RUSSIA TO MAKE PUBLIC THE KATYN FILES...

I think there is a better explanation. Industrial centers, cheap skilled labor. That's what he needed. Gerries did not worry about Poland becoming a power house. Germany was poor back in 1918 but Poland was broke and clueless. Sort of like now.

Poland fought for independence and was a new nation, a rising star before being partitioned by Germany and Russia. What angered Hitler was Britain signing an agreement to help Poland if needed and the aquisition of Gdańsk, a port the Germans were convinced belonged to them. They knew Poland would make a lot of money and outdo Germany, struggling with it's Versailles troubles. Germans saw Poland as the big winner in the deal and feared they would be overshadowed by it.

Poland was created to weaken Austria, Germany. Russia agreed to move the deal forward. They were horrified of Germany, Our nation was reestablished as a side effect of the Treaty of Versailles in 1919.

There is more to it, but i want to keep it simple for arguments sake :)

I'd never call the Piłsudski years government clueless.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Industrial_Region_%28Poland%29

All was missing was a little more time.


Clueless about what? Economical development?

Well, what would you call it? As much as people are trying to make him a legend, I think it only shows that Poland is rather short on true "legends," because he definitely wasn't successful in retrospect, and his authoritarian style of government only led to political divisions afterward, and while Rydz-Smigly and Moscicki were busy bickering, the Soviets and the Nazis were plotting how to divide Poland between them. If that's not being clueless, I don't know what is. Way to go!

Germany was in ruins, 20 years later it took them 20 days to take out the whole well developed Poland. The only thing we had by then was a well organized husaria... Let's charge some tanks!

Kudos to Pilsudski for job well done!

Not to disturb your off-topic chat but Russia has not released any new documents. Again, out of the 183 volumes of the 1999-2004 investigation into the Katyń shootings, 116 volumes remain secret. They just made public the documents already given to the Polish side in 1992 by Yeltsin.

Out of five pages of posts and not one critical reader. Interesting.

Here is what they released:
rusarchives.ru/publication/katyn/spisok.shtml

1jola:
And they only released that to deflect from the investigation and divert attention from the fact that Poland has squat as far as the black boxes go. The sheep are so easily led...

It is the headlines that matter to headline believers. The headlines soon will be: Poles Difficult as Ever: Not Happy with the Generous Russian Release of 10% of Katyń files, or Poles Stalling World Love-in.

secret, lol they don't have them i tell ya. You give them too much f-ing credit.

Go back and read my post to see what they have.

I realize that Poles think Poland-centered. But to understand try to think just wider - there is now a lot of documents from those times. Without it all your conclusions will be wrong.

You should know that Germans invaded Poland and SU invaded Baltic states and part of Poland not because they agreed to live in piece forever. As you found by yourself there was nothing of special economic interest on all these territories for SU - except their strategic importance for next big war. It was just a part of the game for future big war preparation.

All "big boys" - SU, UK, France, and Germany - understood that they can't avoid real big war and played for time. They used smaller countries as pawns. Czech, Poland, Baltic states and Finland were first victims of this game but they never been an aim for big powers.

Stalin was not ready for big war at the end of 30-s - beg. of 40-s: he just completed "chistka" ="cleansing" of army and communist party to strengthen his dictatorship - he killed tens of thousands officers and left Red Army without head. He also tried to develop heavy industry in order to increase military production. He proposed alliance and military help to UK, France, Germany, Poland and Czech against Germany- but it was rejected and Western countries left Czech for Hitler without war. Poland even took part in Czech dismemberment - showing an example for Stalin. Poland also had a hope for alliance with Germany against Stalin - they couldn’t even think about opposite alliance.

The Western allies plan was to put Hitler for war in East, not West. Stalin just make an opposite plan and succeed in the start - Western allies proclaimed war against Hitler. But they did nothing. Unfortunately for Stalin Hitler decided that SU is weak enough and started the big war in June 1941 - he believed that the war will be short and after that he will have enough resources for war against UK without danger from the East. You all know the end of story and who won that big game in the late 80-s - USA and UK.

It could be disappointing to think about evil targeting you and your countries but found instead that the evil just didn't even take you into account.

Good post and very logical.

In the late thirties and then officially in 1939-1941, Stalin made sure Hitler had enough grain, fuel, raw metals, and was well prepared to invade Russia in 41. Stalin was also well prepared but for an offensive war which he didn't get to carry out as planned.

Stalin's contribution to the Nazi war effort was significant.

He had a hope to put the war against Germany future apart - he tried to push Hitler to the west. He rejected any intelligence information about Hitler’s plan and even repressed those who warned him about. His main aim was not "to provoke" Germans for war and he was think about himself as a genius. He was sure that Western allies try to put him to the war first. He wasn't a genius and underestimated Hitler madness.

When the war started he was completely shocked and disappeared for several days - his policy failed.

Don't forget also about other danger for SU in the Far East - Japan. There were hot conflics and local small wars between SU and Japan - in Mongolia and SU Far East in the late 30-s - started by Japanese. Stalin succeeds in the game there. Otherwise the results of WWII would be different.

Out of curiosity Jed - I understand you're a Russian and your profile mentions Moscow as your current residence. What compelled you to join a Polish forum?

I'm interested to know more about your way of thinking - and why you still prefer to use reflexes instead of clever heads when think about Russia.

I work for British company in Moscow and they were thinking to involve Moscow office in their business in Poland. Wrong idea from my point of view.

and I thought you were here to tells us that no documents are secret and let's talk about something else, which you have done.

I think we need to know past and think more about future.

Perhaps that comment is more applicable to your Prime Minister. Please explain the strong-arm tactic with Georgia and the simulated invasion of Poland in September of last year (on the 70th anniversary of the German invasion of Poland). Or is Putin just the type of guy who likes to provoke? With that comment, it can well be argued you're describing your own government to a T.

Poles NEVER charged any tanks. That was a big Nazi German lie that was repeated over and over to discredit and demean Poland. I can't believe you actually believe that big lie.

Also Nazi Germany had literally a MILLION TONS of war aid help from Soviet Russia when starting WWII as per the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact.

You forget the Poland with ONLY 32 million people was fighting BOTH Nazi Germany with 70 MILLION people and Soviet Russia with 130 MILLION people. That's like a person 6 feet tall fighting someone 12 feet tall and another person 24 feet tall TOGETHER.

It took 5 weeks (35 days) for Poland (32 million people) to fall to TWO GIANT NATIONS WITH a combined strength of at least 200 MILLION people.

So by your logic a person 6 feet tall (Poland) should be able to fight off two people, one over 12 feet tall (Germany) and the other 24 feet tall (Russia) for months and months?? Are you insane?

Easy - Geogia is alternative way for oil and gas pipes from Caspian Sea and Central Asia. Monopoly is better for profit. Geogia was a part of plan of former US administration for Russia isolation - but Saakashvili was too hot and started a conflict in Ossetia. This was not in US plan.

The plan has now changed and US puppetts in Georgia, Ukraine and ... are not necessary anymore. The game now has differernt rule - who will pay (lost) more money to these countries. Russia is not clever here.

Look to the future? Funny that, coming from someone whose own government lives in the past and openly worships Stalin. Let's not be hypocritical. As for Georgia, how the he'll do you justify Russian tanks rolling in because of a little skirmish they had with one of their own regions, on their own territory. And you still haven't addresses the simulated Polish invasion.

Oh Baloney.

Saakashivili didn't start anything. Georgia was being violated by Russia and abused for 2 years before Saakashvili did anything

Russia Set Up Georgia for the invasion.

Anybody with any basic military experience knows that the huge air, land and sea force used to invade Georgia took MONTHS to set up by Russia. The invasion of Georgia in 2008 was not a spontaneous response to Saakashvili/Georgia by Russia.

Russian "peacekeepers" were looking the other way as former KGB type Russians were agitating the non-Georgians against the Georgians in Ossetia. Russia also invaded Abkazia when there was NO Georgian military activity there.

nypost.com/seven/08122008/postopinion/opedcolumnists/russia _goes_rogue_124032.htm
realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/08/the_end_of_the_fairy _tale.html

Russia likes to twist history to suit its over-inflated ego. The truth of the matter is, Russia is just a big sh*t-disturbing bully.

Don't pay too much attention to small details. Saakashvili started the confict - it is true fact. Russia won a position in Georgia as a result. There is no evil and good there - just clever and stupid. And it is not clear yet who is clever there (not related to Saakashvili indeed).

Stop thinking by stereotypes, please.


You may think this way or another - just be calm. Nobody has monopoly for truth - the truth is too big for our heads. Our opinions are only projections of partial truth - we see it from different coordinate systems.

From this point any two opposite opinions together could be more true than any particular one.

I'm not an apologist for Russian strong-arm tactics and paranoia (both of which exist) but in the Georgian case, it's pretty well established that Georgia was the agressor.

Yes, a rational person can argue that the Russian response was too extreme (and I certainly would) but Georgia did initiate force in that particular case and Kaczynski's support of Saakashvili did him no creidt.

And the silence on the simulated invasion of Poland is deafening here. Russia has an unstable psychopath for a Prime Minister, with another psychopath, Stalin, as his hero. Which is why the circumstances surrounding recent events emit such a foul odor.

Let's not forget that Putin was not a part of that generation. His praising of Stalin was terrible but he hopefully won't repeat that nonsense.