A Head of State has a symbolic importance for the nation, that transcends the personalityand politics of the individual in office. I am therefore very sorry for the Polish people at the loss of President Kaczynski and the Polish delegation in the air crash at Smolensk.
Looking at the list of victims, I knew at least five of them, though not colse friends, from my time in the British Embassy in Warsaw, which makes the tragedy more real to me.
The massacre at Katyn was one of the most dreadful chapters in Poland’s tragic history. It was not just a massacre of 22,000 soldiers – it was a determined attempt by Stalin to wipe out the entire Polish officer class, as a step towards eliminating Poland’s indigenous leadership potential.
You have to understand Polish history to fully guage the significance of this. In the eighteenth century Poland was wiped off the map in successive partitions by Austria, Prussia and Russia. For two and a half centuries the Polish nation disappeared from Europe. Poles werensplit between different Empires, with Poles expected to fight Poles on their new masters’ behalf. A brief period of existence under Napoleon helped keep Polish identity alive – and along with the Chopin story sparked a lasting attachment to France..
So when Poland reemerged from the mists of time – to quote Norman Davies – in 1918 as a nation again, it was a nation with a sense of the precariousness of its own existence, which was to be strengthened by the hard but succesful battles against Soviet invasion in 1921.
It was only 18 years later, and Poland had only existed anew for 21 years, when Stalin and Hitler treacherously invaded Poland and partitioned it yet again. Britian’s declaration of war was no practical help to the Poles. As Poland was fighting for its very existence, even the least warlike had signed up for the hopeless fight against both Hitler and Stalin, so the 22,000 Polish officers among Stalin’s prisoners of war were a broad cross section of Poland’s educated classes.
Stalin’s decision to massacre them was an attempt to eradicate the very idea of an independent Poland.
When I was in Uzbekistan I was astonsihed to find that in Uzbek schools and universities the Stalin-Hitler pact had been eradicated from the history books. That is true today. They are told the “Great Patriotic War” started inn 1941. The Soviet invasion of Poland is a banned subject.
Since Putin’s new brand of Russian nationalism, the Stalin/Hitler pact has again diasppeared from Russian school books, although it is not formally a banned subject and is taught at some universities. But Putin – who of course is a product of the Soviet secret services – has discouraged at every turn openness about the crimes of Stalin, and archives on the subject have again been closed to the public.
The Poles were therefore quite right to press the Russians hard on Katyn, and you can be sure that the ceremonies would not have been given much prominence in Russian media. The fascinating thing now will be to monitor just how much depth the Russian media give to explaining just what President Kaczynski was on his way to Russia for
What’s with keeping comments short? We’re only talking a few electrons.
Those with a short attention span should migrate to Twitter, whatever that is.
Writerman asks, “What did Britain gain from fighting the war exactly?”
It seems to me that a good answer is provided by considering the likely alternative outcomes, which were:
(1) German conquest of Russia, consolidation of the German empire including Vichy France, with fascist Italy and Spain as satellites — an outcome that would have made British independence tenuous in the extreme, especially as many of the ruling elite would have been happy to do a deal with Hitler and join a fascist block;
(2) Russian defeat of Germany followed by a drive to the Atlantic ?” an outcome fatal to British independence;
(3) a Russo-German struggle to the point of exhaustion, ending in a stalemate, with (most of) Germany under Allied control.
The third outcome is what Britain worked for and got, and which most people in Britain would have wanted. Britain lost the empire and her great power status, but became a relatively independent member of an American-led democratic alliance, which until China went Communist, encircled the only major totalitarian regime still standing. That alliance insured Britain’s security for more than 60 years.
Britain’s primary role in WW2, was to provide the unsinkable aircraft carrier that allowed the US to gather up its resources and put a halt to the Russian advance at a line just inside the Germany’s eastern frontier. Britain’s loss of status reflected her relative economic decline, a loss of status that was inevitably, although the transformation was hastened by war.
The best possibility for averting war may have occurred in 1934 when Poland proposed to France military action to remove Hitler. By this time, Germany was a one-party state, Hitler was ruling by decree and the Blood Purge of June 1934 made it clear that Hitler was a psychopathic tyrant who would not hesitate to use violence when it served his purpose. Yet Britain, under the National Government of MacDonald, would not support such action and France would not act without Britain.
Thus Britain’s policy. which promoted German rearmament and territorial expansion “provided not a shot is fired,” was either totally unrealistic, or cynically crafted to provoke a Russo-German war of mutual annihilation.
For Poland, in 1939, refusal to negotiate with Hitler, once Britain had provided a guarantee of security, does not seem so crazy. The Poles saw Czechoslovakia dismembered in stages. So why give any ground voluntarily? It would only make the final assault on their territorial integrity that much more certain of success.
It seems to me that occurrences such as the Blood Purge of 1934 should be seen as watershed events marking the transformation of constitutional states into a threat to world peace. In modern times, 9/11 seems to mark such a transformation. That there are so many agents of the US, Israel and the corporate world intent on cramming the ludicrous official conspiracy theory down the public’s throat, surely confirms the significance of that event.
@writerman
“I don’t think people in the UK really understand Europe very well. I think they are insular and don’t speak the languages or know much about the history, preferring over-simplification instead, after all Britain had an empire to take care of.”
From my own travels, I would say – I don’t think people in America really understand the world, and do prefer over-simplifications while the US tries to build its global Empire. Is it simply a process of cycles of human history? Willful conflict being an integral part of building the Empire? The Romans, Britsh and now the Americans are having a go?
“Also, please don’t write a response more than 1.5 x longer than my post.
Why not let the fella answer as succintly or long-windedly as he likes?
”
Not to worry, I hadn’t exactly noticed everyone here doing what anybody tells them, anyway 🙂
“From my own travels, I would say – I don’t think people in America really understand the world”
Confirmation bias. It’s fairly easy to find such behavior if you’re looking for it.
Alfred: “That there are so many agents of the US, Israel and the corporate world intent on cramming the ludicrous official conspiracy theory down the public’s throat, surely confirms the significance of that event.”
Bullshit. Really the only time people ever talk about such in the popular press is when the nutjobs bother them with their loony conspiracy theories.
What person or entity in the corporate world has been cramming down the “official theory”? What Israeli has responded to the nutjobs, such that they have cited the “official theory”?
I think you’re starting to believe the conspiracy nuts who seem to think that the world cares about conspiracy nuts.
And by the way, congratulations on being manipulated by the American right wing!
Hey, Larry,
I thought that’d get you going, which is one reason I put it in. But your response “bullshit” is hardly convincing.
As for conpiracy nuts, how about these folks:
http://patriotsquestion911.com/
You think they’re all nuts?
And anyhow, how was it a bunch of Arabs with no obvious skills or moral conviction, armed only with box cutters, were able to outwit a trillion-dollar defense establishment — and no one at the Department of Defense or the military had to resign.
Thre is a special thread all for 911.
http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2010/01/the_911_post.html
Larry knows this already, but Alfred is a fairly newly-appeared name, I think, so he may perhaps not know.
Yeah, Alfred, we’ve been through that. Some of those “patriots” are actually certifiable. Or have been certified.
And your “bunch of Arabs” comment is racist and stupid. (I didn’t initially think that often-stated “argument” was racist, but I’ve heard it so much that I know it comes from a racist place).
Larry,
Why don’t you deploy a real argument? But no, not here.
Hey, Richard,
You’re up late, or are you not in Britain? Anyhow, I only mentioned 9/11 in the context of British foreign policy 1934-1939, and to annoy Larry. My point, however, was relevant.
“Yet another reminder not to fly in Russian-built soviet-era aircraft.”
I’ve flown on a TU-154 before (operated by Air Koryo) and it wouldn’t be my choice for the chief executive’s airline if I were a president but it has a surprisingly good safety record. Surprising given that it is used in countries with some of the laxest safety regulations (i.e the old Soviet bloc, especially the stans) and very few of the crashes have been due to mechanical error.
Thanks angrysoba!
Waow Jake, Ingo and consorts!
“Yet another reminder not to fly in Russian-built soviet-era aircraft.”
“So much for flying in rotten old aircraft, the plane was from the 1960’s and is not the safest.”
Isn’t that a cliche worth of “conspiracy theories”?
At least theories are tentative insight, not uninformed belief.
According to news released yesterday, the pilot declined pressing suggestions from the Russian controlers to divert to more suitable airports. His several attempts to land in Smolensk against advice and standard professional common sense has to be questioned and investigated.
More of interest in this (air) field is the probable assassination of president Sikorsky in (still) occupied Gibraltar (a well substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world, not “shades from the past”, Dr Paul)
Well, all in all the reactions show interest for this important political event and that’s good news.
The central question raised by Poland as staging ground for WW2 is whether or not there was an Anglo-American plan for WW2.
A number of inescapable facts suggest that this was indeed the case.
FDR had given pre-war undertakings to Churchill that the US would enter the war on the side of Britain and France.He was providing naval and materiel assistance to Britain when the US was pretending to its own people that they were neutral and had no plans whatever to involve the US in another European war.
There is extensive evidence that the US provoked and fully expected the Japanese intervention in 1941.
Official historians have allowed themselves to be thoroughly misled into relaying accounts of WW2 that ignore the existence in powerful places like Windsor Castle of documents re-important actors like the Duke of Kent, his brother Windsor,George VI and Mountbatten in the run-up to WW2.
Official history has it that both Edward and his brother were against war with Germany.The same is recorded re-Joseph Kennedy.The supposed crypto-fascism of these players is used to furnish this misleading account of their true role.
All,I would suggest,were party to a plan to entrap Hitler into a two-front war that would culminate in the expansion of the state-capitalist Soviet empire.Thus Poland,which was the ostensible reason for Britain and France to make a stand against Hitler in 1939,would by the end of the war be a troublesome obstacle to Allied plans for the post-war settlement of E.Europe.
Sikorski personified that obstacle and Frederick Winterbottom,the secret service agent later responsible for the Duke of Kent’s death,removed that obstacle via plane sabotage in both cases.
Others who were not party to the plan were removed from the scene.Patton failed to understand that the US had no plans to push into Soviet territory and had actually deemed the East/West frontier to be a line much further West than most envisaged.
It surely is high time people had a better understanding of how wars come about.The true story will never be found in the records released by the victors.
I don’t want to say anything positive about the Russian media, Craig, but coverage of the ceremony at Katyn attended by Putin and Prime Minister Tusk was rather extensive. The report I saw on Channel One the evening after the ceremony even included sound bites from Andrzej Wajda and Lech Walesa, who were there as well.
More interestingly, a couple days before the ceremony the Kultura channel broadcast Wajda’s 2007 film “Katyn,” which until then had had only limited screenings in Russia.
Another person attending the ceremony was Arseny Roginsky, chair of Memorial. In an article published this past week, he called the ceremony a big step forward. And he is certainly no fan of Putin’s, as he underscores in the article:
http://hro.org/node/7932
On the other hand, immediately after the ceremony coverage on Channel One, the news reader reported that Putin and Tusk had a separate meeting after the ceremony to “discuss a long-term natural gas delivery contract and the Nord Stream project.” I took this as a not-so tacit admission that the new “thaw” vis-a-vis Katyn had a quite practical dimension for Putin.
Interesting, Apostate.
Louis Mountbatten… his name pops up everywhere, doesn’t it? He contributed to the monumental screw-up that was the Partition of India, Lady Mountbatten had a long-running affair with Nehru about which he knew and in which he acquiesced, he appears again in murky corners and smoke-filled rooms during the third Harold Wilson term and then, later, is assassinated, obliterated, allegedly (officially) by the IRA – but responsibility for that act is disputed.
Interestingly, the UK did not invade the Republic of Ireland after that terrorist act, nor did they do so when Airey Neave (again, an assassination of disputed provenance) was killed, nor even when the Grand Hotel, Brighton was bombed and Thatcher nearly killed (saved by a visit to the bathroom).
You on the bus, Larry?
My sympathies for the Polish amongst you…
Off Topic
You know Craig Im sure I saw an interview with David Frost and Benazir Bhutto after her first assasination attempt failed. Im sure she mentioned the name of someone who killed Osama Bin Laden. Someone better tell the Americans..
Also for the conspiracy debunkers over 9/11, and this is from people who know.
1) Pentagon Strike: how can a jetliner, travelling at the alleged speed it hit the Pentagon, strike it so close to the ground. Here is where physics causes the ‘smoking gun’ problem with the official version.
Ground effect means its impossible for the plane to fly so low, and if it was, that pristine lawn you see in the photos in front of the Pentagon…well that wouldnt be there…..
Why would anyone even think of invading Ireland? The IRA were a creature of the North, i.e. the UK. They used the Republic as somewhere to hide out, or to rob our banks.
Yes, anonymous, 9/11 has been done to death, on a special 9/11 thread. It’s not supposed to be discussed here.
Oh and if you are really bored today, go look into the Minot Incident (missing nuclear warheads from American base in 2007?)
Aparently by mistake they were loaded onto a plane!
1) Knowing military procedure, this wasnt no mistake, nothing happens with those things without a full auditable trail. There are enough failsafes in the procedures to stop it from happening accidentally….
So which moron high up in the American services was trying to start a war….Cheney?…
http://www.legitgov.org/minot_afb_nukes_oddities.html
CLG has a collection of “oddities” on the Minot affair at the above.
Suhayl Saadi
What does “You on the bus, Larry? ” mean?
I don’t mean its literal meaning. I know you are probably using it to mean some sort of analogy that I’m not smart enough to work out?
OT
This just coming through on Twitter (a URL will follow)
“Homosexual link to murder of South African white supremacist Terre’blanche under investigation, police say” – Reuters
Arsalan,
I left a note for you on the “Comment Is Free, But Hidden” thread.
Dreoilin I know I replied to it but I think the reply was deleted.
Ok, Arsalan, no worries.
——
Anyone interested in the Terre’blanche thing has probably Googled, but if not it’s in the NYT:
http://tinyurl.com/y9mtywp
Tom,
Thanks – that’s interesting, especially the Wajda bit. Hopeful, really. You may not remember, but did the Soviet alliance with Hitler get a mention? I can see a scenario where the audience was left to presume these were poles fighting for the Nazis like so many of the Baltics.
Here’s a bit of a mish-mash post, which also features the issue that shall not be mentioned for those obsessives who insist on bringing it up.
http://angrysoba.blogspot.com/2010/04/tragic-flights.html
Thanks for interesting post & comments.
Fascinating to see history in the prcoess of being re-written, again.
Writerman, think whoever told you to shorten your comments should apologise!
yes writerman, keep posting, you make more sense on here than most do.
(off topic) Angrysoba, A* for the isle of Man!
Writerman: Germany of course was more than Hitler, just as everywhere is more than the sum of their dictators. However, he & his ilk encouraged self-pity & selfishness, and created the climate of fear which allowed indifference to brutality and, eventually, genocide, to prevail. What a dick. Thank goodness these dictators inevitably die horrible deaths, it’s the only point to them.
My word this blog is beginbnign to shape up into a WW2 rememberance blog.
We canvassed near Ewood park today,Rovers held Man U to a draw and we got as very good response from the people living there,. 5thats to say the indigenous population, not one nasty word for this independent candidate.
jack Straw cannot imagine what we have gotin stall for him.
Still, we need all the support you can give us,either by coming to Blackburn or by blogging on Jacks favourite sites, his past has caused rivers of blood in Iraq Afghanisrtan and soon in Iran, so what ever you can bring up to make him think and worry ios appreciated and will be helping us.
Jack Straw is a whore
No one loves his war any More!
Ingo
You have a lot more confidence in my people than I do.
Muslims are blindly loyal to Labour.
They vote for it because their fathers did, and their fathers before them.
What you need to make them realise is loyalty to Labour does not mean Loyalty to Islam.
The attitude of the elders is, obey the law, obey the leader. They repeat the old saying that we are told by racists, “If you don’t like it here leave”, by changing it to “If you don’t want to vote Labour leave the country”.
They will not tell you this, but they tell each other.
This link needs to be broken, don’t under estimate how difficult it will be to break it.