Quick Question: Was Britain the only country at war with Germany in 1940?
- Thread starter Darth_Pugwash
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Kamilian
Deity
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- Oct 5, 2002
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Hmm, well, I agree, Britain and France were most decidedly not against revision of the Eastern European borders. The Locarno Pact with pre-Nazi (Weimar) Germany proves it - Germany's western borders were confirmed as absolute while her eastern borders were not assured as permanent, which was nothing if not a promise to change Poland and Czechoslovakia's borders in favor of Germany. And appeasement was indeed the foreign policy towards Germany in the mid-to-late-1930s, but while a desire to goad Germany into war with the Soviets may have been existent in that appeasement, a major reason for it was to simply avoid war. Revisions of the Versailles Treaty, in the form of the Dawes and Young Plans regarding reparations; Locarno, which ended Germany's exile from participation in the foreign affairs of Europe) had already been made even before Hitler, and the Rhineland, parts of which were supposed to be patrolled by French, American, and British forces, was being evacuated step-by-step - Americans gave France their sector in 1923; the British left 2 years later; the French left their area in 1930. It was a desire to prevent war, and also unwillingness to use resources and troops in these areas, that contributed to appeasement.
But otherwise, I would agree, then, that there was intense anti-communist feeling in Europe's governments.
Yes! Totally agree with you there!
No apologies necessary, I probably had,have, will have a similar tone as well. On a related side-note, is it just me, or is the Polish-Russian conflicts/arguments as old as time itself and neverending? lol
Hmm, but I would kind of disagree with you in the second paragraph you make. The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was very tolerant towards other religions - yes, the Catholics did try to impose themselves here and there, but then again did not the Orthodox in Russia do the same at least occasionally? During the Inquisitions, Jews often fled to Poland; during the Reformation, there was relatively little sectarian violence in Poland-Lithuania, and various Protestant beliefs took hold among segments of the aristocracy. But yes, in those days of the Commonwealth, often "being Polish" was more a social rank than an ethnicity, resulting from many Lithuanian nobles' assimilation with the Polish language and culture. Though the Chmielnicki (Khmelnytsky) Uprising was contributed to partially by the Ukrainian Cossacks' being Orthodox rather than Catholic and very much by tensions between the Catholic nobility and largely-Orthodox peasantry.
However, if by Catholic Poland you mean the Second Republic (inter-war 1918-1939), I would be more inclined to agree with you. Inter-war Poland was indeed affected very much by nationalism, especially after Pilsudski's death, and the Byelorussian, Ukrainian, and Jewish minorities living in the Kresy Wschodnie (Eastern Frontiers) were sidelined very often.
And it's quite interesting you bring religion into the argument of the Byelorussian and Ukrainian desire to join Russia, especially since the Soviet Union was oficially atheist and missed few opportunities to repress and discredit organized religions.
Right - my bad. It was the army command that ordered the troops not to battle the Soviets, and I read why the generals ordered this but can't recall the reason for their command at the moment.
Well, yes, the Polish government refused to allow Soviet right-of-passage through Poland. Why? Well, simply because they knew that if Soviet troops enter Polish soil, they will not leave, and will begin setting up a puppet state, if not seeking to incorporate the entire country as a new republic (there were some Soviet government leaders even in 1945 that envisioned joining what remained of Poland due to border revisions as a new SSR).
"Bah! Paranoia!", some might say. But even if there was some paranoia, it was there for the right reasons. The last time that Russian troops were in Poland as simple protectors for Poland was in the 18th century, when the Russian Empire declared Poland-Lithuania its protectorate. But the troops did more than just "prevent foreign invasions and further slide into anarchy" - they broke up sessions of the Sejm whenever it appeared a law reforming and strengthening the Commonwealth would pass, which would have derailed the plans of Russian, Austrian, and Prussian monarchs for partitioning the country.
And what was the USSR if not simply the heir of Russian Empire? After all, while promoting national self-determination, the Soviets soon sought to regain the breakaway states, not being able to regain only Poland, Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, and Finland until after the World War II, all but Finland were firmly either SSRs or made into satellite. So if Soviet troops entered Poland, why would they leave? And even later when Poland had no choice in the matter, as the Soviets "liberated" Poland, the Red Army did indeed remain, last troops not being pulled out until the fall of Communism in the Soviet Bloc.
Simple anti-Communism cannot be attributed as the single cause for Poland's refusal to let the Red Army through.
Lithuania was nothing compared to the Soviet Union. Of course Poland felt strong enough against a little-ass new country like Lithuania - just like the Soviet Union of course felt comparatively tiny Poland was a piece of cake.
Yes, Poland was a culprit in the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia. I, too, think that was a really bad, really incriminating decision on the part of the Polish government and military.
Poland had aggressive tendencies in Eastern Europe only to the extent of joining ethnic Poles into Poland - such was the tendency for most, if not all, the post-WW1 states of the region, including Germany and the Soviet Union which claimed to be just trying to help Byelorussians and Ukrainians in Poland. You can't seriously single out Poland for this kind of nationalism - it was guilty of it, but it was just one among a whole group of like-minded countries.
Poland, when signing the 1934 Non-Aggression Pact with Hitler, was not trying to court the Nazis or throw in with them. After all, just 2 years prior, a Non-Aggression Pact was signed with the Soviet Union! It was simply an attempt to maintain at least a shaky peace with the two powers while the Polish economy rebounded and the military was increased, trained better, and upgraded wherever possible. Poland was repeatedly approached by the Nazis for an alliance against the Soviets, but refused. Poland's government also refused French plans in 1934 for an anti-German Eastern European security pact, because Poland's border with the Soviet Union was not guaranteed. Poland's entire foreign policy was trying to maintain a very delicate balance between Germany and the Soviet Union, to avoid either declaring war.
Even in 1939, when the Nazis again approached Poland to join the Axis Powers, the Polish government refused, as the Nazis at the same time demanded the cession of the "Polish Corridor" and Danzig to Germany.
Thus, I hardly see how people could say Poland was meant to be Hitler's ally in any way shape or form, when numerous attempts to bring Poland into the Axis fold, even though Poland had an authoritarian government and extorted Wilno (Vilnius/Vilna) from Lithuania after a prolonged state of war and Cieszyn (Teschen/Tesin) from Czechoslovakia during the moment of weakness, were rebuffed.
The actions taken regarding Wilno and Cieszyn were extreme and opportunistic (though Wilno had a liitle more justification, I think, but still more on the wrong side), but they can hardly be with reasonably interpreted as showing a desire to join Nazism. If that's the reasoning, then the Czechoslovaks wanted to be with Nazi Germany for wanting to keep their state intact; the Lithuanians for wanting to regain Vilnius; Hungarians for wanting to regain Slovakia and Transylvania; Romanians for wanting to keep Bessarabia and Transylvania; etc. The trend in central and eastern Europe was nationalism and revisionism of borders. Even before the Nazis could even fathom coming to power, democratic Weimar Germany sought revisionism of its borders, but that hardly means they immediately wanted to be totalitarian and kill non-Germans.
Agreed, it was nostalgic imperialism on the Polish side, though Pilsudski had a vision of a federal state of Lithuanians, Ukrainians, Poles, and Byelorussians that treated all these peoples equally and protected the area of this Miedzymorze from German and Russian expansionism, while Roman Dmowski was a nationalist who preferred a "Poland for the Poles", basically.
The Polish Army was ordered to defend the border - and we all know that there was German East Prussia in the north, so it was a very lengthy border to defend. So the forces were thinly spread as it is. They ended up withdrawing to the east, because planners estimated that they could hold the area near the Romanian bridgehead for several months, which would be more than enough time as France and Britain were supposed to open a front in the west and thus force Germany to send some troops away from Poland to defend its homeland. Misinformation among the troops was also rampant because German divisions disrupted communication and some newspapers and radiostations sent bogus reports of victories or losses or troop numbers. It was the plan to defend the long-stretched borders, then, that failed and forced the remnants of the army to withdraw to the Romanian bridgehead.
And yes the Government was very discredited when it left Warsaw - only the President of Warsaw remained and urged on the people to continue enduring the nearly-monthlong siege of the capital.
And the defense of the Romanian bridgehead plan failed because the Soviets came across the border halfway through September, so instead of defending just against the Germans in that part of Poland, now there would have to be trouble with the Red Army - two large armies that the Polish Army could not possibly resist long enough, even if Poland's Western Allies were prepping their troops an attack on Germany, which they weren't.
So, no, I do not think that it can be said that Poland didn't want to fight. I mean come on - the border with Germany was very long so and really encircled Poland, so it was almost hopeless. And throw in a batch of Soviet Red Army soldiers coming in, not to mention all-words-and-no-action Western Allies, and of course Poland is screwed. Poland did try to fight, but the initial plan to defend was flawed by the extensive German-Polish borders and a huge, misplaced faith on the French and British, and the fallback plan was compromised by the invasion from the East and the resulting pincer.
But unfortunately, we must revisit World War II, because not all of accepted history is true. It's not just for the purpose "who's to blame for whose misfortunes", but also to have a chance at reconciliation. Painful, horrible questions like "What really happened at Katyn, who was responsible, was it genocide?" (concerning modern Polish-Russian relations) must be asked and the controversies, debates, and finally investigations and openings of archives and files must come, so that we know what really happened. Only then can the people of otherwise-opposing nations come together, remember, apologize, and honor the victims of evils that affected both nations in unity and understanding. If we just leave it alone as it is, we'll never know our own history. Germans after the war were given painful wake-up calls, some being forced to walk by emaciated corpses of death march victims, and had learned the truth of what their wonderful Fuhrer Adolf Hitler did, and came to terms with it and learned lessons. They learned their own history, and learned that it must never again be allowed to repeat. We all must strive to do the same, even if it means a moment of tears, pain, anger, or even initial denial.
Beautifully said.
Pokurcz
Emperor
Belarus is a nice example that springs to mind, after the break-up with the USSR they wrote new history books to redefine the countries sense of it self and to distinguish it of its Soviet past. Lately Lukashenko has been pressured by Putin to return closer to the Russian fold and a new History book of the country has been written to tie it closer with the history of Russia (making them all but indistinguishable) as a method of making people protest less in the case of a future reunion. A seemingly well used method.
I must say that I thouroughly enjoyed Vrylakas and Kamilians posts. And Gelions swipe at moderation was also welcome.
"whew what was like like my longest post on this forum in ages" And a job well done! I especially liked:
"But unfortunately, we must revisit World War II, because not all of accepted history is true. It's not just for the purpose "who's to blame for whose misfortunes", but also to have a chance at reconciliation. Painful, horrible questions like "What really happened at Katyn, who was responsible, was it genocide?" (concerning modern Polish-Russian relations) must be asked and the controversies, debates, and finally investigations and openings of archives and files must come, so that we know what really happened. Only then can the people of otherwise-opposing nations come together, remember, apologize, and honor the victims of evils that affected both nations in unity and understanding. If we just leave it alone as it is, we'll never know our own history. Germans after the war were given painful wake-up calls, some being forced to walk by emaciated corpses of death march victims, and had learned the truth of what their wonderful Fuhrer Adolf Hitler did, and came to terms with it and learned lessons. They learned their own history, and learned that it must never again be allowed to repeat. We all must strive to do the same, even if it means a moment of tears, pain, anger, or even initial denial."
I'll sign up to that!
(It made me feel ashamed of myself and the rabid post I was about to post, only leaving the morsel on top)
I must say that I thouroughly enjoyed Vrylakas and Kamilians posts. And Gelions swipe at moderation was also welcome.
"whew what was like like my longest post on this forum in ages" And a job well done! I especially liked:
"But unfortunately, we must revisit World War II, because not all of accepted history is true. It's not just for the purpose "who's to blame for whose misfortunes", but also to have a chance at reconciliation. Painful, horrible questions like "What really happened at Katyn, who was responsible, was it genocide?" (concerning modern Polish-Russian relations) must be asked and the controversies, debates, and finally investigations and openings of archives and files must come, so that we know what really happened. Only then can the people of otherwise-opposing nations come together, remember, apologize, and honor the victims of evils that affected both nations in unity and understanding. If we just leave it alone as it is, we'll never know our own history. Germans after the war were given painful wake-up calls, some being forced to walk by emaciated corpses of death march victims, and had learned the truth of what their wonderful Fuhrer Adolf Hitler did, and came to terms with it and learned lessons. They learned their own history, and learned that it must never again be allowed to repeat. We all must strive to do the same, even if it means a moment of tears, pain, anger, or even initial denial."
I'll sign up to that!
(It made me feel ashamed of myself and the rabid post I was about to post, only leaving the morsel on top)
Gelion
Retired Captain
I had one five hour exam today so I think I'll get to answering tomorrow.
@Gelion, my apologies for the tardiness. It has been a long week.
Response:
Getting you in a debate is fun Anyways....
Im not sure my wife feels the same.
I'm not really crying for any thiefs, empires or their lackeys. If anything is wort crying for it is the people, culture and their treatment. One thing that I hate however is hypocrycy. For example before 1990 West accused USSR of a lot of bad things, USSR did the same to the West (both with regard to WW2 and XX century history in general). Now it seems that when in Russia many things are being studied anew, amout of critisism from the West increases. When two hypocrites are lying to an audience it may get a clear balanced picure. When there is only one the picture gets distorted. So in short I am trying to balance the hypocrycy of Western government statements with Russian hypocrycy. I hope some balance comes out of it.... Anyways to the point:
Well, all things are not equal and hypocrisy is not something that balances well. Russia is an under-developed society with crucial (if often typical) short-comings. While it is certainly true that the West is not beyond criticism or reproach, either in its past or the present, a critical difference is that the West has recognized and repudiated its imperialist past but Russia still hasnt gone through that process of de-imperialization. It is true that post-1992 Russia has changed much, that a Russian civil society is growing today and an independent Russian economy is quietly gaining steam, but still, under Putin, (Tsar Putin, as I call him), the Russian government hasnt taken the leadership in helping Russians to understand that Russias future greatness need not involve Russia continuing to be an empire that rules over other peoples. Germany is also fumbling with the former DDR in the same way, that East Germans never went through a process of depressurization; they went from the Nazi dictatorship directly into a Soviet puppet dictatorship, and generations of East Germans have grown up under one or another extremist ideology.
But back to Russia Putin has taken some very dangerous political steps, and his constant praise for the old USSR continues to feed the Russian national need to be a great military and political power when what Russia needs right now is to be able to concentrate on social and economic development. Russia still wants to be a 19th century-style empire with its armies scattered across Europe and its own spheres of influence (i.e., conquered countries with puppet governments loyal to Moscow), it still refuses to let go of non-Russian peoples and lands (like Chechnya) that it conquered long ago. Just imagine, that when Putin mentions out loud how wonderful the USSR was and how he wishes it were still here, for Eastern Europeans (like Poles or Hungarians), it sounds almost exactly like a German president saying publically how great he thinks Hitler was and that it is too bad that the Nazi Reich failed. How would Russians react if Merkel said that? Do not therefore be surprised at the reaction Russians get from Eastern Europe when Tsar Putin says something similar about the USSR.
You begin well however I must agree with you on "indepenant Ukraine". Unfortunately as even Stanislaw Lem admited Poland and Ukraine are marionettes of US foreign policy in Eastern Europe. One dependant state cannot really support the others independance, can it?
Were not allowed to swear in this forum, are we? Too many kiddies around. Well, I hear this theory a lot from Russians, that its former satellite allies (i.e., conquered puppets) who now oppose Russia must be controlled by the CIA. Sadly, its not true. We (Poland) are not controlled by the US. On the contrary, it is fear of Russia that drives Poland into Washingtons arms, especially since the European Union has proven itself incapable of any realistic mutual security arrangements; the Western European states have proven we cant trust them to protect us. I dont know why Russians need all the conspiracy theories, really; its quite obvious why Poland would have a pro-US foreign policy. If its not obvious, let me spell it out for you: Russia controlled the old, decaying Poland in the 18th century, finally just destroying it in 1795 and ruling (most of) it directly from 1795-1918, 123 years. Then we had a 22 year respite, only to be conquered again by cooperating Russians and Germans in 1939. We spent 5 hellish years under German occupation, only to be re-conquered by Russia again and forced once again to serve Russian interests, and again with the usual Russian secret police and military occupation, which only ended in 1988-90, about 16 years ago. Poland, like many other states ruled by Russia, is very keen not to be ruled by Russia again, and a very large motivation in all Polish foreign policy decisions is exactly to avoid that again.
Ukraine is more complicated because the modern Ukrainian borders were drawn by Stalin intentionally to dilute Ukrainians within their own S.S.R. This means that there is a very large Russian minority in Ukraine that would like to see Ukraine re-join Russia, but western Ukraine (which has far fewer Russians) is much more interested in maintaining independence from Russia. Russians dont seem to ever want to believe that anyone could ever not want to live in a Russian state, but it is a fact for Moscow that most western Ukrainians want an independent Ukraine. It has nothing to do with the CIA, it is just natural that Ukrainians conquered by Russia in the 17th century would eventually want their own country. Poland has its own reasons to support that of course; any anti-Russian foreign policy would obviously want a strong Ukraine between us and Russia. We dont need the CIA to tell us to support Ukraine; it is a very obvious thing for Poland to do. If Belarus was a democracy, they would also most likely have strong support from Poland.
From Ukranian point of view Independance from Russia is good (which is honorable), but we both know (I hope) that escaping one power means becoming a colony of the other. I'm sure you believe what you say, but I also believe that politically both Poland and Ukraine are US vassals. I read enough of your papers and official statements to justify that.
If the US controlled Poland, what could they use to coerce us? Their armies are far away, economically Poland now has all the opportunities that the EU has to offer, and politically they really have nothing to offer us or threaten us with. We seek continued US involvement in Europe thats a cornerstone of Polish policy but what we are ultimately aiming for is our continued independence. We didnt free ourselves of Russian rule in 1988-90 just to hand ourselves over to another power. Sorry, you can indulge in whatever fantasies you want about CIA agents manipulating Poland (in the way Russia has done for so long) but no, Poland is an independent country now whose foreign policy is centered on the goal of keeping it that way. Kaczynski is an idiot, a foolish nationalist, but even he does not bow to Washington. The funny part is that if Russia would just stop acting like its still 1972 and recognize it is no longer a massive military power, and more importantly that it really isnt in Russias self-interest to be so (after all, what finally destroyed the USSR?), then Poland would probably see much less need for continued American involvement in Europe. As for Ukraine, as I mentioned its population is strongly split between pro-Western and pro-Russian groups, but there is no need for paranoid fantasies about the CIA leading the Orange Revolution there really are some Ukrainians who dont want Russian rule or interference anymore. Tell Tsar Putin to leave Kiiv alone, and youll find that the pro- and anti-Russian groups will probably disappear from Ukraine.
Borders of Greater Poland inlcuded a lot of non-Poles in 1400's and 1900's. I think I would not go into "historical claims on land" further or we may end up in Kievan Rus times or even earlier. I have no objections in the first paragraph.
Yes, of course, as did almost all medieval states. Pre-19th century Poland didnt have nationalism yet, as almost no states did at the time. Remember that after the Jagiellonian dynasty died out in 1572, Poland for the most part elected foreign kings from Transylvania, Sweden, Saxony, etc. Even the Jagiellonians were really a Lithuanian dynasty combined with the Anjou dynasty from Burgundia. The 1386-1795 Poland wasnt a vehicle for Polish national(ist) power, it was a vehicle for the aristocracy of Poland which included ethnic Germans, Lithuanians, Rusyns, Ukrainians, Tartars, etc., even Russians (from the Smolensk region). The Union of Lublin of 1569, which formalized the union between Poland and Lithuania, also recognized Ukrainian autonomy and pulled the Ruthenian and Ukrainian nobility into the Polish szlachta as equals. Remember that the official language of government in Poland until 1791 was Latin, not Polish. Russia never allowed autonomy when it ruled Ukraine (1656-1992); government in Ukraine under Tsars or Commissars was almost always Russian. The independent Cossack siches that had existed for centuries under Polish rule were destroyed by Russians only a few decades after they took over Ukraine.
But the issues of 1918 are not relevant today. The core problem was that the victors of World War I were not willing to invest the soldiers and money necessary to build a stable Europe, and the new states of Eastern Europe all wanted to rule every place that had ever historically belonged to their predecessors, and maybe a few others as well. For the Poles of 1918, they wanted to re-create what they had had in 1795 (or 1772). Everyone ignored the ethnic realities of modern Europe, and that fed the poison that would lead to 1939.
MY point now is that Poland learned an ugly lesson in 1918-39, and in 1944-45, although once again we found ourselves part of yet another Russian empire, there was a very firm rejection of the old Sanacja (Pilsudski-ist 1926-39) Poland. There was a widespread feeling that the pre-war Poland and its policies had failed, and that it was built on very fundamentally flawed premises. Poles today are nostalgic for this time period because like Germany it spawned a huge flowering of artistic culture, but similarly, the Polish Sanacja government is seen like the German Weimar government: doomed by its own foolish and nationalist policies.
Thats a lesson that I dont think modern Russia has quite learned yet. While again, things are changing slowly in Russia, they havent quite given up on the idea of a greater Russia, of Russia being a major military power in the world. The Great Power mindset is still too ingrained in Russians minds, and they are still willing to sacrifice their living standards and political rights for that old ideal. There is a reflexive, knee-jerk anti-Westernism in Russia that compels the Russian government in fits of paranoia to spend huge amounts of resources on foolish military and intelligence projects to counter non-existent threats, all the while diverting crucial resources from economic and infrastructural needs, ensuring that for generations to come, Russia will remain a third world country with a wealthy elite and a mass of impoverished, under-educated and hyper-xenophobic/nationalistic underclass. Ive seen signs of some Russians taking their own initiative in starting businesses and making important economic connections to the outside world, but they are few and far between still and Russia is still ruled by a class of people like Putin who do not look forward but look backward in history for examples of how to make Russia great, so the old ways will continue indefinitely.
As for Rus, it is certainly the mother of Russia but it was not Russia. As well, Rus is equally the mother of Belarus and Ukraine. Russians from Ivan IV in the 16th century have seen modern Russia as a reincarnation of old Rus (c. 880-1239), rather like the Germans pretended for centuries to be the reincarnation of the Roman empire. The problem is, for Russians this We are Rus mentality translated into meaning that they felt had a right to rule over all former Rus lands, and still to this day many Russians believe Ukraine and Belarus should be controlled by, if not directly ruled by Russia. Russias mentality today is, and Im repeating myself here, the same as Poland was in 1918. Rus is seen as an excuse for a Greater Russia, and indeed that pretty much describes Russian history since Ivan IV. Rus is to Russia as Rome was to the West, and just as the West had to accept in the failed Crusades that they would never "recover" the lost Roman lands of the Middle East and North Africa, so too does modern Russia have to learn to accept that it has no automatic right to control all the lands of ancient Rus.
In the second paragraph you willingly or unwillingly hide that Poles did invade Ukraine to occupy it and extend the borders to the maximum extent of "Rech Pospolita". Poland was no different than the Russian Empire or USSR when it was going for those territories. But hey who wasnt whose days?
Indeed, accept that modern Poland has renounced those old land claims. I should know; my parents were born in Vilnius, then a largely Polish city but which the Soviets in 1940 (and again in 1945) ethnically cleansed of Poles. Modern Poland has no interest in the old Kresy (eastern) lands from the old Rzeczpospolita.
I wish we could say the same about modern Russia though.
Good historical article as all your works. When you stop equalizing Soviets to Russians we might discuss Russian crimes if you will. USSR used "re-inification" as a reason to occupy Eastern Poland and it did so not even crossing the borders even the British accepted. "Не пойманный не вор" ' I hope you know this proverb. Few accepted that occupation as an agression punishable by war then, so why should it be judged on a political level now? I ask, because thats what Eastern Europeans are doing now.... If these events are not left to historians then, believe me the other side also has similar arguements.
I do not hold modern Russians to the crimes of old, at least in the sense that they should be held responsible for what happened. It has been a decade and a half since the USSR collapsed, and though that empire absorbed the first two + decades of my life, it is gone.
However, I do take issue with how modern Russians often deal with their history, and what lessons they draw from it. Mind you, there are some exceptions, but at least in today's ruling elites in Russia there is a nostalgia for the Soviet days when the world's great powers had to consult Moscow, when Russian troops were stationed on the Elbe River, and when the government could continue to use xenophobia to scare average Russians into conceding virtually all political power to the government. This isn't just an academic discussion for us because again, we feel forced to orient our foreign policy around the need to counter Russian imperial goals in our neighborhood. To our immediate east we have Belarus which is ruled by a 1950s-style Stalinist dictator who has militarized our border (but also allows illegal widespread smuggling of Central Asians and mafia weapons across our long, forested border), and which at the moment has handed its own state border controls over to Russians; someone crossing the Polish-Belarus border today will deal not with Belarus state authorities but Russian state authorities, directly answerable to Moscow.
If Russia were ever to truly reach out to Eastern Europe, to try to find common dialogue and really work for common solutions to a whole host of mutual concerns, the response would be relief and gratitude, and I think the benefits many. Unfortunately, Russia still insists on viewing the world through the lens of Great Powers, and we - Eastern Europe -don't count much in that kind of view. Russia is like a schoolyard bully who has been humiliated and dreams of once again ruling the schoolyard, and can only see the schoolyard in terms of power - who are the other bullies Russia must deal with in order to re-establish its place in the schoolyard power hierarchy. It doesn't understand that things have changed and the bully system of great powers has declined; it just sees its old "enemies" and wants to be as powerful as them again. To quote Dmitri Trenin - who, by the way, largely agrees with you - Russia aspires not to be like India or Brazil (whose economic development and unstable political culture most resemble Russia's) but like the U.S., Germany, or (to a lesser extent), China. Russia (according to Trenin) wants power, not just economic prosperity and competitiveness. Merely being another wealthy country in the European Union (which is what Poland wants) is not enough for Russia.
Also, as Trenin notes (and I'm referring in all this to his essay in the July/August 2006 edition of Foreign Affairs, where has an article this month called "Russia Leaves the West"), modern Russians hate criticism, especially from the West. In fact, Trenin suggests that the West just stop criticizing Russia because it won't do any good anyway. Tsar Putin's popularity rises when he is criticized by the West - the evil West! - and doing so just helps push Russians deeper into their own insular and paranoid world view. At one point Trenin criticizes Western Europe for having the nerve to criticize Russia through the OECD and Council of Europe - organizations designed to foster free markets and human rights in Europe and to which Russia is a member - because, regardless of what the OECD and Council of Europe treaties say and what Russia may have promised when it joined these two organizations, nobody has any right to interfere in Russia's eternal affairs (Chechnya, Gazprom, Yukos, the new NGO law, etc.) So we are to believe that even when Russia joins a treaty promising certain economic and social standards, Russia - unlike other countries - should not be actually held to those standards. This kind of instability and inconsistency in Russia's foreign affairs is what keeps us in Eastern Europe nervous, and why we constantly bring up the past. It's because when we ask Russia whether it has given up its old pre-1992 imperial pretensions, the response is never very clear and we feel like someone who has to take shelter during a terrible lightning storm in a bear cave; is the bear only concerned as we are about the storm, or does he have other designs ?
Response:
Getting you in a debate is fun Anyways....
Im not sure my wife feels the same.
I'm not really crying for any thiefs, empires or their lackeys. If anything is wort crying for it is the people, culture and their treatment. One thing that I hate however is hypocrycy. For example before 1990 West accused USSR of a lot of bad things, USSR did the same to the West (both with regard to WW2 and XX century history in general). Now it seems that when in Russia many things are being studied anew, amout of critisism from the West increases. When two hypocrites are lying to an audience it may get a clear balanced picure. When there is only one the picture gets distorted. So in short I am trying to balance the hypocrycy of Western government statements with Russian hypocrycy. I hope some balance comes out of it.... Anyways to the point:
Well, all things are not equal and hypocrisy is not something that balances well. Russia is an under-developed society with crucial (if often typical) short-comings. While it is certainly true that the West is not beyond criticism or reproach, either in its past or the present, a critical difference is that the West has recognized and repudiated its imperialist past but Russia still hasnt gone through that process of de-imperialization. It is true that post-1992 Russia has changed much, that a Russian civil society is growing today and an independent Russian economy is quietly gaining steam, but still, under Putin, (Tsar Putin, as I call him), the Russian government hasnt taken the leadership in helping Russians to understand that Russias future greatness need not involve Russia continuing to be an empire that rules over other peoples. Germany is also fumbling with the former DDR in the same way, that East Germans never went through a process of depressurization; they went from the Nazi dictatorship directly into a Soviet puppet dictatorship, and generations of East Germans have grown up under one or another extremist ideology.
But back to Russia Putin has taken some very dangerous political steps, and his constant praise for the old USSR continues to feed the Russian national need to be a great military and political power when what Russia needs right now is to be able to concentrate on social and economic development. Russia still wants to be a 19th century-style empire with its armies scattered across Europe and its own spheres of influence (i.e., conquered countries with puppet governments loyal to Moscow), it still refuses to let go of non-Russian peoples and lands (like Chechnya) that it conquered long ago. Just imagine, that when Putin mentions out loud how wonderful the USSR was and how he wishes it were still here, for Eastern Europeans (like Poles or Hungarians), it sounds almost exactly like a German president saying publically how great he thinks Hitler was and that it is too bad that the Nazi Reich failed. How would Russians react if Merkel said that? Do not therefore be surprised at the reaction Russians get from Eastern Europe when Tsar Putin says something similar about the USSR.
You begin well however I must agree with you on "indepenant Ukraine". Unfortunately as even Stanislaw Lem admited Poland and Ukraine are marionettes of US foreign policy in Eastern Europe. One dependant state cannot really support the others independance, can it?
Were not allowed to swear in this forum, are we? Too many kiddies around. Well, I hear this theory a lot from Russians, that its former satellite allies (i.e., conquered puppets) who now oppose Russia must be controlled by the CIA. Sadly, its not true. We (Poland) are not controlled by the US. On the contrary, it is fear of Russia that drives Poland into Washingtons arms, especially since the European Union has proven itself incapable of any realistic mutual security arrangements; the Western European states have proven we cant trust them to protect us. I dont know why Russians need all the conspiracy theories, really; its quite obvious why Poland would have a pro-US foreign policy. If its not obvious, let me spell it out for you: Russia controlled the old, decaying Poland in the 18th century, finally just destroying it in 1795 and ruling (most of) it directly from 1795-1918, 123 years. Then we had a 22 year respite, only to be conquered again by cooperating Russians and Germans in 1939. We spent 5 hellish years under German occupation, only to be re-conquered by Russia again and forced once again to serve Russian interests, and again with the usual Russian secret police and military occupation, which only ended in 1988-90, about 16 years ago. Poland, like many other states ruled by Russia, is very keen not to be ruled by Russia again, and a very large motivation in all Polish foreign policy decisions is exactly to avoid that again.
Ukraine is more complicated because the modern Ukrainian borders were drawn by Stalin intentionally to dilute Ukrainians within their own S.S.R. This means that there is a very large Russian minority in Ukraine that would like to see Ukraine re-join Russia, but western Ukraine (which has far fewer Russians) is much more interested in maintaining independence from Russia. Russians dont seem to ever want to believe that anyone could ever not want to live in a Russian state, but it is a fact for Moscow that most western Ukrainians want an independent Ukraine. It has nothing to do with the CIA, it is just natural that Ukrainians conquered by Russia in the 17th century would eventually want their own country. Poland has its own reasons to support that of course; any anti-Russian foreign policy would obviously want a strong Ukraine between us and Russia. We dont need the CIA to tell us to support Ukraine; it is a very obvious thing for Poland to do. If Belarus was a democracy, they would also most likely have strong support from Poland.
From Ukranian point of view Independance from Russia is good (which is honorable), but we both know (I hope) that escaping one power means becoming a colony of the other. I'm sure you believe what you say, but I also believe that politically both Poland and Ukraine are US vassals. I read enough of your papers and official statements to justify that.
If the US controlled Poland, what could they use to coerce us? Their armies are far away, economically Poland now has all the opportunities that the EU has to offer, and politically they really have nothing to offer us or threaten us with. We seek continued US involvement in Europe thats a cornerstone of Polish policy but what we are ultimately aiming for is our continued independence. We didnt free ourselves of Russian rule in 1988-90 just to hand ourselves over to another power. Sorry, you can indulge in whatever fantasies you want about CIA agents manipulating Poland (in the way Russia has done for so long) but no, Poland is an independent country now whose foreign policy is centered on the goal of keeping it that way. Kaczynski is an idiot, a foolish nationalist, but even he does not bow to Washington. The funny part is that if Russia would just stop acting like its still 1972 and recognize it is no longer a massive military power, and more importantly that it really isnt in Russias self-interest to be so (after all, what finally destroyed the USSR?), then Poland would probably see much less need for continued American involvement in Europe. As for Ukraine, as I mentioned its population is strongly split between pro-Western and pro-Russian groups, but there is no need for paranoid fantasies about the CIA leading the Orange Revolution there really are some Ukrainians who dont want Russian rule or interference anymore. Tell Tsar Putin to leave Kiiv alone, and youll find that the pro- and anti-Russian groups will probably disappear from Ukraine.
Borders of Greater Poland inlcuded a lot of non-Poles in 1400's and 1900's. I think I would not go into "historical claims on land" further or we may end up in Kievan Rus times or even earlier. I have no objections in the first paragraph.
Yes, of course, as did almost all medieval states. Pre-19th century Poland didnt have nationalism yet, as almost no states did at the time. Remember that after the Jagiellonian dynasty died out in 1572, Poland for the most part elected foreign kings from Transylvania, Sweden, Saxony, etc. Even the Jagiellonians were really a Lithuanian dynasty combined with the Anjou dynasty from Burgundia. The 1386-1795 Poland wasnt a vehicle for Polish national(ist) power, it was a vehicle for the aristocracy of Poland which included ethnic Germans, Lithuanians, Rusyns, Ukrainians, Tartars, etc., even Russians (from the Smolensk region). The Union of Lublin of 1569, which formalized the union between Poland and Lithuania, also recognized Ukrainian autonomy and pulled the Ruthenian and Ukrainian nobility into the Polish szlachta as equals. Remember that the official language of government in Poland until 1791 was Latin, not Polish. Russia never allowed autonomy when it ruled Ukraine (1656-1992); government in Ukraine under Tsars or Commissars was almost always Russian. The independent Cossack siches that had existed for centuries under Polish rule were destroyed by Russians only a few decades after they took over Ukraine.
But the issues of 1918 are not relevant today. The core problem was that the victors of World War I were not willing to invest the soldiers and money necessary to build a stable Europe, and the new states of Eastern Europe all wanted to rule every place that had ever historically belonged to their predecessors, and maybe a few others as well. For the Poles of 1918, they wanted to re-create what they had had in 1795 (or 1772). Everyone ignored the ethnic realities of modern Europe, and that fed the poison that would lead to 1939.
MY point now is that Poland learned an ugly lesson in 1918-39, and in 1944-45, although once again we found ourselves part of yet another Russian empire, there was a very firm rejection of the old Sanacja (Pilsudski-ist 1926-39) Poland. There was a widespread feeling that the pre-war Poland and its policies had failed, and that it was built on very fundamentally flawed premises. Poles today are nostalgic for this time period because like Germany it spawned a huge flowering of artistic culture, but similarly, the Polish Sanacja government is seen like the German Weimar government: doomed by its own foolish and nationalist policies.
Thats a lesson that I dont think modern Russia has quite learned yet. While again, things are changing slowly in Russia, they havent quite given up on the idea of a greater Russia, of Russia being a major military power in the world. The Great Power mindset is still too ingrained in Russians minds, and they are still willing to sacrifice their living standards and political rights for that old ideal. There is a reflexive, knee-jerk anti-Westernism in Russia that compels the Russian government in fits of paranoia to spend huge amounts of resources on foolish military and intelligence projects to counter non-existent threats, all the while diverting crucial resources from economic and infrastructural needs, ensuring that for generations to come, Russia will remain a third world country with a wealthy elite and a mass of impoverished, under-educated and hyper-xenophobic/nationalistic underclass. Ive seen signs of some Russians taking their own initiative in starting businesses and making important economic connections to the outside world, but they are few and far between still and Russia is still ruled by a class of people like Putin who do not look forward but look backward in history for examples of how to make Russia great, so the old ways will continue indefinitely.
As for Rus, it is certainly the mother of Russia but it was not Russia. As well, Rus is equally the mother of Belarus and Ukraine. Russians from Ivan IV in the 16th century have seen modern Russia as a reincarnation of old Rus (c. 880-1239), rather like the Germans pretended for centuries to be the reincarnation of the Roman empire. The problem is, for Russians this We are Rus mentality translated into meaning that they felt had a right to rule over all former Rus lands, and still to this day many Russians believe Ukraine and Belarus should be controlled by, if not directly ruled by Russia. Russias mentality today is, and Im repeating myself here, the same as Poland was in 1918. Rus is seen as an excuse for a Greater Russia, and indeed that pretty much describes Russian history since Ivan IV. Rus is to Russia as Rome was to the West, and just as the West had to accept in the failed Crusades that they would never "recover" the lost Roman lands of the Middle East and North Africa, so too does modern Russia have to learn to accept that it has no automatic right to control all the lands of ancient Rus.
In the second paragraph you willingly or unwillingly hide that Poles did invade Ukraine to occupy it and extend the borders to the maximum extent of "Rech Pospolita". Poland was no different than the Russian Empire or USSR when it was going for those territories. But hey who wasnt whose days?
Indeed, accept that modern Poland has renounced those old land claims. I should know; my parents were born in Vilnius, then a largely Polish city but which the Soviets in 1940 (and again in 1945) ethnically cleansed of Poles. Modern Poland has no interest in the old Kresy (eastern) lands from the old Rzeczpospolita.
I wish we could say the same about modern Russia though.
Good historical article as all your works. When you stop equalizing Soviets to Russians we might discuss Russian crimes if you will. USSR used "re-inification" as a reason to occupy Eastern Poland and it did so not even crossing the borders even the British accepted. "Не пойманный не вор" ' I hope you know this proverb. Few accepted that occupation as an agression punishable by war then, so why should it be judged on a political level now? I ask, because thats what Eastern Europeans are doing now.... If these events are not left to historians then, believe me the other side also has similar arguements.
I do not hold modern Russians to the crimes of old, at least in the sense that they should be held responsible for what happened. It has been a decade and a half since the USSR collapsed, and though that empire absorbed the first two + decades of my life, it is gone.
However, I do take issue with how modern Russians often deal with their history, and what lessons they draw from it. Mind you, there are some exceptions, but at least in today's ruling elites in Russia there is a nostalgia for the Soviet days when the world's great powers had to consult Moscow, when Russian troops were stationed on the Elbe River, and when the government could continue to use xenophobia to scare average Russians into conceding virtually all political power to the government. This isn't just an academic discussion for us because again, we feel forced to orient our foreign policy around the need to counter Russian imperial goals in our neighborhood. To our immediate east we have Belarus which is ruled by a 1950s-style Stalinist dictator who has militarized our border (but also allows illegal widespread smuggling of Central Asians and mafia weapons across our long, forested border), and which at the moment has handed its own state border controls over to Russians; someone crossing the Polish-Belarus border today will deal not with Belarus state authorities but Russian state authorities, directly answerable to Moscow.
If Russia were ever to truly reach out to Eastern Europe, to try to find common dialogue and really work for common solutions to a whole host of mutual concerns, the response would be relief and gratitude, and I think the benefits many. Unfortunately, Russia still insists on viewing the world through the lens of Great Powers, and we - Eastern Europe -don't count much in that kind of view. Russia is like a schoolyard bully who has been humiliated and dreams of once again ruling the schoolyard, and can only see the schoolyard in terms of power - who are the other bullies Russia must deal with in order to re-establish its place in the schoolyard power hierarchy. It doesn't understand that things have changed and the bully system of great powers has declined; it just sees its old "enemies" and wants to be as powerful as them again. To quote Dmitri Trenin - who, by the way, largely agrees with you - Russia aspires not to be like India or Brazil (whose economic development and unstable political culture most resemble Russia's) but like the U.S., Germany, or (to a lesser extent), China. Russia (according to Trenin) wants power, not just economic prosperity and competitiveness. Merely being another wealthy country in the European Union (which is what Poland wants) is not enough for Russia.
Also, as Trenin notes (and I'm referring in all this to his essay in the July/August 2006 edition of Foreign Affairs, where has an article this month called "Russia Leaves the West"), modern Russians hate criticism, especially from the West. In fact, Trenin suggests that the West just stop criticizing Russia because it won't do any good anyway. Tsar Putin's popularity rises when he is criticized by the West - the evil West! - and doing so just helps push Russians deeper into their own insular and paranoid world view. At one point Trenin criticizes Western Europe for having the nerve to criticize Russia through the OECD and Council of Europe - organizations designed to foster free markets and human rights in Europe and to which Russia is a member - because, regardless of what the OECD and Council of Europe treaties say and what Russia may have promised when it joined these two organizations, nobody has any right to interfere in Russia's eternal affairs (Chechnya, Gazprom, Yukos, the new NGO law, etc.) So we are to believe that even when Russia joins a treaty promising certain economic and social standards, Russia - unlike other countries - should not be actually held to those standards. This kind of instability and inconsistency in Russia's foreign affairs is what keeps us in Eastern Europe nervous, and why we constantly bring up the past. It's because when we ask Russia whether it has given up its old pre-1992 imperial pretensions, the response is never very clear and we feel like someone who has to take shelter during a terrible lightning storm in a bear cave; is the bear only concerned as we are about the storm, or does he have other designs ?
Part II:
Have you asked yourslf WHY there was no majour battles for Poland and why they were able to escape? IMHO it was due to the fact that the first order given to the Polish Army was to escape and not to fight. Polish President and government escaped the capital onthe 4th and 5th of September - Long before the war was over!!! That was after Britain and France declared war on Germany. Poland had to defend itself only 15 days - in that time mobilization in France would have been completed. However on the 3rd fo Sept. the Presendent gives the order to relocate the army to South-East of the country. 3rd day of war! He gives orders not to defend Wisla, not the destroy German armies or re-organise but to ESCAPE to furthest parts of the country. Doesn't that suffice to say that Poland did not wish to fight? Poles did many heroic things during the actual war, however betrayal of their army and people by government in the beginning of the war leaves to wish that it was different at the start of the war.
Actually, apparently you are not familiar with the history of the September 1939 campaign. Here is a short primer on one of the major battles fought in that campaign that I wrote a while ago:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=62527
I quote a couple historians in the above article, Steven Zaloga and Victor Madej, with the following passage:
The Polish military was poorly organized at the beginning of the campaign and this led to greater losses on our side than should have been, but the Polish military did fight quite heroically, if futilely, from beginning to bloody end in October. The problem was that it was faced with overwhelming odds against which it had no hope of winning, other than close military coordination with our Western "allies". The united front collapsed within a week and a half, and the government fled Warsaw because it was clear the Army would not be able to hold it much longer. My article is about the Bzura River counter-offensive, which was launched as an attempt to save Warsaw after promises from France that a major invasion of Germany was imminent; the French invasion never happened and the Germans regrouped after only three days and were able to destroy the remaining Polish holdouts west of Warsaw (but only taking the city on 27. September, ten days after the USSR had joined Hitler). The decision facing the Polish government was whether to surrender, flee into exile to lead a resistance, or die fighting. Given that both the Germans and the Soviets launched wide-scale executions of Polish political and cultural elites immediately after their occupation, it was probably the wisest thing to flee the country and seek foreign help in organizing resistance.
If you think Poland did not fight in September 1939, consider that from beginning to end - 01. September 1939 to the surrender of the last major army group on 05. October 1939 - Poland managed to just barely last as long as the combined military forces of France, Britain, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands months later against a German attack, with far fewer equipment, manpower and terrain advantages. Also, if we look at the beginning of Operation Barbarossa in June 1941, we find that the Germans managed within 35 days to occupy almost double the amount of Soviet territory as they had in Poland. I would say the initial 6 months of Operation Barbarossa were far worse for the USSR than the September campaign was for Poland, that Soviet army units were far worse led, and that millions of Soviet soldiers died simply because of Stalinist stupidity rather than in any meaningful defense of the homeland. Konstantin Pleshakov's 2005 book Stalin's Folly : The Tragic First Ten Days of World War Two on the Eastern Front mentions (as several others do) how, on the evening of 30. July, Stalin had simply collapsed at his dacha and refused to see anyone or deal with anything, and the leading members of the Politburo showed up. Stalin believed at that point they had come to arrest him for his extreme negligence, and was stunned to hear them simply asking him to return to work, that the country needed him.
I'm not fond of re-thinking WW2 and how it unfolded, but the more revisionism comes from Western authors (with modern political goals) the more Russians will be aware not only of their own history, but also of the before hidden aspects of the history of others...as a shield against various accusations.
I'm not familiar with modern Russian histories of the war, other than those that generally make it to the West. I do remember, however, Soviet histories of the war from up to the 1980s that largely demeaned, ignored or ridiculed any contributions to the war outside of the Soviet Union itself. Soviet war histories never examined difficult questions like the attacks on Finland and Poland in 1939-40, or why Moscow could scream so much about a Western second front in Western Europe against the Germans, but remained quite on the Soviet-Japanese treaty of non-aggression signed after Khalkin Gol while the Americans had to fight two wars, one in Europe and another even more brutal and logistically difficult war against the Japanese. Imagine my surprise when I came to the West and discovered Western libraries filled with books on Operation Barbarossa, Stalingrad, the terrible siege of Leningrad, most of them very sympathetic to the USSR and the sufferings of the Soviet peoples. The West has almost always acknowledged the Soviet contribution to the war effort - indeed, I've read many Western histories that claimed the war could not have been won without the Soviet alliance - but I can't really say, with a few noted exceptions (Nekrich & Geller come to mind, and to a lesser extent Volkoganov), that I know too many Russian-written histories that say anything similar about the USSR's alliance with the West, or that, quite frankly, give much credit to anyone but Russians. It was a dangerous but common stunt in 1980s Polish schools to write a "t" like this: †, referring to the communist lie about Katyn. It was one of the few outlets we had in a (Soviet puppet) world where our history textbooks only talked about the Russians in WW II. Obviously I have a certain background and with it a bias, but memories of the quality of Russian history make it difficult for me to believe that modern Russians are nearly as maligned by the West as happens in reverse. When I read articles like Trenin's that talk of Poland's "defection" to NATO - we didn't defect; we never joined the Soviet empire willingly, we were captives, prisoners - it shows me that to at least some extent, many modern Russians still look at us as mere empire fodder and the West as the eternal Russian bogeyman, like Quixote's tilting at windmills.
I am not fond of Stalin or his policies. Furthermore I would have joined the Whites in the Civil war.
Joining the Whites in 1917-1922 would not have made you any Polish friends; Denikin and Wrangle both wanted to restore the Russian empire, including re-annexing Poland and Finland as well. That's why Pilsudski initially supported Lenin, because he thought the Bolsheviks would always be a weak but radical government with little real control over the oblasts. Oops - everyone makes mistakes.
However the more Soviet and Stalinist equals in anyone's mind as Russian the more tension there will be. Russians suffered more from Communism than any other nation on Earth (yes even including Chinese), however if it is used as an excuse for modern political gains every Russian will defend...not Stalin, not Bolshevism but Motherland just as they did in WW2. USSR survived because people were fighting not for Stalin, not for colonies, but for their own existance. They fought and died in a war that was long planned and desired by many politicians....
I would agree with much of the above, though not all. China under Mao did manage to have even more people killed, but that's just a statistic. Stalin's USSR was a close second. But overall, again, our problem with Russia is its current policies, not its history. The real problem with Russia's history is that the current Russian leadership insists on romanticizing it, and (sometimes only in words, other times in deeds) trying to re-create it in modern Russia. Modern Poles are really grateful for the huge sacrifices Soviet soldiers made in WW II, particularly those that fought in Poland in 1944. From our perspective, it's just a big problem that after the Germans were defeated and expelled, that the USSR didn't leave, that it stayed and imposed another empire on us, one that looked an awful lot like the military occupation of 1795-1918. Our concern is merely whether modern Russia has completely renounced and repudiated that heritage - i.e., that it won't happen again. As I've said, each time we ask that question, we get a mixture of defiant self-righteousness or vague statements in response. We know modern Germany is no threat, we don't know that about modern Russia, as it is not clear that Russians have made up their mind what they want.
Have you asked yourslf WHY there was no majour battles for Poland and why they were able to escape? IMHO it was due to the fact that the first order given to the Polish Army was to escape and not to fight. Polish President and government escaped the capital onthe 4th and 5th of September - Long before the war was over!!! That was after Britain and France declared war on Germany. Poland had to defend itself only 15 days - in that time mobilization in France would have been completed. However on the 3rd fo Sept. the Presendent gives the order to relocate the army to South-East of the country. 3rd day of war! He gives orders not to defend Wisla, not the destroy German armies or re-organise but to ESCAPE to furthest parts of the country. Doesn't that suffice to say that Poland did not wish to fight? Poles did many heroic things during the actual war, however betrayal of their army and people by government in the beginning of the war leaves to wish that it was different at the start of the war.
Actually, apparently you are not familiar with the history of the September 1939 campaign. Here is a short primer on one of the major battles fought in that campaign that I wrote a while ago:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=62527
I quote a couple historians in the above article, Steven Zaloga and Victor Madej, with the following passage:
(Zaloga/Madej, 1991: pg. 157)
The Polish military was poorly organized at the beginning of the campaign and this led to greater losses on our side than should have been, but the Polish military did fight quite heroically, if futilely, from beginning to bloody end in October. The problem was that it was faced with overwhelming odds against which it had no hope of winning, other than close military coordination with our Western "allies". The united front collapsed within a week and a half, and the government fled Warsaw because it was clear the Army would not be able to hold it much longer. My article is about the Bzura River counter-offensive, which was launched as an attempt to save Warsaw after promises from France that a major invasion of Germany was imminent; the French invasion never happened and the Germans regrouped after only three days and were able to destroy the remaining Polish holdouts west of Warsaw (but only taking the city on 27. September, ten days after the USSR had joined Hitler). The decision facing the Polish government was whether to surrender, flee into exile to lead a resistance, or die fighting. Given that both the Germans and the Soviets launched wide-scale executions of Polish political and cultural elites immediately after their occupation, it was probably the wisest thing to flee the country and seek foreign help in organizing resistance.
If you think Poland did not fight in September 1939, consider that from beginning to end - 01. September 1939 to the surrender of the last major army group on 05. October 1939 - Poland managed to just barely last as long as the combined military forces of France, Britain, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands months later against a German attack, with far fewer equipment, manpower and terrain advantages. Also, if we look at the beginning of Operation Barbarossa in June 1941, we find that the Germans managed within 35 days to occupy almost double the amount of Soviet territory as they had in Poland. I would say the initial 6 months of Operation Barbarossa were far worse for the USSR than the September campaign was for Poland, that Soviet army units were far worse led, and that millions of Soviet soldiers died simply because of Stalinist stupidity rather than in any meaningful defense of the homeland. Konstantin Pleshakov's 2005 book Stalin's Folly : The Tragic First Ten Days of World War Two on the Eastern Front mentions (as several others do) how, on the evening of 30. July, Stalin had simply collapsed at his dacha and refused to see anyone or deal with anything, and the leading members of the Politburo showed up. Stalin believed at that point they had come to arrest him for his extreme negligence, and was stunned to hear them simply asking him to return to work, that the country needed him.
I'm not fond of re-thinking WW2 and how it unfolded, but the more revisionism comes from Western authors (with modern political goals) the more Russians will be aware not only of their own history, but also of the before hidden aspects of the history of others...as a shield against various accusations.
I'm not familiar with modern Russian histories of the war, other than those that generally make it to the West. I do remember, however, Soviet histories of the war from up to the 1980s that largely demeaned, ignored or ridiculed any contributions to the war outside of the Soviet Union itself. Soviet war histories never examined difficult questions like the attacks on Finland and Poland in 1939-40, or why Moscow could scream so much about a Western second front in Western Europe against the Germans, but remained quite on the Soviet-Japanese treaty of non-aggression signed after Khalkin Gol while the Americans had to fight two wars, one in Europe and another even more brutal and logistically difficult war against the Japanese. Imagine my surprise when I came to the West and discovered Western libraries filled with books on Operation Barbarossa, Stalingrad, the terrible siege of Leningrad, most of them very sympathetic to the USSR and the sufferings of the Soviet peoples. The West has almost always acknowledged the Soviet contribution to the war effort - indeed, I've read many Western histories that claimed the war could not have been won without the Soviet alliance - but I can't really say, with a few noted exceptions (Nekrich & Geller come to mind, and to a lesser extent Volkoganov), that I know too many Russian-written histories that say anything similar about the USSR's alliance with the West, or that, quite frankly, give much credit to anyone but Russians. It was a dangerous but common stunt in 1980s Polish schools to write a "t" like this: †, referring to the communist lie about Katyn. It was one of the few outlets we had in a (Soviet puppet) world where our history textbooks only talked about the Russians in WW II. Obviously I have a certain background and with it a bias, but memories of the quality of Russian history make it difficult for me to believe that modern Russians are nearly as maligned by the West as happens in reverse. When I read articles like Trenin's that talk of Poland's "defection" to NATO - we didn't defect; we never joined the Soviet empire willingly, we were captives, prisoners - it shows me that to at least some extent, many modern Russians still look at us as mere empire fodder and the West as the eternal Russian bogeyman, like Quixote's tilting at windmills.
I am not fond of Stalin or his policies. Furthermore I would have joined the Whites in the Civil war.
Joining the Whites in 1917-1922 would not have made you any Polish friends; Denikin and Wrangle both wanted to restore the Russian empire, including re-annexing Poland and Finland as well. That's why Pilsudski initially supported Lenin, because he thought the Bolsheviks would always be a weak but radical government with little real control over the oblasts. Oops - everyone makes mistakes.
However the more Soviet and Stalinist equals in anyone's mind as Russian the more tension there will be. Russians suffered more from Communism than any other nation on Earth (yes even including Chinese), however if it is used as an excuse for modern political gains every Russian will defend...not Stalin, not Bolshevism but Motherland just as they did in WW2. USSR survived because people were fighting not for Stalin, not for colonies, but for their own existance. They fought and died in a war that was long planned and desired by many politicians....
I would agree with much of the above, though not all. China under Mao did manage to have even more people killed, but that's just a statistic. Stalin's USSR was a close second. But overall, again, our problem with Russia is its current policies, not its history. The real problem with Russia's history is that the current Russian leadership insists on romanticizing it, and (sometimes only in words, other times in deeds) trying to re-create it in modern Russia. Modern Poles are really grateful for the huge sacrifices Soviet soldiers made in WW II, particularly those that fought in Poland in 1944. From our perspective, it's just a big problem that after the Germans were defeated and expelled, that the USSR didn't leave, that it stayed and imposed another empire on us, one that looked an awful lot like the military occupation of 1795-1918. Our concern is merely whether modern Russia has completely renounced and repudiated that heritage - i.e., that it won't happen again. As I've said, each time we ask that question, we get a mixture of defiant self-righteousness or vague statements in response. We know modern Germany is no threat, we don't know that about modern Russia, as it is not clear that Russians have made up their mind what they want.
Pokurcz
Emperor
I say Amen to that.
privatehudson
The Ultimate Badass
- Joined
- Oct 15, 2003
- Messages
- 4,821
I'd have to say that a number of western authors that I have read who deal with the eastern front (for example Beevor) do so with respect for the Russian soldiers and praise their bravery and achievements. That shouldn't stop them from criticising the Red army for its lack of discipline in Eastern Prussia or Stalin for his callous and paranoid attitude to liberated POWs (to name two examples) though. This is not out of anti-Russian feeling but out of a genuine disgust at what happened.
And to be honest it is much better to discuss and debate such issues than sweep them under the carpet as if they never happened. Western authors debate controversial western actions (Dresden, Hisroshima etc) so why we are suddenly anti-Russian for questioning Russia's controversial actions is beyond me. Beevor mentions in Berlin that the majority of Red Army veterans refuse to admit any excesses occurred in Germany and the few that do would rather not discuss the matter. It would seem the modern Russians may well be happy to follow this same trend.
The last time I was in Waterstones (a chain of bookshop) I'd say I saw 2-3 books on Dresden, 1 on the British colonial period in Kenya, 1 on Hiroshima and another on European/American treatment of the Native Americans. If a Minister was in charge of hiding our embarassing past I'd be demanding his resignation by now.
And to be honest it is much better to discuss and debate such issues than sweep them under the carpet as if they never happened. Western authors debate controversial western actions (Dresden, Hisroshima etc) so why we are suddenly anti-Russian for questioning Russia's controversial actions is beyond me. Beevor mentions in Berlin that the majority of Red Army veterans refuse to admit any excesses occurred in Germany and the few that do would rather not discuss the matter. It would seem the modern Russians may well be happy to follow this same trend.
The last time I was in Waterstones (a chain of bookshop) I'd say I saw 2-3 books on Dresden, 1 on the British colonial period in Kenya, 1 on Hiroshima and another on European/American treatment of the Native Americans. If a Minister was in charge of hiding our embarassing past I'd be demanding his resignation by now.
Gelion
Retired Captain
There's a lot to reply and I have absolutely no time!!!! 
Anyways I think I will do it little by little, like last time.
Anyways I think I will do it little by little, like last time.
privatehudson
The Ultimate Badass
- Joined
- Oct 15, 2003
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*waits for the first little*
Gelion
Retired Captain
Getting to it 
as you can guess - my life became bearable... thus I am here.
as you can guess - my life became bearable... thus I am here.
Gelion
Retired Captain
I might have been as well as it might have been more "let others fight and me join later" strategy. Either way it was not very appealing to the Soviet Union.
thanks and glad you uderstand that....
Few people can understand geopolitics. Kudos to you
I still like to keep different tones with different people. I dont know that many Poles, but you I respect and like
Nah!.... the arguments are only as old as both nations.... as for when they will be over I could hope that it will happen when both nations find something more interesting to do. Just to add most of my compatriots dont think about Poland and "historical problems" that often. As far as I can tell the only ones that are concerned in Poland are the government and newly educated youth (not all)...
I was referring to the pre-1914 unification. Soviet reasons were more "down to earth" and you know what they were
The question of tolerance of Rech Pospolita towards Othrodox Christians is an interesting one and I'm afraid there was a degree of "covertion" and "domination" of one religion over the other. Needless to say when the "owner" changed the direction also changed. Looking for who has stared this will take us far....
I'd be very interested if you could find those justifications. I really need them to get a clearer picture....
I totally agree, however the whole situation before the war looked like Poland was going to side with the Germans.... if the war broke out as sad as it is Poland was doomed. Logically siding with the Germans might have saved Poland and thats what the elite wanted. How should've the Soviet Union reacted?
I understand the Polish position, but Soviet fears of a "crusade" were just as real...
I hope you feel the same way about Lithuanian territories.... Yes Poland was opportunistic and suffered from greater opportunistic states.... IMHO there are few thigns to discuss
Reading after the rest of your post I could only point out that historical disagreements should and must be resolved, howerver under two conditions:
1. The goal of such efforts should be settling hitorical disagreements and promoting good relations between nations, not political goals.
2. Such actions should be taken by governments that are calm and anti-xenofobic.
Sadly none of these conditions can be met at this time. Hoepfully if the tensions will ease in the world and Europe finally becomes a de-militarized "peace-zone" it would be possible to resolve these conflicts.
[not much of a debate here, but I dont really see majour disagreements, unless you want to point me to them
]
Vrylakas said:
Don't think so.
Why would it be shameful? Poland got what belonged to it for a large part of its history. At least Poles were a majority in Lwow and Wilno (Vilnius) cities, and in entire Vilnius region, while Lithuanians were a tiny minority there, less than Byelorussians or Jews.
I didn't like that part of your post, as You surely wouldn't like me to call return of Vilnius to Lithuania a shameful act.
My family comes from Podole/Podolia region in Ukraine. Before the war it was halfly polish - actually, including Jews a bit more people spoke Polish there than Ukrainian. It belonged to Poland for a couple of centuries and I don't think that Poland demanded it was anything wrong.
Pokurcz
Emperor
To Geloions credit he does not glorify the Soviet union as the peak state of desirability for Russia.
It is interesting, however, that in his dislike of what the USSR stands for (perhaps even shame), knowing that it subtracts from his homelands historical glory, in stead of coming to terms with it as an unfortunate part of Russian history he in stead takes a les painful mental shortcut an refuses to admit that The USSR was the successor of tsarist Russia. Refusing to admit that the Soviet Union at the time was Russia under a different name.
The example perfectly illustrates a mechanism that has been mentioned by Vrylakas. The condition of Russia today never having come to terms with the least apealing part of its history. Instead making roundabout and crablike movements, in an unbecoming and often history twisting manner, to avoid and postpone the facing of the ugly face of deeds past.
I am at this time finishing “Stalin. The court of the red tsar” by Simon Sebag Montefiore, a brilliant book, amongst other things showing the human side of this monstrous historical character. And therefore razing a cautioning finger that you needn’t be a demon of some sort to err against humanity and your own people as he did and that it will surely happen again, and has happened since on a smaller scale. It seems to be a human condition, ruthless rule through terror.
The book also shows, without a doubt, that Stalin, who in fact created the USSR saw himself as the successor of previous Russian tsars and compared himself to Ivan the Terrible and Peter the Great. In fact despite that there where many non Russians in the ruling class of the USSR it was always seen as a viability to be anything but an ethnically pure Russian.
Stalin himself thought the “Russians” to be the connecting glue that held the Soviet union together, and at the end of his reign became obsessed by promoting “Russianness” as the peak of desirability and Russian culture to be the only one worth promoting in the USSR, effectively banning all other cultures in a fervour of Russian nationalism and pride.
It is interesting, however, that in his dislike of what the USSR stands for (perhaps even shame), knowing that it subtracts from his homelands historical glory, in stead of coming to terms with it as an unfortunate part of Russian history he in stead takes a les painful mental shortcut an refuses to admit that The USSR was the successor of tsarist Russia. Refusing to admit that the Soviet Union at the time was Russia under a different name.
The example perfectly illustrates a mechanism that has been mentioned by Vrylakas. The condition of Russia today never having come to terms with the least apealing part of its history. Instead making roundabout and crablike movements, in an unbecoming and often history twisting manner, to avoid and postpone the facing of the ugly face of deeds past.
I am at this time finishing “Stalin. The court of the red tsar” by Simon Sebag Montefiore, a brilliant book, amongst other things showing the human side of this monstrous historical character. And therefore razing a cautioning finger that you needn’t be a demon of some sort to err against humanity and your own people as he did and that it will surely happen again, and has happened since on a smaller scale. It seems to be a human condition, ruthless rule through terror.
The book also shows, without a doubt, that Stalin, who in fact created the USSR saw himself as the successor of previous Russian tsars and compared himself to Ivan the Terrible and Peter the Great. In fact despite that there where many non Russians in the ruling class of the USSR it was always seen as a viability to be anything but an ethnically pure Russian.
Stalin himself thought the “Russians” to be the connecting glue that held the Soviet union together, and at the end of his reign became obsessed by promoting “Russianness” as the peak of desirability and Russian culture to be the only one worth promoting in the USSR, effectively banning all other cultures in a fervour of Russian nationalism and pride.
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