał teorię heliocentryczną Kopernika i kazał spalić kukłę przedstawiającą ojca nowoczesnej astronomii pod napisem „głupi Polak-astronom." Nawet samo uformowanie przez Kopernika prawa ekonomicznego „Fałszywy Pieniądz Wypiera Prawdziwy z Obiegu" miało miejsce w czasie obrony waluty polskiej przez Kopernika przeciwko fałszerstwu dokonywanemu przez Niemców.
Iwo Cyprian Pogonowski
Born Sept. 3, 1921 Lwów, Poland
in Dec 1939 left Warsaw. Dec 30, 1939 arrested by Ukrainians serving the Gestapo in Dukla, then transferred to Barwinek, Krosno, Jaslo, Tarnów, Oswiecim, arrived in Oranienburg-Sachsenhausen on Aug. 10, 1940.
April 19, 1945 started on the Death March of Brandenburg from Sachsenhausen; escaped gunfire of SS-guards and arrived to Schwerin and freedom on May 2, 1945.
September 1945 arrived in Brussels, Belgium; obtained admission as a regular student at the Catholic University: Institute Superieur de Commerce, St. Ignace in Antwerp.
in 1954 graduated in Civil Engineering at the top of his class. Was invited to join honorary societies: Tau Beta Pi (general engineering honorary society), Phi Kappa Phi (academic honorary society equivalent to Phi Beta Kappa), Pi Mu (mechanical engineering honorary society), and Chi Epsilon (civil engineering honorary society). Taught descriptive geometry at the University of Tennessee;
in 1955 graduated with M.S. degree in Industrial Engineering.
in 1955 started working for Shell Oil Company in New Orleans. After one year of managerial training was assigned to design of marine structures for drilling and production of petroleum.
in 1960 started working for Texaco Research and Development in Houston, Texas as a Project Engineer. Authored total of 50 American and foreign patents on marine structures for the petroleum industry; wrote an article: The Rise and Fall of the Polish Commonwealth - A Quest for a Representative Government in Central and Eastern Europe in the 14th to 18th Centuries. Started to work on a Tabular History of Poland.
in 1972 moved to Blacksburg, Virginia. During the following years worked as Consulting Engineer for Texaco, also taught in Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University as Adjunct Professor in the College of Civil Engineering teaching courses on marine structures of the petroleum industry. Designed and supervised the construction of a hill top home for his family, also bought 500 acre ranch (near Thomas Jefferson National Forest) where he restored 200 years old mill house on a mountain stream.
in 1978 prepared Polish-English, English-Polish Dictionary with complete phonetics, published by Hippocrene Books Inc. The dictionary included a Tabular History of Poland, Polish Language, People, and Culture as well as Pogonowski's phonetic symbols for phonetic transcriptions in English and Polish at each dictionary entry; the phonetic explanations were illustrated with cross-sections of speech (organs used to pronounce the sounds unfamiliar to the users). It was the first dictionary with phonetic transcription at each Polish entry for use by English speakers
in 1981 prepared Practical Polish-English Dictionary with complete phonetics, published by Hippocrene Books Inc.
in 1983 prepared Concise Polish-English Dictionary with complete phonetics, published by Hippocrene Books Inc. Wrote an analysis of Michael Ch ci ski's Poland, Communism, Nationalism, Anti-Semitism. Also selected crucial quotations from Norman Davies' God's Playground - A History of Poland on the subject of the Polish indigenous democratic process.
in 1985 prepared Polish-English Standard Dictionary with complete phonetics, published by Hippocrene Books Inc. Also prepared a revised and expanded edition of the Concise Polish-English Dictionary with complete phonetics, also published by Hippocrene Books Inc.
in 1987 prepared Poland: A Historical Atlas on Polish History and Prehistory including 200 maps and graphs as well as Chronology of Poland's Constitutional and Political Development, and the Evolution of Polish Identity - The Milestones. An introductory chapter was entitled Poland the Middle Ground. Aloysius A. Mazewski President of Polish-American Congress wrote an introduction. The Atlas was published by Hippocrene Books Inc. and later by Dorset Press of the Barnes and Noble Co. Inc. which sends some 30 million catalogues to American homes including color reproduction of book covers. Thus, many Americans were exposed to the cover of Pogonowski's Atlas showing the range of borders of Poland during the history - many found out for the firsttime that Poland was an important power in the past. Total of about 30,000 atlases were printed so far.
In 1988 the publication of Poland: A Historical Atlas resulted in a number of invitations extended by several Polonian organizations to Iwo Pogonowski to present Television Programs on Polish History. Pogonowski responded and produced over two year period 220 half-hour video programs in his studio at home (and at his own expense.) These programs formed a serial entitled: Poland, A History of One Thousand Years. Total of over 1000 broadcasts of these programs were transmitted by cable television in Chicago, Detroit-Hamtramck, Cleveland, and Blacksburg.
in 1990-1991 translated from the Russian the Catechism of a Revolutionary of 1869 in which crime has been treated as a normal part of the revolutionary program. Started preparation of the Killing the Best and the Brightest: A Chronology of the USSR-German Attempt to Behead the Polish Nation showing how the USSR became a prototype of modern totalitarian state, how this prototype was adapted in Germany by the Nazis.
in 1991 prepared Polish Phrasebook, Polish Conversations for Americans including picture code for gender and familiarity, published by Hippocrene Books Inc.
in 1991 prepared English Conversations for Poles with Concise Dictionary published by Hippocrene Books Inc. By then a total of over 100,000 Polish-English, English-Polish Dictionaries written by Pogonowski were sold in the United States and abroad.
in 1992 prepared a Dictionary of Polish, Latin, Hebrew, and Yiddish Terms used in Contacts between Poles and Jews. It was prepared for the history of Jews in Poland as well as 115 maps and graphs and 172 illustrations, paintings, drawings, and documents, etc. of Jewish life in Poland. This material was accompanied by proper annotations.
in 1993 prepared Jews in Poland, Rise of the Jews as a Nation from Congressus Judaicus in Poland to the Knesset in Israel, published by Hippocrene Books Inc. in 3000 copies. Foreword was written by Richard Pipes, professor of history at Harvard University, and Pogonowski's school mate in the Keczmar school in Warsaw. Part I included: a Synopsis of 1000 Year History of Jews in Poland; the 1264 Statute of Jewish Liberties in Poland in Latin and English translation; Jewish Autonomy in Poland 1264-1795; German Annihilation of the Jews. In appendixes are documents and illustrations. An Atlas is in the Part III. It is divided as follows: Early Jewish Settlements 966-1264; The Crucial 500 Years, 1264-1795; Competition (between Poles and Jews) Under Foreign Rule, 1795-1918; The Last Blossoming of Jewish Culture in Poland, 1918-1939; German Genocide of the Jews, 1940-1944; Jewish Escape from Europe 1945-1947 - The End of European (Polish) Phase of Jewish History (when most of world's Jewry lived in Europe). Pogonowski began to write a new book starting with the Chronology of the Martyrdom of Polish Intelligentsia during World War II and the Stalinist Terror; the book in preparation was entitled Killing the Best and the Brightest.
in 1995 prepared Dictionary of Polish Business, Legal and Associated Terms for use with the new edition of the Practical Polish-English, English-Polish Dictionary and later to be published as a separate book.
in 1996 Pogonowski's Poland: A Historical Atlas; was translated into Polish; some 130 of the original 200 maps printed in color; the Chronology of Poland was also translated into Polish. The Atlas was published by Wydawnictwo Suszczy ski I Baran in Kraków in 3000 copies; additional publications are expected. Prepared Polish-English, Eglish-Polish Compact Dictionary with complete phonetics, published by Hippocrene Books Inc.
in 1997 finished preparation of the Unabridged Polish-English Dictionary with complete phonetics including over 200,000 entries, in three volumes on total of 4000 pages; it is published by Hippocrene Books Inc; the Polish title is: Uniwesalny S ownik Polsko-Angielski. Besides years of work Pogonowski spent over $50,000 on computers, computer services, typing, and proof reading in order to make the 4000 page dictionary camera ready; assisted in the preparation of second edition of Jews in Poland, Rise of the Jews from Congressus Judaicus in Poland to the Knesset in Israel published in fall of 1997. Prepared computer programs for English-Polish Dictionary to serve as a companion to the Unabridged Polish-English Dictionary printed by the end of May 1997.
in 1998 Pogonowski organized preparation of CD ROM for the Unabridged Polish-English Dictionary, Practical English-Polish Dictionary, Polish Phrasebook for Tourists and Travelers to Poland, all published earlier by Iwo C. Pogonowski. The Phrasebook includes 280 minutes of bilingual audio read by actors. Started preparation for a new edition of Poland: A Historical Atlas. New Appendices are being prepared on such subjects as: Polish contribution to Allied's wartime intelligence: the breaking of the Enigma Codes, Pune Munde rocket production; Poland's contribution to the international law since 1415; Poland's early development of rocket technology such as Polish Rocketry Handbook published in 1650 in which Poles introduced for the first time into the world's literature concepts of multiple warheads, multistage rockets, new controls in rocket flight, etc. Poland's Chronology is being enlarged to reflect the mechanisms of subjugation of Polish people by the Soviet terror apparatus. Continued preparation of the Killing the Best and the Brightest: A Chronology of the USSR-German Attempt to Behead the Polish Nation, including the 1992 revelations from Soviet archives as well as the current research in Poland. Continued preparation of two-volume English Polish Dictionary, a companion to the Unabridged Polish-English Dictionary published in 1997. Reviewed Upiorna Dekada by J. T. Gross.
in 1999 Pogonowski continued writing Poland - An Illustrated History and preparing for it 21 maps and diagrams and 89 illustrations.
in 2000 Pogonowski prepared, in a camera ready form, Poland - An Illustrated History; it was published by Hippocrene Books Inc. NY 2000 and recommended by Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski, National Security Advisor under President Carter, as "An important contribution to the better understanding of Polish history, which demonstrates in a vivid fashion the historical vicissitudes of that major European nation."
In 1939 Britain and France signed a series of military agreements with Poland that contained very specific promises. The leaders of Poland understood very clearly that they had no chance against Germany alone.
The French, in fact, promised the Poles in mid-May 1939 that in the event of German aggression against Poland, France would launch an offensive against the Germans "no later than fifteen days after mobilization". This promise was sealed in a solemn treaty signed between Poland and France.
Unfortunately, when Germany attacked, Poland was almost totally and completely betrayed by its democratic "friends". While Britain and France did declare war, French troops made a brief advance toward the Siegfried Line on Germany's western frontier and immediately stopped upon meeting German resistance.
This is very significant since Hitler had concentrated almost all German military forces in the east, and France had one of the strongest armies in the world. Had France attacked Germany in a serious way as promised, the results could have been very serious, if not disastrous for the Germans.
Instead, Hitler was able to win a complete victory over Poland and then mobilize his forces for a devastating offensive in the west in the next year.
The British and French betrayal of Poland in 1939 was not only dishonest, it was a military stupidity of truly monumental dimensions. Unfortunately, more betrayals would follow. Contrary to their assurances to the Poles Britain and France would agree to allow Russia to keep the parts of Poland seized as part of their deal with Hitler in 1939. They were to be compensated by the ethnic cleansing of all Germans from lands that had been German for over 1000 years creating a humanitarian catastrophe at the end of the war.
A crowning humiliation of the Poles was the refusal of their British "friends" to allow the free Polish army to march in the victory parade at the end of the war for fear of offending a Soviet puppet government in Lublin.
During World War II Poland suffered through one of the worst occupations in history, losing roughly six million of its citizens to mass murder and deportation at the hands of both the Germans and the Russians. Among these were three million Polish Jews, whose society, language, and way of life were almost completely eradicated in the gas chambers of the Nazi death camps.
After the war it had to suffer 45 years as colony of the Soviet Union as result of agreement signed by its "friends" Britain and America.
British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain stated in the House of Commons on March 31, 1939.
"As the House is aware, certain consultations are now proceeding with other Governments. In order to make perfectly clear the position of His Majesty's Government in the meantime before those consultations are concluded, I now have to inform the House that during that period, in the event of any action which clearly threatened Polish independence, and which the Polish Government accordingly considered it vital to resist with their national forces, His Majesty's Government would feel themselves bound at once to lend the Polish Government all support in their power. They have given the Polish Government an assurance to this effect. I may add that the French Government have authorized me to make it plain that they stand in the same position in this matter as do His Majesty's Government."[1]
Having secured a guarantee, the Poles now took steps toward coordinating their defensive preparations with the British. On April 4, 1939, Poland's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Józef Beck, visited London for talks with Prime Minister Chamberlain and Lord Halifax, the Foreign Secretary. The content of these talks was described in an official communiqué sent from London to Warsaw on April 6th:
"The conversations with M. Beck have covered a wide field and shown that the two Governments are in complete agreement upon certain general principles. It was agreed that the two countries were prepared to enter into an agreement of a permanent and reciprocal character to replace the present temporary and unilateral assurance given by His Majesty's Government to the Polish Government. Pending the completion of the permanent agreement, M. Beck gave His Majesty's Government an assurance that the Polish Government would consider themselves under an obligation to render assistance to His Majesty's Government under the same conditions as those contained in the temporary assurance already given by His Majesty's Government to Poland."[2]
Shortly thereafter a formal agreement between Poland and Britain was signed which clearly stated "If Germany attacks Poland His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom will at once come to the help of Poland."[3]
France and Poland
Whereas British support of Poland was a relatively recent diplomatic development, Poland's alliance with the French had a long history. The first French efforts to buttress Poland against Germany went back to 1921. In that year, Raymond Poincaré, soon to become president of the French Republic, had stated "Everything orders us to support Poland: The [Versailles] Treaty, the plebiscite, loyalty, the present and the future interest of France, and the permanence of peace."[4]
To this end France had sealed a mutual assistance pact with Poland on February 21, 1921. According to Article One of this pact France and Poland agreed to "consult each other on all questions of foreign policy which concern both states." Furthermore, Article Three made it clear that "If, notwithstanding the sincerely peaceful views and intentions of the two contracting states, either or both of them should be attacked without giving provocation, the two governments shall take concerted measures for the defense of their territory and the protection of their legitimate interests."[5] This agreement for mutual defense was then augmented on September 15, 1922 by a formal military alliance signed by Marshal Foch and General Sokoski. This agreement stated explicitly "In case of German aggression against either Poland or France, or both, the two nations would aid each other to the fullest extent."[6]
Seventeen years later, Poland and France, facing growing tension with Germany, found it necessary to reaffirm the defensive alliance they had formed in the wake of World War I.[7] In mid-May of 1939, Poland's Minister of War, General Tadeusz Kasprzycki, visited Paris for a series of talks. At issue for Kasprzycki was clarifying the terms under which France would assist Poland militarily. These talks resulted in the Franco-Polish Military Convention which, according to historian Richard Watt, stated that "on the outbreak of war between Germany and Poland, the French would immediately undertake air action against Germany. It was also agreed that on the third day of French mobilization its army would launch a diversionary offensive into German territory, which would be followed by a major military offensive of the full French army to take place no later than fifteen days after mobilization."[8]
MILITARY PREPARATIONS
Polish Expectations, British and French Promises
Understandably, throughout the spring and summer of 1939 officials in Warsaw drew strength from the numerous assurances made by France and Great Britain that Poland would not stand alone if war with Germany was to break out. For its part, the Polish military was under no illusion that it could defend against a German assault for more than a few weeks. Although Poland could field one of the largest armies on the European continent, its troops were only lightly armed in comparison to their German counterparts. In terms of modern weaponry, Poland was also severely lacking in armored vehicles and tanks, and its air force was hopelessly outmatched by the German Luftwaffe. Strategically speaking, Polish generals envisioned fighting the Germans at the frontier and then slowly retreating toward the southeastern corner of the country, where an escape route into neighboring Rumania existed. The Poles thus fully expected the Germans to advance deeply into their country. Their sole hope was that Polish forces could hold on long enough for French troops and British air power to attack Germany's western border and draw off enough German divisions to allow a Polish counterattack.[9] After all, France had promised in May to launch a major offensive within two weeks of any German attack.
Expectations of swift Allied action were also repeatedly reinforced by the British. For example, during Anglo-Polish General Staff talks held in Warsaw at the end of May, the Poles stressed the need for British aerial assaults on Germany should war break out. The British responded with assurances that the Royal Air Force would attack industrial, civilian, and military targets.[10] General Sir Edmund Ironside then repeated this promise during an official visit to Warsaw in July. The Poles could be confident that Britain would carry out bombing raids in Germany once hostilities began.[11]
The Reality: English and French Duplicity
At the same time that Allied politicians and military officers were promising to help Poland fight a war against Nazi Germany, events going on behind the scenes revealed that the British and French seriously doubted their ability to effectively aid the Poles. Take for example discussions held by the British and French Chiefs of Staff between March 31 and April 4, 1939. A report issued at the conclusion of these talks entitled "The Military Implications of an Anglo-French Guarantee of Poland and Rumania" stated
"If Germany undertook a major offensive in the East there is little doubt that she could occupy Rumania, Polish Silesia and the Polish Corridor. If she were to continue the offensive against Poland it would only be a matter of time before Poland was eliminated from the war. Though lack of adequate communications and difficult country would reduce the chances of an early decision. ... No spectacular success against the Siegfried Line can be anticipated, but having regard to the internal situation in Germany, the dispersal of her effort and the strain of her rearmament programme, we should be able to reduce the period of Germany's resistance and we could regard the ultimate issue with confidence."[12]
In short, while the Western Allies anticipated the eventual defeat of Germany they also believed that Germany would crush Poland before turning her forces to the west. This situation did not change substantially in the months leading up to the outbreak of war, despite considerable information that western governments received concerning increasing German military activity. No less credible a source than Robert Coulondre, the French ambassador to Germany, telegraphed numerous warnings to Paris of suspicious German troops movements. For example, on July 13, 1939, Coulondre wrote Georges Bonnet, the French Foreign Minister, that "This Embassy has recently reported to the Ministry numerous signs of abnormal activity in the German army and of Germany's obvious preparations for the possibility of an impending war."[13]
Given what we now know about the months leading up to World War II one cannot help but agree with the conclusion of Polish scholar Anita Prazmowska: "After granting the guarantee to defend Poland, the British (one might add the French -- WFF) failed to develop a concept of an eastern front. ... The result was that the ... guarantee to Poland remained a political bluff devoid of any strategic consequence."[14]
THE FINAL DECEPTIONS: AUGUST 1939
Indeed, Coulondre's warnings were to no avail. By August 1939, with German pressure on Poland increasing daily and a diplomatic solution to the crisis farther away than ever, Allied preparations for war remained minimal at best. Great Britain in particular appeared to be paralyzed by an inability to appreciate the gravity of the situation. Amazingly, the British had developed no coherent plan for offensive operations in the west, either in the air or on land. To make matters worse they also refused requests from Paris to devote air power to support the anticipated French offensive into Germany.[15] And as far as aerial attacks on Germany were concerned, British military planners had actually retreated from their earlier promise to the Poles. By the end of August, thus on the very eve of war, the Chiefs of Staff in London had decided not to attack a wide array of targets in Germany. Rather they would limit aerial bombardment to "military installations and units which were clearly that, to the exclusion of industrial stores and military industrial capacity."[16] Naturally, the Poles were not informed of this alteration in Britain's approach to strategic bombing.
Still the Western Allies continued to put a brave face on their diplomatic efforts to dissuade Germany from going to war with Poland. Considering the relative lack of military preparations, these efforts seem farcical now. For example, on August 15, Robert Coulondre cabled Paris concerning a meeting he'd had with Ernst von Weizsäcker, the State Secretary in the Foreign Ministry in Berlin. During this one-hour conversation Coulondre told von Weizsäcker "if any of the three Allies, France, England, and Poland, were attacked, the other two would automatically be at her side." Furthermore, Coulondre told Paris "To guard as far as possible against this danger [of war] which appears to me formidable and imminent I consider it essential:
(1) To maintain absolute firmness, an entire and unbroken unity of front, as any weakening, or even any semblance of yielding will open the way to war; and to insist every time the opportunity occurs on the automatic operation of military assistance.
(2) To maintain the military forces of the Allies, and in particular our own, on an equality with those of Germany, which are being continuously increased. It is essential that we should at the very least retain the previously existing ratio between our forces and those of the Reich, that we should not give the erroneous impression that we are 'giving ground'."[17]
Again, Coulondre's call for proper military preparations by France would be in vain. Historian Anna Cienciala writes that General Maurice Gamelin, the commander of the French army, "had no intention to implement the French commitments made in the military convention [signed in May 1939]." Incredibly, Gamelin instead took steps to ensure that the Poles would resist the Germans, while not further committing French troops to action. In late August, Gamelin sent General Louis Faury to Warsaw as the head of the French Military Mission there. Prior to departing, Faury "was told that no date could be given [to the Poles] for a French offensive, that the French Army was in no state to attack, and that Poland would have to hold out as best she could. His mission was to see that the Poles would fight. ... [As] General Ironside [had] commented in July, 'the French have lied to the Poles in saying they are going to attack. There is no idea of it'."[18]
The British too had no idea of attacking Germany, although they continued to bluff in the hope that Hitler would back down. The Royal Air Force would not be deployed against German units in support of a French offensive and aerial bombardment in Germany would be limited only to clearly marked military installations (an unworkable proposition, both then and now, even with advanced technology). Yet London continued to issue its own false assurances to Warsaw by signing a formal Agreement of Mutual Assistance between the United Kingdom and Poland on August 25, 1939 that committed Britain to declare war on Germany should she attack Poland.
Finally, in the latter days of August, as war loomed on the horizon and Germany massed more than one million men along the Polish frontier, London and Paris pleaded with Warsaw not to provoke the Germans by fully mobilizing her armed forces. Trusting in their allies, the Poles did as they were asked. Consequently, when the German attack came, the Polish army was only partly mobilized, making it that much easier for the Wehrmacht to split Polish defenses and drive deep behind Polish lines.[19]
CONCLUSION
Thus by September 1, 1939, the pieces were in place for the beginning of a general European war. It would be a war for which Great Britain and France were egregiously unprepared. Meanwhile, Poland would pay in untold lives. France and Great Britain did indeed honor their signatures and declare war on Germany on September 3, 1939. Nevertheless, this proved to be a hollow declaration that provided no help to the Poles. From the evidence presented here is is clear that neither France nor Great Britain had the slightest intention of actually coming to the assistance of their Polish ally.
What transpired is by now well known. The RAF did not even attempt to bomb German military installations because, as the Air Staff concluded on September 20: "Since the immutable aim of the Allies is the ultimate defeat of Germany, without which the fate of Poland is permanently sealed, it would obviously be militarily unsound and to the disadvantage of all, including Poland, to undertake at any given moment operations ... unlikely to achieve effective results, merely for the sake of maintaining a gesture." The Chiefs of Staff agreed, informing 10 Downing Street that "nothing we can do in the air in the Western Theatre would have any effect of relieving pressure on Poland."[20] And so the RAF decided instead to drop propaganda leaflets.
For its part, the French army did launch a diversionary offensive into the Saar region (See the Saar Offensive). German defenses quickly stopped the attack, however, and it was never resumed. In fact, France and Great Britain would never launch an combined offensive during the first year of the war, preferring instead to await the German attack, which came in May 1940 and ended in disastrous defeat for both nations.
The opportunity to fight a brief, localized war against Germany was therefore lost in September 1939. In hindsight, also lost were the opportunities to save millions of lives, to rid the world of Hitler, and to have prevented the creation of conditions that led to the Cold War. As General Ironside commented in 1945, after much of Europe was in ruins, "Militarily we should have gone all out against the German the minute he invaded Poland. ... We did not ... And so we missed the strategical advantage of the Germans being engaged in the East. We thought completely defensively and of ourselves."[21] And so they did.
[1] Statement by Prime Minister Chamberlain in House of Commons, March 31, 1939.
Diplomatic correspondence between Georges Bonnet, France's Minister for Foreign Affairs and Léon Nöel, French Ambassador in Warsaw on March 31, 1939 reveals:
"The British Ambassador informed me on March 30 that a question would be put to the British Government next day in the House of Commons, suggesting that a German attack on Poland was imminent and asking what measures the Government would take in such an eventuality.
With the intention of giving the German Government a necessary warning in the least provocative form, the British Government proposed, with the approval of the French Government, to answer that, although it considered such a rumour to be without foundation, it has given the Polish Government an assurance that if, previous to the conclusion of consultations going on with the other Governments, any action were undertaken which clearly threatened the independence of the Polish Government, and which the latter should find itself obliged to resist with armed force, the British and French Governments would immediately lend it all the assistance in their power.
I replied to the communication from Sir Eric Phipps that the French Government would give its whole-hearted approval to the declaration which the British Government proposed to make." See The French Yellow Book: Diplomatic Papers, 1938-1939.
[2] Anglo-Polish Communiqué, April 6, 1939
[3] The Anglo-Polish agreement was also signed on April 6, 1939. See Anita Prazmowska, Britain, Poland and the Eastern Front, 1939 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), p. 193.
Less than one week later (on April 13, 1939) Edouard Daladier, the French Minister for War and National Defence, issued the following statement to the press:
"The French Government ... derives great satisfaction from the conclusion of the reciprocal undertakings between Great Britain and Poland, who have decided to give each other mutual support in defence of their independence in the event of either being threatened directly or indirectly. The Franco-Polish alliance is, moreover, confirmed in the same spirit by the French Government and the Polish Government. France and Poland guarantee each other immediate and direct aid against any threat direct or indirect, which might aim a blow at their vital interests." Source: The French Yellow Book: Diplomatic Papers, 1938-1939.
[4] Richard Watt, Bitter Glory: Poland and its Fate, 1919-1939 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1979), p. 176.
[5] Ruth H. Bauer, "Franco-Polish Relations, 1919-1939" (M.A. Thesis: Georgetown University, 1948), p. 30.
[6] Bauer, "Franco-Polish Relations," p. 32.
[7] Tensions between Germany and Poland arose over the status of the German city of Danzig, which was an independent League of Nations protectorate within northern Poland. Hitler demanded access to Danzig, which had a majority German population, via an extraterritorial highway and rail line from Germany through the Polish Corridor and to East Prussia. Hitler also raged against Poland on the basis of reports that atrocities were being perpetrated by the Poles against the large German minority in the country. This was a tactical maneuver on Hitler's part. Similar claims against the Czechs concerning the German minority in the Sudetenland had won Hitler a significant diplomatic victory at Munich the year before. Although Hitler claimed only to want the status of Danzig settled satisfactorily and the good treatment of Germans in Poland guaranteed, his motives were actually farther reaching. As Hitler made clear on August 11, 1939, during a discussion with Carl Burckhardt at Berchtesgaden (see Carl J. Burckhardt's Meeting with Hitler), his actions were ultimately directed against Soviet Russia and not Poland. Since the Poles had repeatedly rebuffed German invitations to sign the Anti-Comintern Pact, Hitler needed a route by which to reliably transport troops and material to East Prussia, in order to carry out his offensive designs against the USSR. The extraterritorial highway and rail line would have provided this route. Polish refusal to grant Germany this concession thus made war inevitable considering Hitler's broader plans for German expansion to the east (see General Plan East: The Nazi Revolution in German Foreign Policy).
[8] Watt, Bitter Glory, p. 402.
[9] Watt, Bitter Glory, p. 401.
[10] Prazmowska, Britain, Poland and the Eastern Front, pp. 94-95.
[11] Watt, Bitter Glory, p. 408.
[12] Prazmowska, Britain, Poland and the Eastern Front, p. 81.
[13] Coulondre to Bonnet, July 13, 1939
[14] Prazmowska, Britain, Poland and the Eastern Front, p. 105.
[15] Prazmowska, Britain, Poland and the Eastern Front, pp. 182-183.
[16] Prazmowska, Britain, Poland and the Eastern Front, p. 102.
[17] Coulondre to Bonnet, August 15, 1939
[18] Anna M. Cienciala, Poland and the Western Powers, 1938-1939 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1968), p. 245.
[19] Cienciala, Poland and the Western Powers, p. 248.
[20] Prazmowska, Britain, Poland and the Eastern Front, pp. 183-184.
[21] Cienciala, Poland and the Western Powers, p. 249.
Patrick J. Buchanan The Betrayal of Poland 1939-1945
With Poland’s membership in NATO at issue, a question has arisen as to whether America owes a debt to the Polish people for Franklin D. Roosevelt’s having “betrayed” the Polish nation to Joseph Stalin at Yalta.
Undersecretary of State Stuart Eizenstat has lately raised the issue of a moral debt to Poland for the 1945 summit where FDR accepted Stalin’s assurances of free elections. Eizenstat was taken to task by columnist Lars-Erik Nelson for repeating a “50-year-old right-wing slander.” Robert Novak defended the “betrayed” thesis.
Nelson’s point: By 1945 Stalin had 12 million troops in Eastern Europe, and Dwight Eisenhower only 4 million in the West. Conservatives who condemn FDR for Poland’s fate, says Nelson, are joining the “Blame America First” crowd. We couldn’t save Poland!
But, in truth, Yalta was only the final betrayal of Poland, and not only FDR but Winston Churchill bears moral responsibility for a half-century of communist enslavement of the Polish people.
The first betrayal came with the British guarantee to Poland, after Neville Chamberlain was exposed as a dupe when Adolf Hitler tore up his Munich pact and marched into Prague. As Hitler pressed Poland for the return of Danzig, stripped from Germany after World War I, and demanded rail and road transit to the city across a “Polish Corridor” also taken from Germany, Warsaw, encouraged by British Foreign Secretary Lord Halifax, refused even to negotiate. The Poles were assured that if war came, Britain would be at their side.
But when Hitler invaded Poland from the west and Stalin invaded from the east, Britain declared war on Germany alone. Then, the British sat behind the Maginot Line while Poland was crucified. The British had goaded the Poles into standing up to Hitler though they had no plans to save or rescue Poland. Six million Poles would die as a result of having trusted in a British alliance.
The second betrayal occurred at Teheran in 1943, when FDR moved into the Soviet embassy compound and assured Stalin he would not object to his keeping the half of Poland and the Baltic states Hitler had ceded to Stalin in their infamous pact. As Robert Nisbet wrote in “Roosevelt and Stalin: The Failed Courtship,” FDR asked only that word of his concession not leak out before the 1944 elections, so Polish Americans would not react in rage. FDR told one visitor to Hyde Park he was “sick and tired” of East Europeans and their constant clamoring about boundaries and sovereignties.
The third betrayal occurred in the summer of ‘44. The Polish Home Army in German-occupied Warsaw, heeding appeals from Radio Moscow, rose up against the Nazis. As the Home Army was loyal to the free Polish government in London, which was demanding an investigation of Stalin’s murder of Polish officers at Katyn, Stalin halted his own Red Army outside Warsaw to give the Nazis a free hand in crushing the Polish uprising.
British and Americans sought to aid the Poles with air drops of food and munitions. But Stalin refused to let the allies use air fields behind his lines to refuel for the return flight to England. Churchill drafted a strong letter to Stalin, asking that the allies be allowed to use the air fields assigned them, but to appease Stalin, FDR cravenly refused to sign the letter. The Home Army was butchered.
By February 1945, Poland had been overrun by a Red Army that could not be dislodged short of a new war. Yalta, writes Nisbet, “is not the source of the Soviet possessions in Eastern Europe … Teheran is. But Yalta performed a service that was almost as important to Stalin. … This was the invaluable service of giving moral legitimation to what Stalin had acquired by sheer force.”
Britain had gone to war and lost 400,000 men and an empire for Poland’s independence. Yet, as Poland receded into the darkness, not once did Churchill vent upon Stalin the oratory he used so often on Hitler. The rape of Poland by Hitler and Stalin was the moral cause that precipitated the war. Yet, Churchill and FDR, to appease Stalin, meekly acquiesced in the betrayal of that moral cause.
“Of one thing I am sure,” FDR said at Yalta, “Stalin is not an imperialist.” How explain his naivete about Stalin, to whom he gave everything, including a third of the Italian fleet and recognition of his puppet government in Poland? “Puerility,” writes George F. Kennan. FDR once told his friend, ambassador William Bullitt: “I think if I give him (Stalin) everything I possibly can, and ask nothing from him in return, noblesse oblige, he won’t try to annex anything and will work with me for a world of peace and democracy.”
Polish Army World War II BETRAYAL OF POLAND IN 1939
"Polish Soldier fights for the freedom of other nations but dies only for Poland." - Gen.Stanislaw Maczek
Invasion: On September 1st., 1939, 1.8 million German troops invaded Poland on three fronts; East Prussia in the north, Germany in the west and Slovakia in the south. They had 2600 tanks against the Polish 180, and over 2000 aircraft against the Polish 420. Their "Blitzkrieg" tactics, coupled with their bombing of defenceless towns and refugees, had never been seen before and, at first, caught the Poles off-guard. By September 14th. Warsaw was surrounded. At this stage the poles reacted, holding off the Germans at Kutno and regrouping behind the Wisla (Vistula) and Bzura rivers. Although Britain and France declared war on September 3rd. the Poles received no help - yet it had been agreed that the Poles should fight a defensive campaign for only 2 weeks during which time the Allies could get their forces together and attack from the west.
There are many "myths" that surround the September Campaign; the fictional Polish cavalry charges against German tanks (actually reported by the Italian press and used as propaganda by the Germans), the alleged destruction of the Polish Air Force on the ground, or claims that Polish armour failed to achieve any success against the invaders. In reality, and despite the fact that Poland was only just beginning to modernise her armed forces and had been forced (by Britain and France) to delay mobilisation (which they claimed might be interpreted as aggressive behaviour) so that, at the time of invasion, only about one-third of her total potential manpower was mobilised, Polish forces ensured that the September campaign was no "walk-over". The Wehrmacht had so under-rated Polish anti-tank capabilities (the Polish-designed anti-tank gun was one of the best in the world at that time) that they had gone into action with white "balkankreuz", or crosses, prominently displayed in eight locations; these crosses made excellent aiming points for Polish gun-sights and forced the Germans to radically rethink their national insignia, initially overpainting them in yellow and then, for their later campaigns, adopting the modified "balkankreuz" similar to that used by the Luftwaffe. The recently-designed 7TP "czolg lekki", or light tank, the first in the world to be designed with a diesel engine, proved to be superior to German tanks of the same class (the PzKpfw I and II) inflicting serious damage to the German forces, limited only by the fact that they were not used in concentrated groups. They were absorbed by the Germans into their own Panzer divisions at the end of the campaign.
On September 17th. Soviet forces invaded from the east. Warsaw surrendered 2 weeks later, the garrison on the Hel peninsula surrendered on October 2nd., and the Polesie Defence group, after fighting on two fronts against both German and Soviet forces, surrendered on October 5th. The Poles had held on for twice as long as had been expected and had done more damage to the Germans than the combined British and French forces were to do in 1940. The Germans lost 50,000 men, 697 planes and 993 tanks and armoured cars.
Thousands of soldiers and civilians managed to escape to France and Britain whilst many more went "underground" . A government-in-exile was formed with Wladyslaw Raczkiewicz as President and General Wladyslaw Sikorski as Prime Minister.
The Fourth Partition: Under the German-Soviet pact Poland was divided; the Soviets took, and absorbed into the Soviet Union, the eastern half (Byelorussia and the West Ukraine), the Germans incorporated Pomerania, Posnania and Silesia into the Reich whilst the rest was designated as the General-Gouvernement (a colony ruled from Krakow by Hitler's friend, Hans Frank).
In the Soviet zone 1.5 million Poles (including women and children) were transported to labour camps in Siberia and other areas. Many thousands of captured Polish officers were shot at several secret forest sites; the first to be discovered being Katyn, near Smolensk.
The Germans declared their intention of eliminating the Polish race (a task to be completed by 1975) alongside the Jews. This process of elimination, the "Holocaust", was carried out systematically. All members of the "intelligentsia" were hunted down in order to destroy Polish culture and leadership (many were originally exterminated at Oswiencim - better known by its German name, Auschwitz). Secret universities and schools, a "Cultural Underground", were formed (the penalty for belonging to one was death). In the General-Gouvernement there were about 100,000 secondary school pupils and over 10,000 university students involved in secret education.
The Polish Jews were herded into Ghettos where they were slowly starved and cruelly offered hopes of survival but, in fact, ended up being shot or gassed. In the end they were transported, alongside non-Jewish Poles, Gypsies and Soviet POWs, to extermination camps such as Auschwitz and Treblinka; at Auschwitz over 4 million were exterminated. 2000 concentration camps were built in Poland, which became the major site of the extermination programme, since this was where most of the intended victims lived.
Many non-Jewish Poles were either transported to Germany and used as slave labour or simply executed. In the cities the Germans would round-up and kill indiscriminately as a punishment for any underground or anti-German or pro-Jewish activity. In the countryside they kept prominent citizens as hostages who would be executed if necessary. Sometimes they liquidated whole villages; at least 300 villages were destroyed. Hans Frank said, "If I wanted to put up a poster for every seven Poles shot, the forests of Poland would not suffice to produce the paper for such posters."
Despite such horror the Poles refused to give in or cooperate (there were no Polish collaborators as in other occupied countries). The Polish Underground or AK (Armia Krajowa or Home Army) was the largest in Europe with 400,000 men. The Jewish resistance movement was set up separately because of the problem of being imprisoned within the ghettos. Both these organisations caused great damage to the Nazi military machine. Many non-Jewish Poles saved the lives of thousands of Jews despite the fact that the penalty, if caught, was death (in fact, Poland was the only occupied nation where aiding Jews was punishable by death).
Fighting on all Fronts: The Polish Army, Navy and Air Force reorganised abroad and continued to fight the Germans. In fact they have the distinction of being the only nation to fight on every front in the War. In 1940 they fought in France, in the Norwegian campaign they earned a reputation for bravery at Narvik, and in Africa the Carpathian Brigade fought at Tobruk.
Polish Squadrons played an important role in the Battle of Britain, accounting for 12% of all German aircraft destroyed at the cost of 33 lives. By the end of the war they had flown a total of 86,527 sorties, lost 1669 men and shot down 500 German planes and 190 V1 rockets.
The Polish Navy, which had escaped intact, consisted of 60 vessels, including 2 cruisers, 9 destroyers and 5 submarines ( one of which was the famous "Orzel") which were involved in 665 actions at sea. The first German ship sunk in the war was sunk by Polish ships. The Navy also took part in the D-Day landings.
When the Soviet Union was attacked by Germany, in June 1941, Polish POWs were released from prison camps and set up an army headed by General Anders. Many civilians were taken under the protection of this army which was allowed to make its way to Persia (modern-day Iran) and then on to Egypt. This army, the Polish Second Corps, fought with distinction in Italy, their most notable victory being that at Monte Cassino, in May 1944, and which opened up the road to Rome for the Allies as a whole. One of the "heroes" of the Polish Second Corps was Wojtek, a brown bear adopted in Iran as their mascot; at Monte Cassino Wojtek actually helped in the fighting by carrying ammunition for the guns. He died, famous and well-loved, in Edinburgh Zoo in 1964, aged 22.
All the Polish forces took part in the Allied invasion of Europe and liberation of France, playing a particularly crucial role in the significant Battle of the Falaise Gap. The Polish Parachute Brigade took part in the disastrous Battle of Arnhem in Holland. In 1945, the Poles captured the German port of Wilhelmshaven.
In 1943 a division of Polish soldiers was formed in Russia under Soviet control and fought on the Eastern Front. They fought loyally alongside the Soviet troops, despite the suffering they had experienced in Soviet hands, and they distinguished themselves in breaking through the last German lines of defence, the "Pomeranian Rampart", in the fighting in Saxony and in the capture of Berlin.
The "Home Army", under the command of General Stefan Roweki (code-named "Grot"), and after his capture in 1943 (he was later murdered), by General Tadeusz Komorowski (code-named "Bor"), fought a very varied war; at times in open combat in brigade or division strength, at times involved in sabotage, often acting as execution squads eliminating German officials, and often fighting a psychological campaign against German military and civilians. It was a costly war since the Germans always took reprisals.
The Intelligence Service of the Home Army captured and sent parts of the V1 to London for examination, providing information on German military movements (giving advanced warning of the German plan to invade Russia), and gave the RAF full information about Peenemunde, where the Germans were producing V2 rockets.
Betrayal: The crime of Katyn was discovered in 1943 and created a rift in Polish-Soviet relations. From now on the Home Army was attacked by Soviet propaganda as collaborating with the Germans and being called on to rise against the Germans once the Red Army reached the outskirts of Warsaw.
Secretly, at Teheran, the British and Americans agreed to letting the Russians profit from their invasion of Poland in 1939 and allowing them to keep the lands that had been absorbed. The "accidental" death of General Sikorski at this time helped keep protests at a minimum.
When the Russians crossed into Poland the Home Army cooperated in the fight against the Germans and contributed greatly to the victories at Lwow, Wilno and Lublin only to find themselves surrounded and disarmed by their "comrades-in-arms" and deported to labour camps in Siberia.
On August 1, 1944, with the Russian forces on the right bank of the Vistula, the Home Army rose in Warsaw; the Warsaw Rising. Heroic street-fighting involving the whole population, using the sewers as lines of communication and escape, under heavy bombardment, lasted for 63 days. The city was completely destroyed. Not only did the Russians cease to advance but they also refused to allow Allied planes to land on Russian airfields after dropping supplies. After surrendering many civilians and soldiers were executed or sent to concentration camps to be exterminated and Warsaw was razed to the ground.
The defeat in Warsaw destroyed the political and military institutions of the Polish underground and left the way open for a Soviet take-over.
With the liberation of Lublin in July 1944 a Russian-sponsored Polish Committee for National Liberation (a Communist Government in all but name) had been set up and the British had put great pressure, mostly unsuccessful, on the Government-in-exile to accept this status quo. At Yalta, in February 1945, the Allies put Poland within the Russian zone of influence in a post-war Europe. To most Poles the meaning of these two events was perfectly clear; Poland had been betrayed. At one stage the Polish Army, still fighting in Italy and Germany, was prepared to withdraw from the front lines in protest; after all, they were supposed to be fighting for Polish liberation. It is a reflection on Polish honour that no such withdrawal took place since it could leave large gaps in the front lines and so was considered too dangerous for their Allied comrades-in-arms.
The war ended on May 8th, 1945.
The Cost: The Poles are the people who really lost the war.
Over half a million fighting men and women, and 6 million civilians (or 22% of the total population) died. About 50% of these were Polish Christians and 50% were Polish Jews. Approximately 5,384,000, or 89.9% of Polish war losses (Jews and Gentiles) were the victims of prisons, death camps, raids, executions, annihilation of ghettos, epidemics, starvation, excessive work and ill treatment. So many Poles were sent to concentration camps that virtually every family had someone close to them who had been tortured or murdered there.
There were one million war orphans and over half a million invalids.
The country lost 38% of its national assets (Britain lost 0.8%, France lost 1.5%). Half the country was swallowed up by the Soviet Union including the two great cultural centres of Lwow and Wilno.
Many Poles could not return to the country for which they has fought because they belonged to the "wrong" political group or came from eastern Poland and had thus become Soviet citizens. Others were arrested, tortured and imprisoned by the Soviet authorities for belonging to the Home Army.
Although "victors" they were not allowed to partake in victory celebrations.
Through fighting "For Our Freedom and Yours" they had exchanged one master
Prof. Jerzy Robert Nowak Pytania do Władysława Bartoszewskiego
O tzw. "prof." Bartoszewskim
Pytania do Władysława Bartoszewskiego Prof. Jerzy Robert Nowak
Władysław Bartoszewski niedawno został określony przez przywódcę Platformy Obywatelskiej Donalda Tuska jako "najlepszy polski życiorys" i jako "najlepsza polska biografia". Tenże pan Tusk już jako premier RP powołał Bartoszewskiego na sekretarza stanu do spraw zagranicznych w kancelarii premiera. W ostatnim czasie nadeszła również wiadomość, że Senat KUL postanowił akurat teraz uhonorować Władysława Bartoszewskiego doktoratem honoris causa, nie bacząc na bezprzykładną serię wyzwisk i obelg, jakimi popisał się pan Bartoszewski w ostatniej kampanii wyborczej. W związku z tymi wszystkimi przedziwnymi uhonorowaniami człowieka, który dawno przestał spełniać wymogi stawiane przed ludźmi o prawdziwym autorytecie, pozwolę sobie wystosować do niego następujących 30 pytań:
- Dlaczego zgodził się Pan na uroczyste wręczenie Panu medalu ku czci największego niemieckiego polakożercy lat dwudziestych Gustawa Stresemanna?
- Dlaczego w 2006 r. jako sekretarz kapituły Orderu Orła Białego sprzeciwił się Pan przyznaniu Orderu Orła Białego (pośmiertnie) generałowi Augustowi E. Fieldorfowi i rotmistrzowi Witoldowi Pileckiemu? Czy można w ogóle porównać Pana zasługi jako kawalera Orła Białego z zasługami dwóch wspomnianych bohaterów?
- Dlaczego, będąc oficjalnym gościem Izraela jako polski minister spraw zagranicznych, milczał Pan jak grób w parlamencie izraelskim w czasie, gdy obrażano Pana kraj, gdy Polaków publicznie nazywano współwinnymi wraz z Niemcami zagłady Żydów (robił to m.in. wiceprzewodniczący parlamentu R. Rivlin)?
- Jeśli nie miał Pan odwagi na publiczną polemikę z antypolskimi oszczerstwami, dlaczego nie wyszedł Pan z sali, jak doradzała Panu większość polskiej delegacji?
- Dlaczego kłamał Pan (w 2000 r.), że Polaków zaatakował w Knesecie tylko "głupi ekstremista"?
- Dlaczego używa Pan bezprawnie tytułu profesora w sytuacji, gdy jest Pan tylko maturzystą, absolwentem gimnazjum? Jak wiadomo, obowiązują twarde reguły: aby zostać profesorem, trzeba mieć magisterium, doktorat i habilitację, a żadnej z tego typu prac Pan nie obronił, nie mówiąc o skończeniu studiów.
- Dlaczego nie zdobył się Pan na publiczne wystąpienie w obronie pamięci słynnej pisarki Zofii Kossak, której Pan tyle zawdzięcza, jak Pan sam wielokrotnie przyznawał?
- Dlaczego zgodził się Pan na zamieszczenie w książce - wywiadzie z Panem - cytatu z kłamliwym twierdzeniem Stefana Niesiołowskiego, że jakoby: "Zapisał (Pan) piękną kartę walki o Polskę z bronią w ręku". W jakim to było oddziale? Przy jakiej ulicy? Jakich ma Pan świadków tej rzekomej walki?
- Dlaczego tak mocno, a kłamliwie, przesadza Pan z eksponowaniem swej roli jako rzekomo jednej z głównych postaci organizujących pomoc dla Żydów w ramach Żegoty w 1942 roku? Miał Pan wtedy tylko 20 lat i był podwładnym faktycznej wielkiej organizatorki pomocy Żydom Zofii Kossak.
- Dlaczego nie zareagował Pan na poturbowanie polskich, katolickich wiernych przez moskiewską milicję?
- Dlaczego nie zrobił Pan nic, aby zaprotestować przeciwko brutalnej obławie policyjnej na 300 Polaków we Frankfurcie nad Odrą, potępionej nawet przez 7 niemieckich posłów?
- Kto upoważnił Pana jako ministra do przepraszania Niemców cytatem z Jana Józefa Lipskiego za przesiedlenie?
- Na jakiej podstawie zaniżył Pan o milion osób - wbrew sprawdzonym naukowo statystykom - liczbę Polaków, ofiar wojny, w swym wystąpieniu w Bundestagu?
- Dlaczego Pan, w latach 60. tak zdecydowanie reagujący na początki fali antypolonizmu, milczy w tej sprawie, gdy fala antypolonizmu jest wielokrotnie większa?
- Dlaczego piętnował Pan w Izraelu antyżydowskich "polskich ciemniaków", a nie wypowiada się Pan na temat skrajnych przejawów żydowskiego antypolonizmu? Dlaczego nie reaguje Pan na coraz silniejszą falę antypolonizmu w niemieckich mediach?
- Dlaczego Pan, były żołnierz AK i Powstania Warszawskiego, nie zareagował na potworne oszczerstwa rzucane na powstanie w artykule Cichego i na AK w tekście Yaffy Eliach?
- Dlaczego nic Pan nie zrobił w celu wystąpienia na arenie międzynarodowej przeciw używaniu oszczerczego nazewnictwa: "polskie obozy zagłady" i "polskie obozy koncentracyjne"? (Zrobił to dopiero kilka lat po Panu minister Adam Daniel Rotfeld).
- Co skusiło Pana, jako 83-letniego staruszka niemającego zielonego pojęcia o lotnictwie, do przyjęcia swoistej synekury, posady prezesa Rady Nadzorczej LOT, znajdującego się skądinąd w bardzo trudnej sytuacji finansowej? Czy w czasie Pana zarządu LOT-em może się Pan pochwalić choć jednym, jedynym posunięciem, które przyczyniło się do poprawy sytuacji finansowej firmy?
- Czy w czasie Pana pierwszego szefowania resortem spraw zagranicznych zrobił Pan w ogóle choć jedną konkretną rzecz dla obrony polskich interesów narodowych w polityce zagranicznej, czy wystarczyło Panu bierne reagowanie na wszelkie przypadki brutalnego dyskryminowania Polaków?
- Dlaczego Pan po tylekroć kłamliwie wychwalał kanclerza Helmuda Kohla znanego z niechęci do Polaków i do uznania granicy na Odrze i Nysie?
- Dlaczego Pan - antykomunista - zgodził się być ministrem w postkomunistycznym rządzie Józefa Oleksego?
- Dlaczego nie zdobył się Pan na publiczne wystąpienie w obronie pamięci słynnej pisarki Zofii Kossak, swojej byłej przełożonej?
- Dlaczego nie zdobył się Pan - "autorytet" w Niemczech i Izraelu - na publiczne potępienie antypolskich oszczerstw najgorszego polakożercy i katolikożercy Jana Tomasza Grossa?
- Czy nie wstydzi się Pan swej decyzji odwołania z funkcji polskiego konsula honorowego wielkiego Polaka Jana Kobylańskiego, tylko dlatego że zaangażował się on w obronę prezesa Kongresu Polonii Amerykańskiej Edwarda Moskala?
- Czy nie wstydzi się Pan, że na stare lata dał się Pan wciągnąć w niegodną Pana siwych włosów kampanię obelg w stylu "dewianci" i "bydło"?
- Czy popierał Pan awansowanie swego syna na pełnomocnika rządu ds. bezpieczeństwa energetycznego w randze ministra w rządzie Marcinkiewicza? Kto pierwszy zachęcił premiera Marcinkiewicza do rozważenia kandydatury Pana syna - pracującego przez wiele lat jako historyk w żydowskim instytucie w Oxfordzie - na to stanowisko, twierdząc, że Pana syn jakoby "od wielu, wielu lat zajmuje się energetyką"?
- Dlaczego dziwnie nie mówi Pan w swoich wywiadach o tym, że Pana syn pracował przez wiele lat w żydowskim instytucie w Oxfordzie i w polsko-żydowskim roczniku "Polin"? Przecież chyba nie było nic wstydliwego w jego pracy?
- Dlaczego Pan nie wpłynął na swego syna, by w 1989 r. nie wydawał jako "Editor" polakożerczej książki Samuela Willenberga "Surviving Treblinka", w której znalazły się m.in. oszczercze twierdzenia, że AK-owcy, uczestnicy Powstania Warszawskiego, mordowali Żydów i gwałcili Żydówki?
- Dlaczego w ostatnich kilkunastu latach milczał Pan, nie protestując publicznie w sprawie oskarżeń przeciw Polakom (m.in. w tak bliskim Panu "Tygodniku Powszechnym"), że radośnie bawili się na karuzeli w pobliżu ruin płonącego warszawskiego getta? Przecież jeszcze w 1985 r. prostował Pan to kłamstwo na łamach paryskich "Zeszytów Historycznych"?
- Dlaczego kłamie Pan w wywiadzie-rzece udzielonym Michałowi Komarowi, jakoby złożył Pan rezygnację po objęciu na KUL funkcji dziekana przez prof. Ryszarda Bendera? W rzeczywistości był Pan podwładnym w jego katedrze aż 11 lat, w tym kilka lat w czasie, gdy był on dziekanem. Jerzy Robert Nowak, historyk (profesor wyższej uczelni) i publicysta, autor ponad 40 książek i około 1500 publikacji prasowych (w tym około 900 artykułów). Jako świetny znawca problematyki węgierskiej (należy do nielicznych cudzoziemców mianowanych za zasługi dla kultury węgierskiej nadzwyczajnym członkiem Węgierskiego Związku Pisarzy) zrobił ogromnie wiele dla upowszechnienia wiedzy o naddunajskich „bratankach". Już w 1966 roku - w wieku 26 lat - opublikował na Uniwersytecie Warszawskim książkę o najnowszej literaturze węgierskiej, która zgodnie została uznana przez węgierskich krytyków krajowych i emigracyjnych za pracę „pionierską". Później wydał m.in. książkę o dziejach stosunków polsko-węgierskich „Węgry bliskie i nieznane", „Węgry 1939-1973", książkę o Powstaniu Węgierskim, „Historię literatury węgierskiej XX wieku", dwa wybory węgierskiego eseju, wybór poezji największego węgierskiego poety XX w. - Endre Adyego, wybór „Pamiętników" ks. F. Rakoczego. Opublikował również książkę o najnowszej historii Hiszpanii, szybko rozchwytany mimo 50 tys. nakładu wybór myśli C. Norwida „Gorzki to chleb jest polskość" i wybór pism gen. J. Prądzyńskiego. W 1975 r. „czujnie" partyjni recenzenci zablokowali wydanie w PWN 600-stronicowej książki J.R. Nowaka o historii węgierskiego stalinizmu. PRL-owska cenzura zablokowała również parę dziesiątków artykułów J.R. Nowaka (m.in. w „Polityce", „Twórczości", „Przeglądzie Technicznym", „Studiach Filozoficznych" i w „Radarze") z powodu wyrażanych w nich dążeń do poszukiwania prawdy o kulisach najnowszej historii lub sugestii proreformatorskich. W latach 70. 80. J.R. Nowak niejednokrotnie występował przeciwko przejawom antypolonizmu na Węgrzech (głównie ze strony niektórych żydowskich środowisk komunistycznych). Ostro zderzał się m.in. z kierownikiem działu kulturalnego organu KC WSPR - P.E. Feherem. W 1986 r. J.R. Nowak opublikował w prasie polskiej i węgierskiej kilka artykułów krytykujących jadowicie antypolską powieść Gy Spiró „Iksowie". Z zemsty na Węgrzech zablokowano wydanie dokonanego przez J.R. Nowaka wyboru polskiego eseju, mimo trzech entuzjastycznych recenzji wewnętrznych. Po 1989 roku prof. J.R. Nowak odegrał większą niż ktokolwiek inny w Polsce rolę w ukazywaniu zagrożeń antypolonizmu i przełamywania tabu wokół problematyki żydowskiej (kilka książek, bardzo obszerne teksty do „Encyklopedii Białych Plam" i ponad 200 artykułów). Szczególnie duże zainteresowanie wzbudziły dwa kolejne cykle publicystyczne o stosunkach polsko-żydowskich: „Przemilczane świadectwa" (47 artykułów na łamach „słowa - Dziennika Katolickiego") i 30 dwukolumnowych artykułów „Za co Żydzi muszą przeprosić Polaków" w „Naszej Polsce". W 1999 r. ukazała się jego pionierska książka „Przemilczane zbrodnie", przerywająca długotrwałe milczenie o zbrodniach popełnionych przez zbolszewizowanych Żydów na ich polskich sąsiadach. W 2001 r. prawdziwym bestsellerem stała się jego książka „100 kłamstw J.T. Grossa". W 2003 r. Polonia amerykańska wydała angielski przekład tomiku „Kogo muszą przeprosić Żydzi". Nader cennym źródłem wiedzy o obrazie Polski i Polaków w świecie stały się dwa kolejne wydania książki J.R. Nowaka „Myśli o Polsce i Polakach". Jego dwutomowe „Zagrożenia dla Polski i polskości" stały się prawdziwym bestsellerem 1998 r., podobnie jak wydany rok później „Czarny leksykon" (demaskatorski obraz ludzi z polskich pseudoelit). Wielkim zainteresowaniem cieszyły się również jego książki: „Kościół a Rewolucja Francuska" (wydana w 2003 r. w Czechach), „Walka z Kościołem wczoraj i dziś", „Spory o historię i współczesność" (ponad 650-stronicowy wybór dorobku publicystycznego) i „Czarna legenda dziejów Polski", demaskująca rozliczne dzisiejsze próby zafałszowywania polskiej historii. W latach 2001-2002 ukazały się 2 tomy wyboru kazań ks. prałata H. Jankowskiego - „Ks. Jankowski na przekór kłamstwom" w wyborze J.R. Nowaka i z jego obszernymi wstępami.
Od 2000 r. w wydawnictwie MaRoN, w serii "Biblioteka książek niepoprawnych politycznie" ukazało się ponad 20 tomików J.R. Nowaka. W 2001 roku wyszła jego obszerna książka "100 kłamstw Grossa o żydowskich sąsiadach i Jedwabnem". Prof. J.R. Nowak robi szczególnie wiele dla budowania mostów między Krajem a Polonią. Na zaproszenie Prezesa KPA Edwarda Moskala wygłosił referat o antypolonizmie na posiedzeniu Rady Dyrektorów KPA. Miał blisko 300 audycji w polonijnych radiostacjach USA i Kanady. Od dłuższego czasu bierze stały udział (dwa razy w tygodniu) w programach Wojciecha Wierzewskiego w polonijnym radiu w Chicago (uważany jest za najlepszego komentatora z Polski). W prasie polonijnej (głównie w Stanach i Kanadzie, ale także i w Ameryce Południowej, Australii i Francji) przedrukowano paręset artykułów J.R. Nowaka. Konsekwentna obrona polskości prowadzona przez prof. J.R. Nowaka naraziła go za to na różne ataki i szkalowanie w kraju (na łamach „Gazety Wyborczej", „Wprost", „Tygodnika Powszechnego", „Midrasz", etc.). Ciągle próbuje się blokować dotarcie do jego książek na terenie całego kraju. W 2002 r. doszło do wystąpienia przeciwko 3 książkom prof. J.R. Nowaka ze strony prokuratury w Tychach. Sprawa zakończyła się fiaskiem po wielkiej serii wystąpień w obronie książek prof. J.R. Nowaka ze strony o. Tadeusza Rydzyka, prezesa KPA Edwarda Moskala i licznych innych działaczy polonijnych, kilku interpelacji poselskich, kilkudziesięciu profesorów i in. Niepowodzeniem zakończyła się również podjęta w 2003 r. próba zaskarżenia broniącej prawdy o Polsce książki „100 kłamstw J.T. Grossa" w prokuraturze warszawskiej. Od 2000 r. prof. J.R. Nowak przygotowuje stały obszerny cotygodniowy przegląd prasy „Pro i contra" w najpopularniejszym tygodniku katolickim „Niedzieli". Publikowane tam teksty J.R. Nowaka zyskały m.in. podziękowania ks. arcybiskupa Józefa Michalika i przeora (obecnie generała) zakonu paulinów Izydora Matuszewskiego.
