Holocaust - Some Facts
On Feb 1 st , 2018, the
Poland’s Senate has adopted a
Holocaust law. It is a product as
well as a source of controversy in
Poland and the world.
Disapproving the view that
some in Poland had participated
in the crimes committed by Nazis
against the Jews during the World
War- II, the law asserted that the
‘Poles were victims as were the
Jews’. The Poland’s ruling party,
Law and Justice Party (PiS) said
that this law was needed to protect
the ‘Poland’s honour and ensure
historians recognise that Poles,
like Jews, were punished under
the Nazis.’ The Law sets fines or
a maximum three years’ jail term
for anyone who “ascribes the
responsibility or co-responsibility
to the Polish nation or State for the
crimes committed by the German
Third Reich”.
Ever since it assumed power
in 2015, the Law and Justice Party
- an ultra - nationalist party – is
persistently attempting to re –
write the history to suppress the
evidence and facts concerning the
crimes.
Here is a look into some
related historical facts.
In 1930s, the German
Fascists led by Hitler came on the
world scene with an ambitious
strategy to bring the entire world
under their heel by unleashing a
most disastrous War. Hitler
wanted to wipe out the Socialist
Soviet Union from the world map,
crush the revolutions, seize the
colonies, semi – colonies and the
areas of influence under the
powers like Britain and France and
impose German domination over
the entire World.
While the European imperia-
list powers were reluctant to
checkmate the German Fascists,
the German Fascists went ahead
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with a strategy of first taking other
countries into their control, isolate
and single out the Soviet Union for
future assault.
On Aug 22 nd , 1939, Hitler said:
“Poland will be de – populated and
settled with Germans.... As for the
rest, the fate of Russia will be
exactly the same. We will break
the Soviet Union. Then, there will
be the dawn of German rule of the
earth”.
In Sept 1939, the German
Fascists attacked Poland. As
noted by the Nazi Chief of
Operations, General Jodl, the
Germans could occupy Poland
with relative ease because the
French and British armed forces
stood idly. French and British
Govt’s paid a deaf ear to the Soviet
proposals for a collective security
and Anglo – French – Soviet Co-
operation against the aggrandi-
sement of Fascism because they
wished and hoped that Germany
destroy the Soviet Union first.
When the Nazi Germany attacked
Poland, on the one side, the Polish
people were flung into the fire of
fascist fury, on the other side, the
Polish ruling circles had prostrated
themselves before the German
invaders. By early Oct 1939,
Poland totally fell under the heel
of Hitler.
Once the Poland was under
their occupation, the German
Fascists had carried out their
pogram. In a campaign of mass
extermination, called Holocaust,
the German fascists had killed
around half of Jews (one and half
million) in Poland. Jews who were
sent to Poland from different parts
of Europe were killed en-masse at
death camps, specially built and
operated by Germans on the soil
of Poland and other places.
According to US Holocaust
Memorial Museum, the Nazis also
killed at least 1.9 million non – Jew
civilians.
The prostration of Polish ruling
circles at the feet of German
Fascists and the connivance of
traitors and fascist collaborators
in Poland had strengthened the
hands of Nazis to carry out their
ghastly crimes with some ease. It
is a fact of the history.
It is also an undeniable
historical truth that the general
masses of Polish people, more
particularly those who opposed
and fought against the German
invasion, occupation and atrocities
had suffered and sacrificed a lot.
They had done so at a great risk.
The struggle of Polish people also
extended to their opposition to the
German mass extermination of
Jews and also to their daring
attempts to save the lives of Jews.
Honest way of protecting the
honour of Polish people and nation
can be: to uphold the historic
tradition of Polish people in
opposing the Fascist invasion and
occupation of Poland and the
policy of mass extermination of
Jews carried out by the Nazis;
renunciation of treachery of the
sections of Polish ruling circles,
traitors who had bloodied their
hands by acting as the
accomplices of Fascists in the
period of Second World War. Any
attempt on the part of the present
Polish rulers to condone, absolve
from the responsibility and paint
the faces of the traitors with an anti
– Fascist brush would only raise
serious doubts among the people
about the real intentions of present
rulers. The moves of Poland Govt.
to stifle the voice of dissent and
debate and impose a view by law
and punishment will only prove
counterproductive. It can be seen
in the democratic protest growing
in Poland.
Class Struggle