The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact - ELTE BTK Történelem Szakos Portál

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possible future opposition to the Soviet system. 10 The Soviet plan too intended to erase the political, military and mental leadership of Poland and to leave no opportunity for organised resistance. The mass shootings in Katyn and other places have reached sad prominence among the many crimes of this war. 11 With regard to the Ukrainian and White Russian people, the Soviet propaganda claimed that the Red Army had come as a liberator from their Polish oppressors. 12 According to David Murphy, the Red Army‘s arrival was - in part - actually seen as the long-yearned liberation from the Polish yoke. He attributes this feeling in large part to the Ukrainian‘s and White Russian‘s hope for national independence. As he states, the people in these regions had no actual knowing of the Soviet state and thus no idea of what they were to expect. 13 Following the statement of liberation, the former Eastern Polish territories were incorporated into the Ukrainian and White Russian SSRs respectively, according to the majority of people living in a given area. The population was ordered to elect assemblies and vote in favour of the incorporation, which they did. 14 These votes were, as Wanda Krystina Roman puts it, the juridical and political basis for overtaking the Polish territories. 15 And George Sanford goes even further, in claiming, that the incorporation was the basis for a wide range of terror against the former Polish citizens. Passports were handed out to the inhabitants of the newly acquired territories, they became Soviet citizens; this gave the Soviet leadership not only legal power and control over its new subjects, but also unleashed the whole range of terror unto them. 16 The liberators and helpers soon became prison-wards. 17 10 ROBERTS, Geoffrey: Stalins Kriege - Vom Zweiten Weltkrieg bis zum Kalten Krieg. Düsseldorf, 2008. 61. 11 For Katyn see SANFORD, George: Katyn and the Soviet massacre of 1940 - Truth, justice and memory. London, 2007. OVERY, Richard: Russlands Krieg - 1941-1945, Reinbek bei Hamburg, 2003. 95. 12 SANFORD, George: Katyn and the Soviet massacre of 1940 - Truth, justice and memory. London, 2007. 20. Soviet Note to the Polish government, 17th September 1939, cited from KENNAN, George F.: Soviet Foreign Policy 1917-1941. Princeton, 1960. 179. 13 MURPHY, David E.: What Stalin knew - The enigma of Barbarossa. New Haven, 2005. 31. 14 According to GROSS, the population became accomplices by taking part in these elections, as they accepted the Soviet‘s rules. GROSS, Jan T.: Revolution from Abroad - The Soviet conquest of Poland‘s Western Ukraine and Western Belorussia. Princeton, 2002. 54. By contrast Honigsman, whom one has to attribute a very subjective Soviet-Ukrainian-Jewish point of view, speaks of an atmosphere of euphoria. HONIGSMAN, Jakob: Juden in der Westukraine - Jüdisches Leben und Leiden in Ostgalizien, Wolhynien, der Bukowina und Transkarpatien 1933-1945. Konstanz, 2001. 114. 15 Nevertheless her Polish perspective: ROMAN, Wanda Krystina: Die sowjetische Okkupation der polnischen Ostgebiete 1939 bis 1941. In: CHIARI, Bernhard: Die polnische Heimatarmee- Geschichte und Mythos der Armia Krajowa seit dem Zweiten Weltkrieg. München, 2003. 94. 16 SANFORD, George: Katyn and the Soviet massacre of 1940 - Truth, justice and memory. London, 2007. 24. Sanford further explains that Stalin used these events later to claim the incorporation of these territories on the conferences of Yalta and Teheran. The treatment of Polish prisoners as counterrevolutionaries was, according to Sanford, another output of it. 40-42. 17 OVERY, Richard: Russlands Krieg - 1941-1945, Reinbek bei Hamburg, 2003. 93. 172
The Soviets were - officially - not occupying former Eastern Poland, but started building local administrations immediately. 18 These administrations were to consist of the dominant people, that is, Ukrainians or White Russians. Both nations, even though they made up the majority in their main regions, had been subdue to forced Polish polonization politics during the inter-war years and had thus, especially the Ukrainians, adapted a very aggressive nationalism. They now expected, believing the Soviet propaganda, to be able to build their own state within the Soviet Union. 19 Jews as part of the new administrations Naturally, the Soviets had no intention of having these nationalists in the new local administrations, at least not in leading positions; and, in addition, most Ukrainians and White Russians were peasants and did not posses more than basic education. Old civil servants, who had been part of the Polish government, were no basis for recruiting new cadres either. Because of this, the Soviet leadership had to take whatever else they could get. 20 While many leading positions were taken over by cadres from the Soviet union, middle and lower ranks had to be filled with locals, and, as Jan T. Gross states, the Soviet power expected to be able to teach everyone the necessary knowledge. 21 Considering this situation, the new administrations welcomed every acceptable person willing to help; their first choice were often Jews, even though they were not part of one of the titular nations. Jews had been discriminated against in the Polish Republic and did not have the chance to be government officials but were educated and ambitious. When the boundaries of the old regime broke down, they were eager to take any possibility they could get and involved themselves with the new regime. The new state symbolised a chance for social mobility which they embraced. 22 Proportionally Jews were not represented in a bigger amount in the new administration than the other nationalities (besides the Poles), but in the eyes of the locals, they were. According to Jan T. Gross there was a proportionally high 18 MURPHY, David E.: What Stalin knew - The enigma of Barbarossa. New Haven, 2005. 32. 19 POHL, Dieter: Nationalsozialistische Judenverfolgung in Ostgalizien 1941-1944 - Organisation und Durchführung eines staatlichen Massenverbrechens. München, 1996. 25-27. GROSS, Jan T.: Revolution from Abroad - The Soviet conquest of Poland‘s Western Ukraine and Western Belorussia. Princeton, 2002. 31. ROMAN, Wanda Krystina: Die sowjetische Okkupation der polnischen Ostgebiete 1939 bis 1941. In: CHIARI, Bernhard: Die polnische Heimatarmee- Geschichte und Mythos der Armia Krajowa seit dem Zweiten Weltkrieg. München, 2003. 91. 20 MUSIAL, Bogdan: „Konterrevolutionäre Elemente sind zu erschießen” - Die Brutalisierung des deutsch-sowjetischen Krieges im Sommer 1941. Berlin 2001. 39. 21 GROSS, Jan T.: Revolution from Abroad - The Soviet conquest of Poland‘s Western Ukraine and Western Belorussia. Princeton, 2002. 52. 22 For anti-Semitism in interwar Poland see WEISS, Yfaat: Deutsche und Polnische Juden vor dem Holocaust - Jüdische Identität zwischen Staatsbürgerschaft und Ethnizität 1933-1940. München, 2000. 105-116. 173
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ISBN 978-963-284-164-9
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Unknown Clauses: The Background Dea
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CONTENTS Foreword (István MAJOROS,
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Foreword The world remembers in 200
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The Historical Judgement of the Mol
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went often on emotional instead of
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What is much more interesting is th
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such an international agreement as
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Text of the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggress
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Done in duplicate, in the German an
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Lachaise, Bernard Historiography of
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Relations) are the focus of special
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Russian agreement (…) would allow
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Europe and on the French communists
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adopted a stance of denying the fac
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Ortolan, Guillaume The 70 th annive
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government (more than twenty) came,
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War. On the contrary, it shows that
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this anniversary and more widely of
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interesting: „Illusions. In summe
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Kretschmann, Vasco The ideological
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One of the most influential associa
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Germanness in the provinces of West
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Prętkiewicz, Przemysław The syste
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interwar period and the treaty was
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situation of rising danger accepted
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Manchukuo and broke relations with
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I would like to finish my article w
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party itself but for the whole Slov
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In summary, the group of the „Mod
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make proposals or suggestions. 6 In
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(Aland), Hanko and the islands of t
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have had a less serious effect on t
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not expect strong resistance and ho
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Winkler, Paul Adolf Eichmann’s Vi
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individual offenders, 10 who used h
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esearch. But how could the suppress
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expert of this matter 29 and had as
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Arendt on the contrary is in the op
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the „matter”, where there was a
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adoption of the model it became cle
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of Eichmann. For that Heydrich deli
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esistance […] but of logistics. N
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British government refused to give
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ole in the defence of Madrid in Nov
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public doubt the democratic idea of
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Republicans. In the refugee camps i
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102
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iron? Where can one find more nicke
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According to his diaries, the main
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announced: „We have no active all
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110
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negative, an analysis of the disapp
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can let think of an imminent war po
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de la guerre [il] ne fait que l'agg
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Party), the enemy of the inside. Of
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120
Page 124 and 125: Before the Pact M. Coulondre, the F
Page 126 and 127: Lets us skip a few decades and list
Page 128 and 129: argain with. Hitler had an offer th
Page 130 and 131: secret protocol clarified that the
Page 132 and 133: to reach out for Russia through the
Page 134 and 135: of a war interesting rather on civi
Page 136 and 137: At the same moment, we can note an
Page 138 and 139: Faure 2 , remains hostile to war. I
Page 140 and 141: war can still be avoided in June 19
Page 142 and 143: acked by a „belligerent” coalit
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Page 146 and 147: agreement” sound anachronistic. E
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Page 150 and 151: Two ideas emerge from the press: on
Page 152 and 153: soviets didn’t have motive. Blum
Page 154 and 155: Moscow's line, with the national an
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Page 158 and 159: 2.000 German speaking inhabitants).
Page 160 and 161: The Eastern Polish border was not r
Page 162 and 163: Army. The mayor of Lviv did not wan
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Page 166 and 167: Budapest, and for Warsaw. The two c
Page 168 and 169: could not destroy the Polish Air Fo
Page 170 and 171: independence, Romania was forced to
Page 172 and 173: importance for the events considere
Page 176 and 177: ate of communists within the Jews o
Page 178 and 179: the initial positive feeling toward
Page 180 and 181: wanted to take revenge for the NKVD
Page 182 and 183: German Reactions A last point that
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