Zydokomuna BEZPIEKA Half Leadership Jewish Steinlauf

Polin Vol. 16, by Michael C. Steinlauf and Antony Polonsky (eds.) 2003

The Zydokomuna in Action: Jews Held Half the Managerial Positions in the Dreaded Post-WWII Communist Security Forces (U. B., or Bezpieka) of Soviet-occupied Poland

I focus on a few pertinent issues:

THE ZYDOKOMUNA UNDER EARLY SOVIET RULE

Andrzej Paczkowski (pp. 453-464), using archival sources, examines the over-representation of Jews in the leadership of the UB, or Bezpieka. He comments: “One of the few reliable sources is a report sent Nikolay Selivanovsky, the chief Soviet advisor at the Ministerstwo Bezpieczenstwa Publicznego (Ministry of Public Security, MBP) to Beria on 20 October 1945. According to this report, Jews made up 18.7 per cent of the ministry’s workforce AND HELD HALF OF THE MANAGERIAL POSITIONS…we must accept these data, at least initially, as reliable.” (p. 456; Emphasis added). To put these numbers in perspective, post-Holocaust Jews constituted only 1% of Poland’s postwar population, and the figures cited by Paczkowski applied only to the early stages of end-WII Soviet rule over Poland.

Other figures cited by Paczkowski are either lower or higher, and these discrepancies probably stem from different reckonings based on geographical coverage, different criteria for “managerial position”, etc. (p. 457). In any case, they all agree on the gross over-representation of Jews in the leadership of the hated Bezpieka–a force responsible for the torture and murder of tens of thousands of Poles.

Furthermore, this was only the beginning, For a definitive study of the Jewish leadership of the dreaded Bezpieka in 1944-1956, see my review of Krzysztof Szwagrzyk, APARAT BEZPIECZENSTWA W POLSCE.

CANNED ZYDOKOMUNA EXCULPATIONS FAIL

The over-representation of Jews in the Bezpieka has at times been equated with Poles’ over-representation earlier in the Cheka (the post-1917 Soviet Communist police). In actuality, the two are not remotely comparable. Poles, at about 2% of USSR’s population, peaked at 6.3% membership in the Cheka (in September 1918), and declined rapidly thereafter. (p. 454). The Jewish overrepresentation was much more pronounced, and it became a mainstay in the first few decades since the Russian Revolution. See my review of CHEKA, by Leggett.

Paczkowski rejects those who say that U.B.-serving Jews were no longer Jews. He compares it to those who say that Polish Communists are not “real” Poles. Besides, many U.B. Jews identified, to varying degrees, with their Judaism. (pp. 459-460). (Finally, according to Israel’s Law of Return, one is Jewish if born to a Jewish mother, provided that one does not convert to another religion.)

Studying the U.B.–Jewish connection, according to Paczkowski, is a legitimate one, and is not “racist”. (Is study of Polish misdeeds against Jews “racist”?) But the very calling of the Zydokomuna racist is a transparent attempt to control the narrative.

SO POLES WERE SUPPOSED TO COMMIT SUICIDE ON BEHALF OF THE JEWS–EVEN THOUGH THEY DID NOT COMMIT SUICIDE ON BEHALF OF OTHER POLES! AND JEWS DID NOT COMMIT SUICIDE FOR OTHER JEWS

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, 3-4 million Polish gentiles were also being murdered the Germans, yet the AK did not start a national uprising on behalf of the 3-4 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. So Poles did not want to die on behalf of the Jews. But Jews ALSO did not want to die on behalf of other Jews. See my review of THE STARS BEAR WITNESS, by Goldstein.

Nevertheless, the AK did aid Jews in various ways, including supplying the Jewish Warsaw Ghetto Uprising with firearms, training, etc. The reader capable of moving beyond a purely Judeocentric mindset must 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 the risk of a Polish gentile’s life, and kept at the 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.