Poland commemorates the 75th anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising
6062 Mins Read
For 63 days between August and October 1944, the Polish Home Army fought against the Nazis in an effort to liberate Warsaw. 2019 marks the 75th anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising.
For one minute of stillness, sirens blared across the city and red and white smoke will be sent above crowds.
This annual moment of silence is how Poles commemorate the Warsaw Uprising of 1944, the largest military operation by a resistance movement in Europe during the second world war.
German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas took part in a series of commemorative events here on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of Warsaw Uprising against Nazi Germany.
On Thursday morning, Maas and Polish Foreign Minister Jacek Czaputowicz laid flowers at the monument of the Wola district massacre (up to 50,000 civilians and members of the Polish Home Army were killed in mass executions by Nazis in early August 1944, in an attempt to stifle the uprising), and then visited the Warsaw Uprising museum located in the area.
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
“I am grateful that, 75 years after the Warsaw Uprising, Poland and Germany share strong trust as friends,” Maas said during a joint press conference with Czaputowicz on Wednesday.
The Germans are planning to build a monument to the Polish victims of World War II in Berlin.
Context :
By 1944, years of German occupation had left the Polish capital suffering from food shortages, roundups to labour camps and the systematic persecution of Jews – which came to a head in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of April 1943, leaving 63,000 dead. As the Red Army advanced from the East, Poles were afraid that the Germans would demolish the capital and turn it into a front-line fortress.
At five o’clock on August 1, the Uprising broke out. In the first few days the Home Army troops, the armed wing of the underground Polish state, took control of some quarters of the city. Patriotic elation briefly flooded the streets: Polish flags appeared in windows, loudspeakers played prewar songs.
A month later ammunition ran low and fighters began to retreat from the city centre. Allied supplies sent by airdrop mostly failed to reach the uprising.The Germans took back the city district by district, killing swaths of civilians in reprisal. By October 2, the uprising had failed.The struggle claimed the lives of some 18,000 insurgents and over 150,000 total.
