Hello, I am responding to your question regarding the various parts of
the Polish Resistance Movement and their importance. Below you will
find information describing the Polish resistance and their various
factions. I have listed full text articles on the Polish resistance as
well as book titles and a DVD on the Polish resistance.
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"The main resistance force in the Nazi occupied Poland was the Armia
Krajowa ("Home Army"; abbreviated "AK"), numbered some 200,000-300,000
soldiers at its peak as well as many more sympathizers.[1] The Home
Army coordinated its operations with the exiled Polish Government in
London and its activity concentrated on sabotage, diversion and
intelligence gathering"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_contribution_to_World_War_II
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Book on underground army:
"The Polish Underground Army, the Western Allies, and the Failure of
Strategic Unity in World War II, foreword by Piotr S. Wandycz,
Jefferson, North Carolina, McFarland & Company, 2005, 244 pp., ISBN
0-7864-2009-X. A ground-breaking, densely documented study of Polish
military staff efforts in World War II, with special reference to
Poland's relations with her allies. "
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Alfred_Peszke
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"Polish resistance movement was a resistance movement in Poland, part
of the anti-fascist resistance movement which fought against the
occupation of Poland by Nazi Germany during World War II. Resistance
to the Nazi German occupation began almost at once, although there is
little terrain in Poland suitable for guerilla operations. The Home
Army (in Polish Armia Krajowa or AK), loyal to the Polish government
in exile in London and a military arm of the Polish Secret State, was
formed from a number of smaller groups in 1942. From 1943 the AK was
in competition with the People's Army (Polish Armia Ludowa or AL),
backed by the Soviet Union and controlled by the Polish Workers' Party
(Polish Polska Partia Robotnicza or PPR). By 1944 the AK had some
380,000 men, although few arms: the AL was much smaller. The Polish
partisan groups (Le?ni) killed about 150,000 Axis during the
occupation."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_resistance_movement_in_World_War_II
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"Squads/troops
Antyfaszystowska Organizacja Bojowa
Armia Krajowa
Armia Ludowa
Bataliony Ch?opskie
Brygada Swietokrzyska
Gwardia Ludowa
Gwardia Ludowa WRN
Le?ni
Milicja Robotnicza Polskiej Partii Robotniczej - Wolno??, Równo??, Niepodleg?o??
Narodowa Organizacja Wojskowa
Narodowe Si?y Zbrojne
Pa?stwowy Korpus Bezpiecze?stwa
Szare Szeregi
Zwi?zek Odwetu
Zwi?zek Walki Zbrojnej
?ydowska Organizacja Bojowa
?ydowski Zwi?zek Walki "
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_resistance_movement_in_World_War_II
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"The Armia Krajowa (Home Army) or AK functioned as the dominant Polish
resistance movement in World War II in German-occupied Poland, which
was active in all areas of the country from September 1939 until its
disbanding in January 1945. The Armia Krajowa, one of the largest
underground resistance movements during World War II, formed the armed
wing of what subsequently became known as the "underground state"
(pa?stwo podziemne)."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armia_Krajowa
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The largest faction of the Polish Resistance ,"Armia Krajowa" was very important:
"Armia Krajowa supplied valuable intelligence information to the
Allies, for example, about V-1 and V-2 flying bombs.'
"Major military and sabotage operations included:
Operation Belt
Operation Tempest
Wilno Uprising
Lwów Uprising
Warsaw Uprising
Armia Krajowa supplied valuable intelligence information to the
Allies, for example, about V-1 and V-2 flying bombs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armia_Krajowa
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Other sites:
"Did you know that the largest underground resistance army during
World War 2 was the Polish Home Army?
300,000 strong at its peak it is credited with supplying the Allies
with constant intelligence information about the eastern front,
providing information about the V-1 rocket in Peenemunde, the sending
over to Britain of the V-2 rocket, the sabotage and destruction of
German supply trains and communication centres.It carried out the
war?s largest uprising (the Warsaw Rising) which lasted 63 days. The
fate of these men and women was to be hounded, often killed and
deported by the Soviet ?liberators?."
http://www.polishresistance-ak.org/Main%20Page.htm
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Book regarding Polish Resistance:
"Author: Dr Marek Ney-Krwawicz
Translated from the Polish original by: Antoni Bohdanowicz
Publisher & Copyrights' holder (English edition):
The Polish Underground Movement (1935-1945) Study Trust
Place and Date of Publication: London 2001
ISBN: 0 9501348 9 9
Brief description:
The Polish Underground (1939-1945) Study Trust? has published in
English a factual account concerning the deeds and organisation of the
Polish Resistance Home Army during the Second World War.
A well-known Polish author, Marek Ney-Krwawicz, an expert in modern
history of the period wrote the original version of the book in
Polish. This English translation fills the gap for the interested
British and American readership as well as Poles whose first language
is English."
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Here is an article for you
"The Polish Underground State and Army"
The most important, however, was the Home Army (AK), the backbone in
the struggle with the occupant. This armed force, evolved from SZP,
through the Union of Armed Combat (ZWZ), to reach its apogee as the
AK. This constituted an integral part of the Polish Armed Forces (PSZ)
and remained under the overall command of the Polish
Commander-in-Chief who remained abroad. The successive commanders in
the SZP-ZWZ-AK chain of development were General Micha?
Tokarzewski-Karaszewicz (pseudonym ?Torwid?), General Stefan Rowecki
(ps. "Grot"), General Tadeusz Komorowski (ps. "Bór"), and General
Leopold Okulicki ("Niedzwiadek?).
http://www.polishresistance-ak.org/2%20Article.htm
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Another article:
"Home Army Intelligence Service"
"Before the last shots of the Polish 1939 Campaign were fired, the
nucleus of the future resistance organisation, the Home Army was being
put into place in Warsaw. At the time it was called Service for the
Victory of Poland. Soon replaced by the Union of Armed Combat in
November 1939, it developed into a formidable fighting machine. In
February 1942 it was renamed the Home Army (Armia Krajowa). From the
outset it was recognised that one of the major tasks of the Home Army
was to organise an efficient intelligence gathering service both for
its own needs and that of the allied war effort. Built partially on
the pre war structure of Polish intelligence networks, expanded and
developed during the occupation, the Home Army Intelligence Service
become the chief source of information for the allies about the
eastern front. The important role of intelligence was recognised by
the Commandant in Chief of the Union of Armed Combat, Gen. K.
Sosnkowski in his first instruction of January 1940 directed to the
Commanding Officer Polish resistance, in which the first point was
entirely devoted to the organisation of the intelligence service. "
http://www.polishresistance-ak.org/3%20Article.htm
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This site links to articles:
http://www.polishresistance-ak.org/Essays.htm
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This site lists titles:
"Ascherson N., The Struggles for Poland, London 1987
Banasiewicz C., Warsaw aflame 1939-45
Bartoszewski W., Righteous among nations, London 1965
Bartoszewski W., The blood shed unites us, Interpress Publishers, Warsaw 1970
Bartoszewski W., The Samaritans, N.Y. 1970
Bartoszewski W., Warsaw death ring, Interpress Publishers, Krakow 1968
Bauminger A., Roll of honour, Tel-Aviv, 1971
Bokiewicz Z.,The scouts field post in the Warsaw Uprising, London 1974
Bór-Komorowski T., The secret army, V. Gollanez Ltd., London 1950
Bruce G., The Warsaw Uprising, PAN Books Ltd., London 1972
Carter F., The First Breaking of Enigma, [The Bletchley Park Trust
Reports, No.10, 1999]
Castle J., The password is courage, London 1954
Celt M., By parachute to Warsaw, D. Crisp&Co., London 1945
Ciechanowski J., The Warsaw Rising, Univerity Press Cambridge 1974
Cohen I., The Jews in the war, F. Muller Ltd., London 1942
Conversino M., Fighting with the Soviets, University Press of Kansas 1997 "
http://www.polishresistance-ak.org/FurtherR.htm
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another site:
"The Warsaw Uprising of 1944 ? a heroic and tragic 63-day struggle to
liberate World War 2 Warsaw from Nazi/German occupation. Undertaken by
the Home Army (Armia Krajowa, AK), the Polish resistance group, at the
time Allied troops were breaking through the Normandy defenses and the
Red Army was standing at the line of the Vistula River.
Warsaw could have been one of the first European capitals liberated;
however, various military and political miscalculations, as well as
global politics ? played among Joseph Stalin, Winston Churchill and
Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) ? turned the dice against it.
This site is dedicated to all those who fought for their freedom in
the Warsaw Uprising of 1944 as well as all those who, as civilians,
perished in the effort. "
http://warsawuprising.com/
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Here is a DVD:
"Europe's Secret Armies - Resisting Hitler - The Polish Resistance "
Description
Features eye witness accounts and archived and new location footage
which explore the fortunes of the Polish during the Second World War.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=140022816589
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Another book:
"Bibliographic information
Title: Repression and Resistance in Communist Europe
ISBN: 0415306698
Publisher: Routledge (UK)
Author(s): J. C. Sharman
Format: Hardcover
Publication Date: Sep 1, 2003
Dimensions: 6.25 x 9.25 x 0.50 in
Pages: 216
http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0415306698&id=TIJzN6IFcxYC&dq=polish+resistance+books
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Another book:
"Bibliographic information
Title: A Secret Life
ISBN: 1891620541
Publisher: Public Affairs
Author(s): Benjamin Weiser
Format: Hardcover
Publication Date: Jan 6, 2004
Subject: Biography / Autobiography
Dimensions: 6.96 x 9.14 x 1.25 in
Pages: 383 "
http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN1891620541&id=2vK3x16KSVQC&dq=polish+resistance+books
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Book:
"On April 19, 1943, thousands of Nazi troops were given the order to
remove all Jews in the Warsaw ghetto, a few square blocks sheltering
the remnants of the half million or more Jewish citizens of Poland's
capital, to the death camps of Treblinka and Auschwitz. They were to
kill those who resisted. A few hundred of the trapped Jews, mostly
teenagers, armed only with pistols, Molotov cocktails, and a few light
machine guns, vowed to fight back. Resistance is the full story of the
uprising and the events leading to it, told by a survivor of the
battle who is now a world-renowned Israeli scholar of the Holocaust.
Warsaw in the 1920s and 1930s was the home of Europe's largest and
most vibrant Jewish community. It included the rich, the poor, and the
middle class; casual assimilationists and ardent Zionists;
representatives of the full spectrum of political and religious
factions. Then came the German onslaught of ruthless violence against
the Jews - isolation and starvation amid desperation and disease -
then deportations. As the ghetto walls rose, hundreds of thousands
were rounded up and sent to Treblinka. But resistance began to take
shape, and when the final attack order came, the ghetto fighters stood
ready. Supported by moving and dramatic excerpts from diaries,
letters, and other documents of the period, Resistance is destined to
take its place as the classic account of a most important turning
point in Jewish and world history."
Bibliographic information
Title: Resistance
ISBN: 0395901308
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Books
Author(s): Israel Gutman, Asrael Gutman
Format: Paperback
Publication Date: Apr 23, 1998
Subject: History / General History
Dimensions: 5.98 x 8.98 x 0.84 in
Pages: 328
http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0395901308&id=bKjJsGI_HkMC&dq=polish+resistance+books
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I hope that you find this information useful. -jdb-ga |
