Thank you Mark for the invaluable history lesson - it of course helps explain Poland being caught, as it were, between a rock and a hard place, and throws light on what sometimes appears to be its “schizophrenic” behaviors: not exactly head of the class of dingbat Ursula’s LGBTQ++ EU, but at the same time, wedged in between Germany and Russia, it feels none too comfortable with the belligerence UA-Russia war…
It's as though Poland is itching for a fight to regain and restore it's honor and sense that no one should consider it a sidecar any longer. My guess is that they'd feel the same way about Germany if they (again) invaded Austria, Hungary, or the Baltics.
I was blessed in college to have had as a professor, mentor and thesis advisor a legendary Polish Resistance fighter, diplomat and scholar by the name of Jan Karski. With all the atrocities he'd witnessed (as "up close and personal" as anyone on the planet, seeing as he was repeatedly dropped into occupied Poland specifically to try to disrupt or, at least, report them back out to London and the world) from both the Nazi and the Soviet sides, it never ceased to amaze me how impeccably and dispassionately he could present the incredibly-nuanced history of Russia and Eastern Europe. Need more of that both in the academy and society these days....more scholar, less holler.
The park-bench statute that they have of him at Georgetown (and elsewhere, I believe) is so spot-on. Recall at least a few Friday afternoons trying to breeze past to get my pitcher order in before happy hour ended, and I'd hear "sit, young man, sit..." He was a gem, and always up for a discussion.
It’s also worth remembering that, before “liberating” Warsaw, the Red Army stopped at the Vistula to allow the Germans to first put down the Warsaw Uprising, which was timed to take advantage of the Soviet offensive and expected German retreat.
There's a lot behind what's feeding into Polish attitudes. It's completely understandable, but still not smart. America will always have two oceans around it (albeit the Bering Strait is narrow), but Poland doesn't have that luxury.
Agreed. Which makes our efforts over the past two+ decades to enflame those attitudes all the more infuriating. Recent events have now convinced me that, Smolensk air disaster aside, the U.S. never would have allowed rapprochement between Russia and Poland.
In a comment I made on a previous post I noted that Russia genuinely reached out in friendship to the West in the wake of the Soviet collapse. As evidence of this, Putin’s gesture regarding Katyn and the Smolensk air disaster ranks with his call to W after 9/11 expressing condolences (the first foreign leader to do so) and his help in facilitating the U.S.’s retaliatory moves in Afghanistan. Peter Hitchens recently said that the West’s refusal to reciprocate Russia’s desire for friendship since 1991 will eventually be recognized as one of the greatest geopolitical blunders in history.
Good point, Bro. Peter Hitchens is right. Looking back at the debates in 2012 and the Romney-Obama exchange on Russia seems so strange all these years later. Romney sees Russia as our biggest threat and then Obama condescends with snark and four years later the progs go into hyperventilation over Russia-Trump that continues today. China has been our biggest threat for decades, not Russia.
I should add that Mark’s post also reminds us that Putin is in many ways a centrist in Russian politics. His loudest and most effective Russian critics are on the right, not the liberal-left. They have long accused Putin of being soft toward the West. The recent virulent and irrational wave of Russophobia has disabused many Russians of their sense of affinity for the West.
Dateline 1996: 60 Minutes interview of Madeleine Albright by Leslie Stahl:
Lesley Stahl questioned Albright – then the US ambassador to the United Nations – on the catastrophic effect the rigorous US sanctions imposed after Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait had on the Iraqi population.
“We have heard that half a million [Iraqi] children have died. I mean, that is more children than died in Hiroshima,” asked Stahl, “And, you know, is the price worth it?”
“I think that is a very hard choice,” Albright answered, “but the price, we think, the price is worth it.”
Putin may be capable (hell, anyone is capable), but that, my friend, the actions by the US gov't in Iraq, is real history and it is truly pure fricking evil!!!
I don’t disagree with you at all. I think what we have found out about our Western Leaders and their Intel Chiefs since March of 2020 is quite horrific. And of course the Russian Collusion Trump hoax. But I believe there are no good guys on the World stage. Putin’s allies include China, Syria, Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, etc. Klaus Schwab in a recent video had a photo of Stalin in the background. Biden was funded by communists groups since his early Delaware years. Obama’s mentor was communist Franklin Davis Marshall. Leading democrats are constantly at political events with actual communists. Putin and Xi are communists. Are they all secretly working together? Or is it the globalists Marxist cabal vs The communist dictator Putin? I’m having a real hard time seeing all of this as a black and white issue.
I'll offer only opinion with nothing to back it up, but that very strongly held opinion is this: whatever labels may properly describe Putin, "communist" is miles down the list from the top. That is to speak neither well nor ill of the man, just carefully and precisely.
“Putin and Xi are communists. … The communist dictator Putin.” I’m sorry, but… WHAT? I’m afraid you have a fair bit more work to do on this topic before spouting off here.
If they are not “communists” then what are they? Freedom fighters? And if they are not communists, why are they propping up n Korea, Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, etc. I fear and despise the evil Globalists as I fear the “dictator” with his nukes….
I think the discussion is easily seen as black and white. There are the Globalists and there are those who are not. I pretty much will stand with anyone who is from the "those who are not" camp.
I understand Poland's historical grievances against Russia. However, in the current context, ripping down this war memorial is just the latest in a long line of insane and reckless acts against Russia. As many have remarked elsewhere, our "leaders" are behaving like a bunch of narcissistic school children towards Putin. In the UK, we've banned Russian players from attending Wimbledon. This kind of thing is only counterproductive and strengthens Russian support for Putin. Love him or hate him, Putin is the only adult in the room at the moment.
Have to agree at least to some extent that the Russians may be the only adults in the room. Seems Yellen, other US officials, and other central bank clowns apparently walked out of a G20 meeting yesterday when it came to the Russians turn to speak. It is rumored that Yellen will attempt to avoid any events that the Russians may attend and speak. It would seem middle school was the highest maturity level most of them were only able to reach.
It's not actually insane. I mean, you don't think those monuments were the result of spontaneous outpourings of gratitude on the part of average Poles, do you? They're a very different thing that war memorials of whatever kind in America.
Agreed about your first point. I worked in Kaunas, Lithuania, way back in 1991. There used to be a T34 tank on the main roundabout there. It was the first tank that entered the town to "liberate" it in 1944. As soon as the Russkies left, the tank was dumped in the river. However, there is meaning in general, and meaning in context. I understand the Poles getting rid of this monument at any other time, but in the current context, it is just another stupid, provocative act. The Poles really believe the EU and the US are their friends. They should have done a deal with Russia years ago.
As a follow up to my last post. There is a picture on the internet. I'd post it here but don't know if I should. It's of a man, I believe his name is Piotr Sosnowski, a Catholic priest and Polish. He, along with some other men, is about to be shot in a wood somewhere. It might seem odd but, sometimes I stare at the photo and wonder about the man. He doesn't cower, he stands tall, one foot slightly in front of the other, staring at his killers - DEFIANT in his priestly black with white collar. Refusing to show fear. He's being murdered for what he represents - obedience to something higher than men. I pray that I could represent myself so well in the face of certain death.
I highly suggest watching Katyn. There are a couple of clips on YouTube. One is about 5 minutes long and difficult to watch. It represents the most realistic depiction of how totalitarian regimes brutally exterminate their "problems." It is also a great example of how these regimes prepare the ground for total domination. Evil, brutal, systematic efficiency. They just erase you from the earth. Even while typing this out I realize how hard it is for me to describe what I feel when I watch the clips. True evil.
It depends on how you define "definitive." There were official commissions from both countries working more or less together. They had their disagreements about assigning blame. The Smolensk airfield was a military one, so it didn't follow civil flight procedures and didn't use English. The Poles tended to place more blame on the controllers, the Russians tended to place more blame on the flight crew. Neither side claimed deliberate action. Later attempts to establish a conspiracy have been unsuccessful--including the lastest just this April. The Polish government initially embraced it but then backed away from it.
Thank you Mark for the invaluable history lesson - it of course helps explain Poland being caught, as it were, between a rock and a hard place, and throws light on what sometimes appears to be its “schizophrenic” behaviors: not exactly head of the class of dingbat Ursula’s LGBTQ++ EU, but at the same time, wedged in between Germany and Russia, it feels none too comfortable with the belligerence UA-Russia war…
It's as though Poland is itching for a fight to regain and restore it's honor and sense that no one should consider it a sidecar any longer. My guess is that they'd feel the same way about Germany if they (again) invaded Austria, Hungary, or the Baltics.
Another terrific piece...
I was blessed in college to have had as a professor, mentor and thesis advisor a legendary Polish Resistance fighter, diplomat and scholar by the name of Jan Karski. With all the atrocities he'd witnessed (as "up close and personal" as anyone on the planet, seeing as he was repeatedly dropped into occupied Poland specifically to try to disrupt or, at least, report them back out to London and the world) from both the Nazi and the Soviet sides, it never ceased to amaze me how impeccably and dispassionately he could present the incredibly-nuanced history of Russia and Eastern Europe. Need more of that both in the academy and society these days....more scholar, less holler.
Thanks for this, Mark.
I spent an afternoon chatting with Karski. Fine man.
The park-bench statute that they have of him at Georgetown (and elsewhere, I believe) is so spot-on. Recall at least a few Friday afternoons trying to breeze past to get my pitcher order in before happy hour ended, and I'd hear "sit, young man, sit..." He was a gem, and always up for a discussion.
It’s also worth remembering that, before “liberating” Warsaw, the Red Army stopped at the Vistula to allow the Germans to first put down the Warsaw Uprising, which was timed to take advantage of the Soviet offensive and expected German retreat.
There's a lot behind what's feeding into Polish attitudes. It's completely understandable, but still not smart. America will always have two oceans around it (albeit the Bering Strait is narrow), but Poland doesn't have that luxury.
Agreed. Which makes our efforts over the past two+ decades to enflame those attitudes all the more infuriating. Recent events have now convinced me that, Smolensk air disaster aside, the U.S. never would have allowed rapprochement between Russia and Poland.
In a comment I made on a previous post I noted that Russia genuinely reached out in friendship to the West in the wake of the Soviet collapse. As evidence of this, Putin’s gesture regarding Katyn and the Smolensk air disaster ranks with his call to W after 9/11 expressing condolences (the first foreign leader to do so) and his help in facilitating the U.S.’s retaliatory moves in Afghanistan. Peter Hitchens recently said that the West’s refusal to reciprocate Russia’s desire for friendship since 1991 will eventually be recognized as one of the greatest geopolitical blunders in history.
Good point, Bro. Peter Hitchens is right. Looking back at the debates in 2012 and the Romney-Obama exchange on Russia seems so strange all these years later. Romney sees Russia as our biggest threat and then Obama condescends with snark and four years later the progs go into hyperventilation over Russia-Trump that continues today. China has been our biggest threat for decades, not Russia.
I should add that Mark’s post also reminds us that Putin is in many ways a centrist in Russian politics. His loudest and most effective Russian critics are on the right, not the liberal-left. They have long accused Putin of being soft toward the West. The recent virulent and irrational wave of Russophobia has disabused many Russians of their sense of affinity for the West.
And what if Putin and his current Leadership are as evil as Stalin and his? https://jrnyquist.blog/2022/04/21/will-russia-go-nuclear/
Stop it with the stupid comments.
Maybe I am a stupid man but I don’t think Nyquist is? Whatever else Putin may be, he is capable of great evil.
Dateline 1996: 60 Minutes interview of Madeleine Albright by Leslie Stahl:
Lesley Stahl questioned Albright – then the US ambassador to the United Nations – on the catastrophic effect the rigorous US sanctions imposed after Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait had on the Iraqi population.
“We have heard that half a million [Iraqi] children have died. I mean, that is more children than died in Hiroshima,” asked Stahl, “And, you know, is the price worth it?”
“I think that is a very hard choice,” Albright answered, “but the price, we think, the price is worth it.”
Putin may be capable (hell, anyone is capable), but that, my friend, the actions by the US gov't in Iraq, is real history and it is truly pure fricking evil!!!
I don’t disagree with you at all. I think what we have found out about our Western Leaders and their Intel Chiefs since March of 2020 is quite horrific. And of course the Russian Collusion Trump hoax. But I believe there are no good guys on the World stage. Putin’s allies include China, Syria, Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, etc. Klaus Schwab in a recent video had a photo of Stalin in the background. Biden was funded by communists groups since his early Delaware years. Obama’s mentor was communist Franklin Davis Marshall. Leading democrats are constantly at political events with actual communists. Putin and Xi are communists. Are they all secretly working together? Or is it the globalists Marxist cabal vs The communist dictator Putin? I’m having a real hard time seeing all of this as a black and white issue.
I'll offer only opinion with nothing to back it up, but that very strongly held opinion is this: whatever labels may properly describe Putin, "communist" is miles down the list from the top. That is to speak neither well nor ill of the man, just carefully and precisely.
Exactly.
“Putin and Xi are communists. … The communist dictator Putin.” I’m sorry, but… WHAT? I’m afraid you have a fair bit more work to do on this topic before spouting off here.
If they are not “communists” then what are they? Freedom fighters? And if they are not communists, why are they propping up n Korea, Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, etc. I fear and despise the evil Globalists as I fear the “dictator” with his nukes….
I think the discussion is easily seen as black and white. There are the Globalists and there are those who are not. I pretty much will stand with anyone who is from the "those who are not" camp.
I still can’t stand with Russia, Iran, China etc. Nor with Brandon and Schwab and Trudeau.
Globalists are an existential threat to the human race.
Rethink that.
I understand Poland's historical grievances against Russia. However, in the current context, ripping down this war memorial is just the latest in a long line of insane and reckless acts against Russia. As many have remarked elsewhere, our "leaders" are behaving like a bunch of narcissistic school children towards Putin. In the UK, we've banned Russian players from attending Wimbledon. This kind of thing is only counterproductive and strengthens Russian support for Putin. Love him or hate him, Putin is the only adult in the room at the moment.
Have to agree at least to some extent that the Russians may be the only adults in the room. Seems Yellen, other US officials, and other central bank clowns apparently walked out of a G20 meeting yesterday when it came to the Russians turn to speak. It is rumored that Yellen will attempt to avoid any events that the Russians may attend and speak. It would seem middle school was the highest maturity level most of them were only able to reach.
It's not actually insane. I mean, you don't think those monuments were the result of spontaneous outpourings of gratitude on the part of average Poles, do you? They're a very different thing that war memorials of whatever kind in America.
Agreed about your first point. I worked in Kaunas, Lithuania, way back in 1991. There used to be a T34 tank on the main roundabout there. It was the first tank that entered the town to "liberate" it in 1944. As soon as the Russkies left, the tank was dumped in the river. However, there is meaning in general, and meaning in context. I understand the Poles getting rid of this monument at any other time, but in the current context, it is just another stupid, provocative act. The Poles really believe the EU and the US are their friends. They should have done a deal with Russia years ago.
As a follow up to my last post. There is a picture on the internet. I'd post it here but don't know if I should. It's of a man, I believe his name is Piotr Sosnowski, a Catholic priest and Polish. He, along with some other men, is about to be shot in a wood somewhere. It might seem odd but, sometimes I stare at the photo and wonder about the man. He doesn't cower, he stands tall, one foot slightly in front of the other, staring at his killers - DEFIANT in his priestly black with white collar. Refusing to show fear. He's being murdered for what he represents - obedience to something higher than men. I pray that I could represent myself so well in the face of certain death.
https://www.ushmm.org/collections/the-museums-collections/collections-highlights/german-invasion-of-poland-75-years-later/from-the-museums-collections/execution-of-piotr-sosnowski
Back in the days when men were men. Not the pussified wretches of today who cower and renounce their liberties in the face of a bad flu.
I highly suggest watching Katyn. There are a couple of clips on YouTube. One is about 5 minutes long and difficult to watch. It represents the most realistic depiction of how totalitarian regimes brutally exterminate their "problems." It is also a great example of how these regimes prepare the ground for total domination. Evil, brutal, systematic efficiency. They just erase you from the earth. Even while typing this out I realize how hard it is for me to describe what I feel when I watch the clips. True evil.
The Wikipedia page describes the procedure in detail. It's ...
Indeed.
It depends on how you define "definitive." There were official commissions from both countries working more or less together. They had their disagreements about assigning blame. The Smolensk airfield was a military one, so it didn't follow civil flight procedures and didn't use English. The Poles tended to place more blame on the controllers, the Russians tended to place more blame on the flight crew. Neither side claimed deliberate action. Later attempts to establish a conspiracy have been unsuccessful--including the lastest just this April. The Polish government initially embraced it but then backed away from it.