As Britain celebrated Victory in Europe (VE) Day on Would possibly 8 1945, the Polish airmen of RAF 305 Bomber Squadron captured a starkly other sentiment of their diary. “‘Victory!’ every Anglo-Saxon says in greeting instead of the traditional ‘Hello!’. The word ‘Victory!’ is devoid of meaning, power and any sense today only for the Poles.”
Regardless of their essential contributions to the allied battle effort, from the Struggle of Britain to Monte Cassino, Polish forces felt remoted and betrayed, their hopes of a unfastened Poland overwhelmed by means of the Yalta settlement. On that first VE Day, many Poles who fought with the allied forces recorded feeling unhappy, remoted or sour.
Tadeusz Szumowski, who served within the RAF in Britain discovered it nearly not possible to sign up for within the celebrations. He wrote in his diary: “Our war is lost, the war which we fought so hard and so long to win … It is a very long time since I felt so alone.”
A Polish soldier in Italy wrote: “The war is over – but not for us. The population of the greater part of the world are happy, in consequence; but we are sad. I am afraid that we have lost so many of our best men all for nothing.”
Many of those squaddies got here from jap Poland, which used to be invaded by means of the Soviet Union in 1939. Along side their households, they’d been deported to Siberia or Kazakhstan and got here out simplest beneath a so-called “amnesty” after Russia entered the battle at the allied facet. Gellhorn reported: “They follow the Russian advance across Poland with agonized interest.”
As I discovered when researching my e book concerning the various nationalities preventing along Britain in the second one global battle, Polish squaddies wrote about Russia at all times in addition to speaking about it. Their letters had been censored and quoted in censorship experiences.
The letters are placing for the numerous phrases which tackle meanings that show a gulf that opens up, keeping apart Poles from different allied squaddies. Victory belongs to others whilst Poles have long past all the way down to a catastrophic defeat.
Russia, broadly considered a valued best friend, is the enemy of Poles. The Polish slogan “For our freedom and yours” is rewritten in a single letter: “We are fighting for yours and our freedom, but now I think rather only for yours.” Every other letter asks: “What are we fighting for if Poland is to be enslaved?”
Polish pilots of RAF 303 (Polish) Fighter Squadron right through the second one global battle.
Imprial Struggle Museum
Poles in finding it insufferable to be informed that Russia is releasing Poland, the use of heavy irony. “The ‘liberation’ of Poland by our so-called Allies is causing us great anxiety. Probably my own home will soon be ‘liberated’.”
Every other soldier cautions: “Never, never congratulate our people of Warsaw and Poland being ‘liberated’. This sounds like the most cruel irony and is deeply resented by every Pole. You could speak about a lamb being liberated from a bear by a tiger.”
The concept that of “home” additionally acquires new meanings which can be devoid of any affiliation with excitement or belonging. Because the battle ends, allied squaddies’ ideas are an increasing number of concerning the prospect of returning house – however censors reported in 1944: “Thousands of letters written by Polish soldiers in the last days repeat as a cardinal topic that to Poland governed by communists they won’t return.”
One soldier writes: “It would be better to be killed here on the battlefield than to be alive in the new ‘Red Paradise’ in Poland.” Every other writes: “There is no return for us to the Soviet republic of Poland which seems to be the newest invention of our Allies.”
Echoes of Yalta
The Yalta settlement of February 1945 between The usa, Britain and Russia, the “Big Three” powers, showed Poles’ worst fears. Censors document that within the squaddies’ letters, it “overshadows all other topics”, and has “evoked a terrible shock amongst the Polish troops … they find that they are lost and betrayed”.
One soldier writes: “For the last few days I have been in a state of dumb bewilderment. Occasionally I ask myself, ‘Can it be true?’ … I cannot believe that it has really happened.”
Yalta is in Crimea – a part of the territory annexed by means of Russia sooner than its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, has made it transparent he’s going to be offering no concessions on Ukraine, which he has argued all alongside he sees as an inalienable a part of Russia. This can be a stark reminder of Yalta when Josef Stalin made concessions on different issues, however none on Poland.
Trump’s management has introduced Ukraine no safety promises. Its framework to finish the battle will permit Russia to retain the territory it has seized. There at the moment are echoes of what one Polish soldier wrote in 1945 of the Yalta settlement: “This business smells and no high-sounding words can disguise the stench of a bad deed.”
