Karol Świerczewski
Karol Świerczewski , ( nom de guerre : General Walter ), (born February 22, 1897 in Warsaw , † March 28, 1947 in Jabłonki near Baligród ) was a Polish officer and general in the service of Bolshevik Russia from 1918, Soviet Russia from 1919, des Republican Spain as Soviet division commander in the Spanish Civil War from 1936 and from 1944 of the army of the Provisional Government of National Unity of Poland. He died in a skirmish, presumably with militants of the Ukrainian insurgent army in 1947. In the history of the communist regime , he was portrayed as a hero, whereas in the history of the post-1989 period his struggle against the Republic of Poland and his part in the Stalinist repression are emphasized.
Life
Early years
Karol Świerczewski grew up in Warsaw as the son of a poor Polish working-class family, when his homeland was part of the Russian Empire after it lost its state independence in 1815 ( Congress Poland ). He was evacuated to Moscow by the Russian Army when he was working in a Warsaw factory during World War I at the age of 18 .
Russian civil war
In Moscow he joined the Bolsheviks in 1918 and fought for the Red Army in the Russian Civil War . For his services he was awarded the Order of the Red Banner . Even after the end of the civil war, he remained in Bolshevik Russia , which in 1922 became part of the Soviet Union founded by Vladimir Ilyich Lenin .
Polish-Soviet War
During the Polish-Soviet War in 1920 he fought against Poland in the now regular Red Army at his own request. As a communist he did not sympathize with the Second Polish Republic , which was also founded in 1919 , he reported as a lieutenant to be transferred to the western front , where he was wounded in battle. After his recovery he returned to the front, but the course of the war had already turned for Poland and against Soviet Russia.
1920s
From 1921, when the war against Poland ended with the defeat of Soviet Russia, he returned to the Soviet Union and taught at the Polish School of the Red Communards . In 1928 Świerczewski completed his training at the Military Academy "MW Frunze" in Moscow and from then on served in the General Staff of the Red Army.
Spanish Civil War
In 1936 he came to Spain under the code name General Walter to support the republic against the nationalists under General Francisco Franco in the Spanish Civil War . There he rose to division commander (see Soviet General Ranks ), but was also recognized by the Republican government as a Spanish general. Initially, he gained a reputation as a competent commander when he led the XIV International Brigade and later the 35th International Division , but in the late phase of the civil war his military performance was rather changeable and his units suffered heavy losses repeatedly.
Świerczewski was also a member of the Military Council founded on October 26, 1936 in Albacete , the headquarters of the International Brigades, which emerged from the Organizing Committee for the establishment of the International Brigades. Other relatives were Vittorio Vidali and Vital Gaymann (Vidal), Constancia de la Mora acted as interpreter .
After the military defeat of the Second Spanish Republic in 1939, he returned to the Soviet Union.
Second World War
At the time of the attack on Poland by the German Reich in early September 1939 (→ attack on Poland ), which marked the beginning of the Second World War , Świerczewski was the commander of the 248th Rifle Division of the Red Army; He also held this position during the German invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941. A little later, he led some command training courses for the Soviet secret service NKVD . Around mid-1943 he became one of the generals who were tasked with forming the 1st Polish Army , part of the Soviet-controlled “ Polish Armed Forces in the Soviet Union ” (also: Polish Armed Forces in the East). In January 1944 he was after he and his staff at the tomb of the murdered Polish officers the oath of revenge of the Soviet counterintelligence ( SMERSH had done), Force General of the newly formed 2nd Polish Army under the command of Marshal of the Soviet Union Konev . In the same year he rose to become one of the leaders of the communist Polish Workers' Party and the still unofficial government of the People's Republic of Poland , which was established after the war under Soviet pressure.
In the winter of 1944 he led the 2nd Polish Army during the fighting on the Vistula to recapture the western Polish territories of the Second Republic before 1939 and during the further advance on German territory.
In March 1945, the 2nd Polish Army was reorganized under his command on the Oder front in Lower Silesia and equipped with new Soviet tanks and vehicles.
From mid-April 1945 the 1st Ukrainian Front launched its major offensive on the Lusatian Neisse as part of the Red Army's operations for the planned conquest of Berlin (→ Battle of Berlin ). Świerczewski and his troops were supposed to secure the left southern flank of the planned advance on the Dresden - Bautzen - Niesky line as part of the so-called Operation Lausitz . The fighting lasting several days at the Battle of Bautzen in Upper Lusatia and the partially occupied city of Bautzen caused very heavy losses, especially for the Polish attackers. Their brigades had lost most of their tanks and were also heavily decimated. Even the Soviet units sent to support suffered heavy losses. The Wehrmacht succeeded, however, with its last major tank attack of the war, Bautzen and the surrounding reclaim and liberate trapped own troops before. The fighting was carried on with extreme brutality on both sides, including war crimes . Although a further advance of the German troops in the first place by the lack of fuel - supply ( gasoline ) for the tanks from the Hydrierwerken was prevented, these areas could be held until the war ended.
Despite the military disaster in April 1945, General Karol Świerczewski was promoted to army general after the Battle of Bautzen . Polish propaganda also hid the inglorious role of the Polish staff during the battle. Although the fighting was described as extremely bloody, it was never described as a defeat for the Polish army . The political myth of the undefeated general was built around Świerczewski .
After the war and death
In February 1946, Świerczewski became Poland's Deputy Minister of Defense . He was subsequently also actively involved in the persecution of the anti-communist underground in Poland and signed many death sentences while a communist regime was being installed in the country.
In March 1947, he fell in Baligród in the Beskidy Mountains in an ambush believed by guerrillas of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army ( Ukrajinska Powstanska Armija ) and was in the subsequent battle in Jabłonki shot. The circumstances of death have not yet been clarified exactly. In retaliation for this, the Warsaw leadership started the long previously planned Aktion Weichsel ( Akcja Wisła ), the forced resettlement of over 140,000 Ukrainians and Lemks from the southeast of the now communist People's Republic of Poland to the " Reclaimed Areas " in what is now northern and western Poland.
According to a much discussed but unproven version, the NKVD itself had been interested in his death.
Aftermath
In 1967 the National Bank of Poland issued a commemorative coin on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of Świerczewski's death with a face value of 10 złoty. In 1975 it was shown on the 50-zloty note, which was worth only 0.005 new zloty (PLN) with the introduction of new banknotes in 1996.
Since the political change in 1989, its role has been viewed much more critically in today's Poland, on the one hand because of the military debacle in April 1945 and on the other hand because of its dubious function in the military and repression apparatus in the installation of the communist regime in Poland. With the end of the Warsaw Pact , numerous of his monuments were removed and streets named after him (such as the Warsaw Trasa WZ ) were renamed again.
On May 21, 2003, the Organization of Former Polish Veterans and Independence Fighters appealed to the Institute for National Remembrance ( Instytut Pamięci Narodowej - IPN ) to investigate the extent to which Karol Świerczewski had committed crimes against the Polish nation during his political activities before and after 1945 . In a letter, the organization recalled that he was "one of the people who consciously worked towards the enslavement of the Polish nation through the forcible enforcement of a communist regime that was a vassal of Moscow". Among the crimes, which are not subject to statute of limitations and which should be cleared up by the IPN, are 29 death sentences against Polish soldiers and officers that Świerczewski signed as commander of the Soviet-controlled 2nd Polish Army.
literature
- Jerzy Kochanowski : "... but they will praise this name". General Karol Świerczewski , in: Silke Satjukow ; Rainer Gries (Hrsg.): Socialist heroes: a cultural history of propaganda figures in Eastern Europe and the GDR . Berlin: Ch. Links, 2002 ISBN 3-86153-271-9 , pp. 193-202
Web links
- 50 zloty note (1975)
swell
- ↑ cf. Sławomir Cenckiewicz: Długie ramię Moskwy. Wywiad wojskowy Polski Ludowej 1943–1991. Warszawa 2011, ISBN 978-83-7506-875-7 .
- ^ Antony Beevor : The Spanish Civil War , 2nd edition, ISBN 978-3-442-15492-0 , page 208
- ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original from October 20, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ "Wisła" ( memento of the original from August 29, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Encyclopedia PWN.
- ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from May 21, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ a b Karol Świerczewski "Walter" (1897–1947) IPN.
- ↑ http://www.republika.pl/antinazi2/maj%203.htm
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Świerczewski, Karol |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | General Walter (nom de guerre) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | General of the Soviet and Polish armies, member of the Sejm |
| DATE OF BIRTH | February 22, 1897 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Warsaw |
| DATE OF DEATH | March 28, 1947 |
| Place of death | Jabłonki near Baligród |