Ignacy Jan PADEREWSKI, Pianoforte – Study in C Major (Chopin) “The Revolutionary Etude”, HMV late 1930s, UK

NOTE: On the 1st August 1944, the Warsaw Uprising broke out in Warsaw. It was a major World War II operation in the summer of 1944, led by the Polish underground resistance Home Army (Polish: Armia Krajowa), to liberate Warsaw from German occupation. Initially, the Poles established control over most of central Warsaw, but the Soviets ignored Polish attempts to make radio contact with them and did not advance beyond the city limits. The Soviet soldiers were forbidden to offer the least help to the city of Warsaw, which was seen by all of them in flames on the other bank of the Vistula River. Those, who did not surrender to the regulations and tried to swim across the river (many of the of the Soviet Army soldiers were Polish) were shot during their attempt. With a symbolic help from the Poland’s Western allies: Great Britain and USA, after two months of unprecedented heroism of the fighters as well as Warsaw civilians, the Warsaw Uprising collapsed on the 2nd Oct 1944.

The reaction of the Germans to the Polish “insubordination” was madly furious. It’s estimated that about 200,000 Polish civilians died, mostly from mass executions. Jews being harbored by Poles were exposed by German house-to-house clearances and mass evictions of entire neighborhoods. The greatest massacre of civilians which is considered as the most terrible massacre of civilians during entire World War II, was carried on between 5-7th August 1944 in the western district of Warsaw, Wola The troops commanded by SS-Gruppenführer Heinz Reinefarth containing the famed German criminals-units led by the sexual deviant Oskar Dirlewanger as well as the Russian, Ukrainian and Cossack SS-volunteers, during 3-4 days of the “action” slaughtered about 60 000 Warsaw civilians. During the massacre gen. Reinefahrt, seeing in his thugs the great enthusiasm and efficiency in murdering, urged his authorities to send in more ammunition, which his soldiers may lack at this rate of killing. After the war, Heinz Reinefarth became mayor of the CDU Westerland on Sylt Island in Germany. He died in peace and respect on May 7, 1979.

During the urban combat, approximately 25% of Warsaw's buildings were destroyed. Following the surrender of Polish forces, German troops systematically leveled another 35% of the city block by block. Together with earlier damage suffered in the 1939 invasion of Poland and the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in 1943, about 90% of the city was destroyed by January 1945. The entire remaining civilian population of Warsaw was expelled from the city and sent to a transit camp Durchgangslager 121 in Pruszków near Warsaw. Out of 350,000–550,000 civilians who passed through the camp, 90,000 were sent to labour camps in the Third Reich, 60,000 were shipped to death and concentration camps (including Ravensbrück, Auschwitz, and Mauthausen, among others), while the rest were transported to various locations in the occupied Poland. The Polish capital city was erased from the surface of the Earth.
Thank you, Germany.
Thank you, Russia.
Tank you, the 2nd WW allies of Poland: Great Britain and USA.

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