Was the holocaust by Germans in Poland the worse genocide in history?

Fact remains, that while Oświęcim aka Auschwitz, Majdanek, Treblinka etc. clearly rested on Polish soil, they were almost exlusively manned, operated and administrated by GERMANS, not Poles (as I stated once before)!

The blame therefore lies solely with Nazi Germany for carrying out as well as having the Holocaust carried out in occupied countries as well as in those territories squarely within the Nazi dragnet.

I'm able to do so and have done so in the past. Here I posted the names of four Poles who served in the same Nazi concentration camp, the one at Trawniki.

And that's before we get to the likes of Sawoniuk and Serafinowicz who actively murdered Jews as part of the holocaust.

Are you still laughing?


No. In reality Germans were only a minority of the staff (although almost all of the command level staff were indeed German).

That is not true. There were quite a lot of Ukrainians who served as guards at the concentration camps.


Have you ever been to the Alsace?

JollyRomek, although factually correct about the vast number of accomplices in such cases as that Demanjuk, a Ukrainian indeed, this was more the exception than the rule, at least in Germany itself. The watch guards in Belsen, Dachau, Orthruf etc. compared with the majority of extermination camps in Poland, were almost exclusively Germans.

To be sure, the orders in ALL cases were given by the German, NOT the Poles, Ukrainians, assorted Balts and so on!

Yes, but these were not on Polish territory and it is my understanding that the concentration camps on Polish soil are the subject of discussion here, no?


but carried out by the Poles, Ukrainians etc. If we take the Ukrainians for example, a lot of them have willingly signed up to the SS. The orders may have been given by the Germans but it was the Ukrainians and also the Latvians (as an example for the Baltic troops in the SS) who enthusiastically joined the SS to follow those orders.

Anyway, to think that it would have been possible to carry out the mass murder of millions of people without some kind of involvement of the locals is somewhat unrealistic.

As "TheOther" has said, after the war they all claimed to have been part of the resistance.

Obviously, JollyRomek! On this I concur wholeheartedly, if merely from the perspective of historical accuracy!

The big issue after the War was whether crimes committed by Germans in "occupied" territory, i.e. NOW no longer technically German, could be ascribed to the present government of the that-time fledgling Federal Republic of Germany, i.e. (former) West Germany. This remains a question as fewer and fewer survivors from that period are still with us and actual first-hand memory of the period has already begun to fade, will the proverbial "statute of limitations" (Verjaehrungsfrist) run out and will therefore culpability too become a mere talking point.

The "Verjaehrungsfrist" does not apply to crimes committed during the war. Just a few years ago, the German government put a Ukrainian guard on trial in Munich.

Apologies, of course it was not the German government but the German state prosecution that put the guard on trial.

Noooo, not exactly! The statute of limitations according to your own Basic Law/ post-War Constitution is determined clearly by the government of the Federal Republic:-) Israel to this day continues fighting for the extradition (Auslieferung) of any number of "former" German Nazis, e.g. Alois Brunner, accused of war crimes. Merkel has said on more than one occasion, both to the Jewish Claims Conference International as well to her own parliament, that she does NOT intend to make this debate an issue in ther campaign any longer.

Apologies myself! Posted message before reading your latest reply. SorryLOL

A general addendum to this most engaging thread!

Over the past two decades, I've had the sad duty to attend a number of Yom Hashoah Holocaust Remembrance Day ceremonies, both in Israel and at the UN Headquarters in New York. German, Austrian, Hungarian and Russian consular representatives each came up to speak regarding their country's complicity if not direct involvement in the Shoah. Not ONE (1) time did a representative from Poland come up to speak. While I'm not speaking about before a specifically Polish venue, I wondered for a long time, why at the former venues, the Poles stood silently while others spoke.

And I still don't have an answer.

The polish genocide was terrible, but not even close to be the worst genocide in history.

If you talk about percentage of population exterminated, for example, less than 20% of the Polish population was killed by the Nazis.

In comparison, Astonishing 64% of the Armenian population was killed by the turkish in 1915. (Those that were not killed were forced to convert to Islam). This means 1,5 million people. (Remembering that just 20 years before that, in 1985, the Turkish already massacrated 300 thousand Christian Armenians during the Hamidian Massacres)

In this same year, unbealivable 83% of the Christian Assyrian population was exterminated by Turkish. That means 750 thousand assyrians.

Not to mention the 300 thousand of Christian greeks killed in a timespam of few weeks by the Turkish government.

All that happened less than 100 years ago.

Going a bit further in the past:

In 1756 the Turkic Uyghurs invaded Dzungar and massacrated 80% of the native population. Same happened when the Turkish invaded Romania or the Balkans.

If you want make the Nazis look like Barbies, just take a look at Turkish History, they are the true genocidal state.

So in other words, you want to misuse this thread for your Anti-Islam propaganda...........

Amen!

Levi, to be perfectly honest, I'd post less and READ more if I were you:-) Your text is filled with half-truths, every one bent to fit your personal rant.

Spare us, please.

@Levi, if an Armenian were fortunate enough to escape from Turkey, unlike in Nazi-held Europe, the Ottoman Empire is far from an analogous example! Her tentacles didn't extend throughout the know continent of Central Asia at the time, and if an Armenian slipped through their fingers, they wouldn't likely be returned to Turkey itself and then executed.

I'm not minimizing any horror, merely placing it in it's correct historical perspective.

I decided not to post on this forum anymore but I couldn't really believe what I just read and decided to post once again.

English speaking sources are unreliable when it comes to little known people. Sometimes it's not easy even for the natives to distinguish between Polish, Ukrainian and Belarusian surnames because of the same endings.

Fortunately, there are sources who speak about nationality of these people:
Bronislav Hajda was Ukrainian who was a Polish citizen. You are a foreigner who holds Polish citizenship as you said. It doesn't make you Polish. Hajda was Ukrainian. Period. Polish sources know better in this case.

Walter (Uladzimir) Obodziński was Belarusian.
Jaroslav Bilaniuk was Ukrainian.
Jakiw Palij is indeed a very Polish name
Sawoniuk was Belarusian. He is actually well known and if you claim that he was Polish, it makes you even dumber.
Serafinowicz was Belarusian. Even your precious English speaking sources admit it in this case.

Pathetic.

If you want to give us names then give names of actual Polish people and then we can talk about it. It's you who denies historical facts right now.

Why do you even accuse Poles of taking part in the Holocaust? Some people were simply forced. Jews themselves were in Sonderkomando and had to do tasks like getting the victims into gas chambers. They were treated better than "normal" prisoners (for example they got more food). Does it mean that they were "taking part" in Holocaust of their fellow Jews?

If someone provides names of Polish people who willingly (!) took part in exterminating Jews, I would gladly take a look. Without it, there is no need to speak about it and accuse us.

Millions of Poles died during World War II, we were object of heavy racism from the Nazi in our own country. It makes us laugh when we hear how some foreigners accuse us of something now. Germans were responsible for the Holocaust. Period.

.....but even the all-powerful Nazi juggernaut couldn't have succeeded with the same ruthless efficiency with which it had, were it not for the able assistance from far too many willing accomplices!! While it is true that many were forced into committing heinous acts, even against their own, e.g. the kapos, members of the Sonderkommando (forget the Judenrat itself which tried to meet personally with Hitler and discuss their fate!), what pray tell forced normal, run-of-the-mill Poles AFTER THE WAR WAS OVER to herd Jews into a barn and burn them all, or to massacre innocents in a pogrom, e.g. in Kielce, huh??!

Sorry, but by '47, the "evil" Germans (sic) were long since out of commission; the Poles did it on their own.

When you say "we" do you mean all Poles, including those who like to lift their right arm in order to make sure that everyone understands their political beliefs?

It is beyond me how you can claim that there was no racism and anti semitic element in Poland when we still have people roaming the streets of Poland with a very clear view and ideology in favour of Nazi Germany.

Right on, dude!

Even as late as several years ago, a Jewish acquaintance of mine from Warsaw, having recently returned to Poland, remarked that Polish Jews don't usually let on that they're Jews,for fear of having their car tires slashed!!! This was in 2009.

@Haylel,

The fact that Poland didn't have a puppet gov't. installed by the Nazis such as Vichy France, Horthy's Hungary, Seyss-Inquart in Austria, Hacha in Czechoslovakia or Ion Antonescu and the Iron Guard in Romania, even Norway's Quisling nevertheless scarcely excuses a large number of Poles from fomenting Jew hatred within their own cities and towns!!

Your pretzel logic to hopefully characterize all these men as card-carrying Polish citizens who volunteered to carryout genocide during Nazi Germany's occupation of war ravaged Poland is hilarious!

The men you listed - Bilaniuk, Obodzinsky, Palij, Serafinowicz and Sawoniuk - were all born on territory that is now part of Ukraine and Belarus. Nothing provided in your supporting links shows that they regarded their identity as Polish rather than Ukrainian or Belarusian. It hasn't been established either that they had any command of the Polish language if at all. Furthermore, Poland never had a collaborative government with Nazi Germany in occupied Poland especially when the death camps were up and running. Therefore any possible claims of Polish citizenship by these men at the time could never have been officially authenticated.

In fact, both Belarusians Szymon Serafinowicz and Anthony Sawoniuk were already British citizens when they were accused of war crimes which they denied. Although Serafinowicz was found unfit to stand trial, Sawoniuk was convicted and imprisoned on war crime charges. Neither were ever stripped of their British citizenship. So how does that make you feel Harry knowing that your fellow Brits committed genocide during the war? Why haven't you and other members of the British public ever demanded the British government give Poland a formal apology and billions in reparations for British participation in The Holocaust? I expect a full account from you because earlier today you said yourself that "Denying history is no way of making sure that the mistakes made in the past are not made again in the future."

As for the other men, they all moved to either the United States or Canada after the war and took up citizenship there. Regarding these other war crimes allegations, including those made against and denied by Bronisław Hajda, all focused on seeking to strip the men of their US and Canadian citizenship and deport them. Some did loose their citizenship but not a single one was ever successfully deported and so were left effectively stateless.

How peculiar though that pursuing these men rested solely on accusations that they did not declare on their immigration paperwork any alleged participation in Nazi-led atrocities on occupied Polish soil. But why would they do this in the first place when they strenuously denied the charges later on in life? And if such serious charges had iron-clad proof to back them up then why didn't the American and Canadian justice authorities ever seek to convict and imprison these men on crimes against humanity rather than making it a case of them failing to declare their suspected status when they immigrated? As aforementioned your home country of Britain found that it had jurisdiction over the war crimes your two fellow citizens committed in Poland when Nazi Germany occupied her.

Interestingly your one NY Times link from 2003 admitted that "The evidence against Mr. Palij and Mr. Bilaniuk has not been made public."

Really? Nearly 60 years after the war ended at that point and the prosecutors had to keep evidence regarding such serious allegations under wraps? Were these accused OAPs a flight risk or was the proof so flimsy they feared they would get no traction with the cases?

So much for transparency and due process under the law. It would be laughable if it wasn't so pathetic.

Once again Harry, your dire attempt to implicate Poland in The Holocaust has absolutely no merit.

Hatred towards Jews wasn't something the Germans invented. Anti-Jewish propaganda was spread all across Europe during that time. Just the Germans actually went for the "final solution" while others merely talked. Doesn't change the fact that in Greece for example, the locals of Thessaloniki applauded when Greek Jews were deported. Similar scenes happened all over Europe but after the war, everyone was "shocked" and blamed the Germans for doing what they secretly hoped would happen.

In general, we can only hope that something as the Holocaust will never repeat itself. But in order for that to happen, we have to openly deal with our past, as painful as it may be. Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary have done very well in their attempt to deal with their part of that period of time. Poland seems to be lacking either interest or guts to openly discuss the involvement of Poles in the Holocaust and openly discuss the Anti-Jewish stand of members of their beloved AK.

Agreed, one-hundred-and-one percent, JollyRomek!

No serious student of history, much less literate being, would even have the temerity to intimate that Hitler "invented" virulent anti-Semitism. Like the Reagan "Revolution" starting round about 1981 here in the States, Hitler was simply an enabler, he didn't create the ghastly stuff. In the latter case, the stuff was Jew hatred, in the former, unbridled, crony capitalism which brought out the bully businessman in us all.

Germany's already tenuous joke of a democracy (the late, lamented Weimar Republic, may she rot in peace!!!), paultry understanding of multi-culturalism, and, according to Prof. Helmut Plessner, lack of true Judeo-Christian roots, allowing Germany to easily descend into pagan barbarism, were all the true culprits in creating that which The Fuehrer merely exploited.....but oh' sooooooo easily.

According to the US 7th circuit court Hajda was a Goralian Pole whose sister said "My brother Bronislaw Hajda, was a Pole like myself".


Your sources know better than his sister? That's unlikely.


According to Canadian court Obodzinsky was born in Poland and a Polish ex-service man.


Anthony Sawoniuk: born a Polish citizen in Poland to an ethnically Polish mother and (according to local rumour) a Polish Jewish father, grew up identifying himself as ethnically Polish, joined the Polish police, joined the Polish army during WWII and then lived in England where he identified himself as a Polish patriot. You really want to claim he wasn't Polish? Good luck.


I state that some Poles took part in the holocaust because some Poles did take part in it, as shown above. Simply lying about the mistakes of history is an excellent way of making sure that the mistakes are repeated.

Actually pogrom w Kielcach happened because people thought that Jews kidnapped Polish boy for ritual sacrifice. Moreover, I referred to the Holocaust, not anything else because it is not the subject of this thread.

I came to this forum once again only to get the names of Poles who willingly participated in Holocaust from a certain user. Nothing more. I'm not gonna stay here and discuss post war situation of Jews because it was never my intention.


When did I clam that there was no racism and anti Semitic element in Poland? Can't you read or are you delusional? Moreover, rarely do I meet antisemitic or racist people in Poland. So your "people roaming the streets" is an exaggeration. And who do you refer to by "we have still..", I speak as a native Pole, and you? Czyżby znowu cudzoziemiec atakował Polaków tutaj? I jeszcze przekręca moje słowa. Żałosne. Rany, mówisz o holokauście, a wyjadą ci ze wszystkim innym, byle tylko było związane z "polskim antysemityzmem" i byle tylko nas znów oskarżyć o coś.

English is the language on these forums.

You said it to me, but i think that you should read more.

During the genocides, the Ottoman empire was bigger than Nazi Germany :

Ottoman Empire at 1915: 1,800,000 km², From Africa to Asia, taking entire Arabian Peninsula.

This is more than Nazi Germany (630 000 Km2) + Occupied territories in France, Poland, Balkans, East Europe and North Europe (just excluding Africa).

No dice, as we say in English, Haylel!

The ritual murder stuff's right out of the Middle Ages, mister! You excuse fellow Poles involved in the Kielce affair for being just ignorant slobs who grew up with hostility to Jews as with their own mother's milk??? I'd think a condemnation and call for re-thinking past brutalities would be a more appropriate response:-)

The Germans have been re-thinking and re-evaluating their past non-stop now for nearly seventy years counting. When will the Poles start? When the last Jew living in Poland is dead and buried??

Exactly! And you said -


Who is "we"? Who is "us"? Do you include all Poles in that "we" and "us", even those who still show their affection for Nazi Germany?


Yes, i must admit that it was a tiny bit exaggerated. But, those people exist in Poland and in lesser wealthy areas of Poland, their numbers are quite big. That's not something you can deny.

Didn't the hostilities grow larger when Jewish political party Bund wanted an independant Jewish state on Polish Soul? There is a reason why the Polish state supporter emigrasjon to Palestine and trailer Jewish "partisants"? Can remember it being discussed before

Trained and emigration*

Secretly hoped that their governments would slaughter Jews?

After the War, the so-called "Werwoelfe" (Werwolves) roamed the bombed out countryside areas of Germany in bands. These were diehards who presumably still believed in the cause!

In Poland too, WiN totally different wolves but, still hiding in the woods

Stick to one username please

Only for different reasons.

As i said, Anti-Jewish propaganda wasn't something Germany invented. It was spread all across Europe.

Nobody wanted anyone to get slaughtered but at the same time wished "they would just disappear". In Germany nobody wanted to happen what happened, same as in every other country in Europe. But we can not close our eyes to the fact that at the time Jews were as welcomed across Europe as a fire in an orphanage.

Even the UK had it's own "Hitler" but when he became too dangerous he was arrested and locked away. I just can't remember his name at the moment.

Should be "according to a website".
Here they said that he was Ukrainian.
m.wprost.pl/ar/id,24090

So what? This is one case that we definitely won't solve. Actually his name sounds Polish but in Polish I read that he was Ukrainian.


Well, it is extremely funny to hear it from you, Harry. Especially when you were the one who spoke that Chopin wasnt Polish. Back then you knew better than Chopin himself, right?

Sure! Canadian court knows better. Uladzimir sounds very Polish too!
kamunikat.fontel.net/www/czasopisy/czasopis/02-2003/miesiac.htm

They say here that "he collaborated with Germans in Belarusian police"
And that he may be deported to Belarus for a trial. Then why not to Poland if he was Polish?

Antoni Sawoniuk. If he was Polish and had Polish parents, why does he have a Belarusian surname and name (his real name was Andrei) and his names are written in cyrillic alphabet even on the wikipedia? Well, all your words about him considering himself a Polish patriot is a lie as long as you don't provide sources.

Some Poles certainly did take part in the Holocaust but these ones are not Polish or it is impossible to say which nation they belonged to. We can argue all night and won't come to the truth. Give other names Harry and we will talk. I'm not gonna reply to you anymore without it, so don't bother replying to me.


Actually just wanted to see if someone's a native Pole.


Excuse fellow Poles? When? Geez, I'm sick of people here who can't even read properly. Lyzko, read properly and then speak out. Kidnapping was their reasoning. When did I defend them because of it?


Haha, now you say that you're Polish? Don't make me laugh. You speak Polish "troche" but you are a Pole. Oh my...


I should have said "most of us". Actually I'm pretty sure that majority of Poles think the same way about Holocaust and our "part" in it. All I have to do is check random articles about it or comment s in the Polish internet. Or just ask people around me.