Semitism 101: Poland 1939 (East Poland? say, isn't that where Jedwabne is. . .?)
Honest Aryan
militia which was friendly to the Red Army and had made its
apperance even before the enemy had marched in. Armed
and organized, its first task was to arrest the students and
Boy Scouts who had been posted as guards and who
carried old carbines in some cases taller than them.
The Jews roughed up the shocked youngsters who had
considered their captors as friends and classmates, before
turning them over to the Soviets from whom they had
prior directions. What was the fate of those young Poles?
In many cases torture and death. This Jewish militia
would help carry out the Soviet's dirty work during
their occupation. My family would fall victim to them. "
http://www.polandsholocaust.org/memoir2.html
"A Gulag and Holocaust Memoir of Janina Sulkowska-Gladun
The Red Army Invades
----------------------------
At 5 a.m. on September 17, 1939, our telephone rang. It was the
third week of war and it had been ringing day and night with urgent
messages for my father Jan in his capacity as county secretary.
Before I could throw on a housecoat, he had already run from my
parents' bedroom and picked it up. He was used to the routine by
now.
On the other end was the Starost of the county and a family friend
with the latest news.
'Hello...I'm listening...Yes...When?...Where?...I see...I see...'
my father's voice trailed off chocked with emotion and chronic
bronchitis.
My father slowly hung up. I watched him as a silhouette swaying
against our veranda doors, his gold bracelet glinting in the early
dawn as he cradled his forehead in a pair of graceful hands. He said
nothing as he tried to compose himself.
Finally he whispered: 'The Soviet army has crossed the border...it's
all over...it's the end.'
'Maybe they're coming to help us against the Germans!' I spoke up
trying to bolster both our spirits.
He just put his arm around me and shook his head. We both realized
that it was all over for Poland. But what lay in store for us now?
That day the sound of artillery echoed from the hills east of
Krzemieniec as our lightly-armed Frontier Defense Corps opposed the
Red Army which was pouring across the border. Locked in mortal
combat with the Nazis, we did not anticipate an attack from that
direction and our shock was considerable. Confusion reigned as to
the intent of the Soviet Union, but Poland was not privy to the
secret protocals of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact which would see
us divided between two age-old enemies. A horror unimaginable by
any of us was unfolding...
Later that morning my father dispatched a county car to pick up my
mother Natalia and my two younger siblings, Czeslaw and Wanda, from
a vacation spot in the country where they'd been sent following the
German Stuka attack on our town a few days earlier. Home was the
only place now for the Sulkowski family to face a dark future
together.
Greta Garbo and Jewish Collaborators
-----------------------------------------------
The very next morning a nauseating smell of crude burnt fuel and a
rumble of tanks and tractors announced the arrival of the Red Army
into our beautiful town. I ventured into the streets to see what it
was all about.
My introduction to the Red Army were rag-tag soldiers marching out
of step and tanks that constantly broke down. Even the NKVD officer
wore canvass boots and tattered greatcoats. Though they were
well-armed, they didn't bring supplies with them, and an occasional
soldier would break from the ranks to make a quick purchase. Their
eyes bulged at the amount and quality of goods in the stores, even
as they insisted that they had 'plenty of everything in the USSR -
including Greta Garbos!'
The Poles watched the Soviet invaders with a mixture of revulsion
and fear. Not a few of us cried. But as disconcerting was the
emergence of a local Jewish militia which was friendly to the Red
Army and had made its apperance even before the enemy had marched
in. Armed and organized, its first task was to arrest the students
and Boy Scouts who had been posted as guards and who carried old
carbines in some cases taller than them. The Jews roughed up the
shocked youngsters who had considered their captors as friends and
classmates, before turning them over to the Soviets from whom
they had prior directions. What was the fate of those young Poles?
In many cases torture and death. This Jewish militia would help
carry out the Soviet's dirty work during their occupation. My
family would fall victim to them.
In town, Jews and Ukrainians were cheering and ingratiating
themselves with the Soviets. I recognized many neighbours and
acquaintances among those who were now jostling Poles and eyeing
their property for future theft. Jewish men offered gifts to the
Russians while their wives and daughters kissed their tanks. Among
this rabble were criminals released from jail by the Soviets to
create mayhem. They were all emboldened by posters that had
suddenly appeared urging various groups to attack Poles with axes
and scythes. And the Soviet officers indicated they would not
stand in the way of slaughter which was already turning the
countryside red with the blood of the Polish minority
outnumbered by Ukrainians and Jews.
On that day I had my first encounter with a swaggering group
of traitors attired in leather jackets, red armbands or sashes,
pistols, and hatred in their eyes. I beheld a number of
classmates among them, including girlfriends. These mostly
young Jews, often well-educated and from rich or religious
families, now addressed each other as 'comrade'. One of
them gestured a slash across the throat at me. Their
love for Communism and Joseph Stalin knew no bounds - especially
human sacrifice. They were much worse than the blackmailers and
denouncers who emerged in great numbers among the Jews and who
were mostly interested in the goods and jobs of their Polish
victims.
Starting as Communist sympathisers who flocked to the militia or
acted as informers, these political types would soon graduate into
'agitators,' administrators and even sadistic interrogators for the
Soviets as they filled positions in the new order. A knowledge of
the language and the local scene, combined with their fanaticism,
would be essential to the NKVD's reign of terror; they eagerly
compiled lists and arrested Poles - and Jews, whom they considered
to be enemies of the state. They were the ones who on horseback
would chase my father down the main street like an animal, to act
as interpreter for their torture victims.
A sizable minority of Polish Jews from all levels collaborated,
usually passively but often actively, with the Soviet occupiers in
their liquidation of Poles in eastern Poland in 1939-1941. For many,
including my kin, the last sight they had of Poland or of their
loved ones, was a cattle train bound for Siberia - and a Jew or a
Ukrainian, or both, with a rifle on every wagon."
--
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