Polish-Jewish Relations: 1,300 Keyword-Phrase-Indexed Book Reviews (by Jan Peczkis)

Wyrok Na Miasto: Berlin i Moskwa Wobec Powstania Warszawskiego, by Tadeusz Sawicki. 1993. Wydawnictwo Bellona, Warszawa

The Red Army, in German Military Opinion, Was Capable of Taking Warsaw During the Warsaw Uprising

A CITY CONDEMNED TO DEATH is the title of this Polish-language book. It alludes to the fact that both Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union ended up sentencing the Polish capital to death. In this review, I discuss matters that have seldom been brought up in other books on the Warsaw Rising.

Sawicki believes that the Germans should have just withdrawn from Warsaw and allowed the Poles to take control of their capital city. This fait accompli would have put the Soviets in an awkward spot, and could potentially have divided the Allies were the Communists to make a move against the Poles. (p. 14).

OPERATION BAGRATION

The big westward push of the Red Army, which began June 23, 1944, was supported by 2.4 million soldiers, 36,400 artillery pieces, 5,200 tanks, and 5,300 warplanes. (p. 11). So successful was it that the German front was not only routed, but also in danger of collapsing. (p. 15).

The original plan for Operation Bagration, following its shattering of the central part of the German front, called for the Red Army to break up the remaining German army at Siedlce, and thus open the gate to Warsaw. (pp. 16-17). However, the Red Army was diverted to take Lublin instead–for political and not military reasons. Stalin wanted a clear-cut Polish city to serve as the nucleus of the Communist puppet government that was about to be forced on all of Poland. Lublin was taken July 24 (p. 17), and generations of Communist-ruled Poles were henceforth forced to commemorate this date as the birth of the “new” Poland.

WHY THE SOVIET ARMY DID NOT TAKE WARSAW IN AUGUST OR SEPTEMBER 1944

The Wehrmacht regrouped after its drubbing in Operation Bagration, but this did not eliminate the capability of the Red Army moving on Warsaw. The Germans reckoned this so (see below).

Apologists for Soviet conduct allege that the Red Army was too exhausted and overextended, following its highly-successful Operation Bagration, to take Warsaw in a timely manner and to relieve the Poles’ Warsaw Uprising. German General Nikolaus von Vormann begged to differ. He should know: He was put in charge of defending the Warsaw sector against the advancing Red Army! (p. 16).

Pointedly, Von Vormann applied increasing pressure on von dem Bach-Zelewski, in August and September 1944, to suppress the Uprising. (p. 51). Von Vormann realized that the Red Army, notwithstanding the setbacks it had experienced, and the reinforcements that the Wehrmacht had obtained, would sooner or later break through Warsaw. He wanted the Uprising out of the way as soon as possible. (p. 51).

ROKOSSOVSKY PREVENTED FROM TAKING WARSAW, EVEN IF HE WANTED TO

Author Sawicki brings up a little-known fact. Stalin intervened, and ordered the withdrawal of critical parts of the Red Army, from the Warsaw sector, on August 20 and again on September 8. This militarily eliminated the possibility of the Red Army taking Warsaw during the Warsaw Uprising. (p. 51).

It was cold-blooded Soviet Communist perfidy.

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For a definitive work on the Soviet-betrayed Warsaw Uprising, see:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2020/08/06/warsaw-uprising-definitive-work-poles-and-not-only-jews-faced-choiceless-choices-zawodny/