No Suicidal ProJewish Polish Uprising Silly Complaint Bartal

Polin: Studies in Polish Jewry Volume 12: Focusing on Galicia: Jews, Poles and Ukrainians 1772-1918 (Polin: Studies in Polish Jewry #12), by Israel Bartal (Editor), Antony Polonsky (Editor). 1999

Poles Would Not Have Committed Collective Suicide on Behalf of a Few Million Murdered Poles, But Now We Hear That They Were Supposed to Have Committed Collective Suicide For a Few Million Murdered Poles

In one article, Antony Polonsky cites a document from the mainstream Polish underground (AK: ARMIA KRAJOWA) wherein the AK would come out in open combat if the Germans tried the same thing to Polish gentiles that they did to the Jews. From this, Polonsky infers that the leadership of the Polish underground saw Polish deaths as worth averting, but not Jewish deaths. But this is a complete non-sequitur on Polonsky’s part. Remember that, along with 3 million Polish Jews, 2-3 million Polish gentiles were also being murdered by the Germans, yet the AK did not start a national uprising on behalf of the 2-3 million gentiles any more than it did on behalf of the 3 million Polish Jews.

What the AK leadership was actually saying was that a national uprising would not be in the offing unless a large fraction of the Polish population was in danger of being exterminated in a full-blown genocide, at which time there would be nothing to lose, for Polish people as a whole, to come out in open warfare against the German occupation authorities. The Jews, of course, had nothing to lose already in 1942, but the Polish gentiles, as a whole, still did. That is the actual reason for the AK witholding more overt military action on behalf of the Jews. Nevertheless, the AK did aid Jews in various ways, including supplying the Jewish Warsaw Ghetto Uprising with 50 firearms. This may not seem like much, but remember that every gun was worth its weight in gold. In fact, if was worth human lives, as each donated firearm had been procured at risk of a Polish gentile’s life, and kept at risk of a Polish gentile’s life. And, of course, each gun donated to the Jews meant one less gun available to Polish gentiles to conduct guerrilla actions against the Germans, and to protect Polish gentiles in the event of a full-blown German genocide against the entire Polish population.

CONCLUSION

This Poles-Did-Not-Sacrifice-Themselves argument seems to be nothing more than one piece in the endless series of complaints that Poles “did not do enough” for the Jews. This book was now written almost 20 years ago, and we still have the same. It never ends.