Revised january 30, 2009 a tangled web

Nothwithstanding such evidence primitive Holocaust memoirs contend that, already in late 1941 and throughout 1942, Home Army partisan units roamed the countryside in search of Jews and Communists to murder, long before Home Army partisan units became active in the Naliboki forest area. An example of such a memoir of a Jew from Wiszniew (Noah Podberesky) is found in Samuel Podberesky, Never the Last Road (College Station, Texas: Virtualbookworm.com, 2003), 37, 50, 51.

25 Peter Silverman, David Smuschkowitz, and Peter Smuszkowicz, From Victims to Victors (Concord, Ontario: The Canadian Society For Yad Vashem, 1992), 79, 107–108, 97, 129. Throughout this area the local police was infiltrated by the Polish underground. The chief of police of the Nowa Mysz district, Henryk Zaprucki, was at the same time a commander in the Home Army. See Martin Dean, Collaboration in the Holocaust: Crimes of the Local Police in Belorussia and Ukraine, 1941–41 (Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire and London: Macmillan, 2000), 143. The chief of police in Raduń, Franciszek Ługowski, who provided considerable assistance to Jews, also maintained connections with the Polish underground and eventually abandoned his post. See Aviel, A Village Named Dowgalishok, 25–26, 263.

26 Oscar Pinkus, The House of Ashes, Revised Edition (Schenectady, New York: Union College Press, 1990), 213–14.

27 Norman Davies, “Poles and Jews: An Exchange,” New York Review of Books, April 9, 1987.

28 As mentioned earlier, according to Soviet statistics, between October 1939 and June 1941, the Soviets had deported more than 120,000 people from prewar Polish territories incorporated into the Belorussian SSR, of whom around 90,000 were ethnic Poles and 23,000 Jews. The vast majority of the Jewish deportees, however, were non-natives who had fled to this area in 1939 in advance of the invading German army; the reason for their deportation was their reluctance to accept Soviet citizenship after being offered the possibility of returning to their homes in the German zone in the early part of 1940. It appears that about half of the Jews who had taken refuge in the Soviet zone did accept Soviet citizenship and thus avoided deportation; the remainder were, much to their surprise, rounded up for deportation as unsure elements. See Eugeniusz Mironowicz, “Zmiany struktury narodowościowej w zachodnich obwodach Białorusi w latach 1939–1941,” Białoruskie Zeszyty Historyczne, vol. 20 (Białystok: Białoruskie Towarzystwo Historyczne, 2003): 194–202.

29 These abuses targeted primarily Polish authorities, the military, and landlords on the eve of and during the early weeks of the Soviet invasion of Poland in mid–September and early October 1939. Some 2,000 Poles were killed by their Belorusian neighbours, who were inspired to a large degree by Communist agitators and whose misdeeds were applauded by the Soviet authorities (such as Ponomarenko). See Michał Gnatowski, W radzieckich okowach: Studium o agresji 17 września 1939 r. i o radzieckiej polityce w regionie łomżyńskim w latach 1939–1941 (Łomża: Łomżyńskie Towarzystwo Naukowe im. Wagów, 1997), 69; Wierzbicki, Polacy i Białorusini w zaborze sowieckim.

30 According to Soviet sources, in July 1944, in the combined districts of Baranowicze, Białystok, Brześć, Pińsk and Wilejka, there were 8 partisan groupings or concentrations, 69 brigades and 171 independent detachments with more than 63,500 partisans. In addition, they were supported by 226 NKVD groups and units, counting more than 3,100 persons, which were involved in diversionary and intelligence operations directed at the “enemies” of Soviet authority. See Michał Gnatowski, “Kontrowersje i konflikty między ZWZ–AK i radzieckim podziemiem na północno-wschodnich ziemiach Polski w latach 1941–1944,” in Marzena Liedke, Joanna Sadowska and Jan Tyrkowski, eds., Granice i pogranicza: Historia codzienności i doświadczeń (Białystok: Instytut Historii Uniwersytetu w Białymstoku, 1999), vol. 2, 180–81. The largest concentration of Soviet partisans was located in the Baranowicze district and was under the command of Vasilii Chernyshev (or Chernyshov), who was known as Platon. It was divided into four zones or regions (Iwieniec, Szczuczyn, Lida and Stołpce) and, at its peak, consisted of 22 brigades and five independent detachments totalling about 17,500 people. There was also a partisan concentration in the southern zone of that same district (Baranowicze) consisting of three brigades and four independent detachments and counting 2,400 people. In the Wilejka district, to the north, there was an operational military division headed by Colonel Fedor Markov, which consisted of 18 brigades and five independent detachments. Their combined strength was 12,000 people. In addition, it had two reconnaissance and diversionary detachments counting 600 people. The weakest district was Białystok, where there were five brigades and seven independent detachments, totalling 7,000 people. These were located mainly in the Lipiczany and Różana forests. See Boradyn, ed., Armia Krajowa na Nowogródczyźnie i Wileńszczyźnie (1942–1944) w świetle dokumentów sowieckich, 11. Historian Michał Gnatowski points out that Soviet efforts to penetrate the Polish underground were largely unsuccessful because of a lack of support for the Soviets on the local Polish population. See Gnatowski, “Kontrowersje i konflikty między ZWZ–AK i radzieckim podziemiem na północno-wschodnich ziemiach Polski w latach 1941–1944,” in Liedke, Sadowska and Tyrkowski, eds., Granice i pogranicza, vol. 2, 188.

31 In the summer of 1943 the leadership of the Wilno and Nowogródek districts of the Home Army received instructions from the Home Army’s high command to conduct discussions and to cooperate with Soviet partisans based on principles of mutual respect including respect for Poland’s territorial integrity. (In international law, Poland’s Eastern territories continued to be an integral part of the Polish state.) See Tadeusz Pełczyński, Halina Czarnocka, Józef Garliński, Kazimierz Iranek-Osmecki, and Włodzimierz Otocki, eds., Armia Krajowa w dokumentach 1939–1945, vol. 3: Kwiecień 1943–lipiec 1944 (London: Studium Polski Podziemnej, 1976), 94; Wołkonowski, Okręg Wileński Związku Walki Zbrojnej Armii Krajowej w latach 1939–1945, 156; Gnatowski, “Kontrowersje i konflikty między ZWZ–AK i radzieckim podziemiem na północno-wschodnich ziemiach Polski w latach 1941–1944,” in Liedke, Sadowska and Tyrkowski, eds., Granice i pogranicza, vol. 2, 186.

32 Israeli historian Leonid Smilovitsky, for example, claims baselessly that “the Armia Krajowa and the Narodowy [sic] Sily Zbrojne … In the summer and spring of 1943 [sic], they victimized Jews in the forests of Lipichany [Lipiczany], Naliboki, Rudensk, Naroch [Narocz] and Bryansk.” The Home Army was just becoming active in the spring and summer of 1943, though certainly not in Rudensk and Bryansk (areas located in Soviet Belorussia), and was still on good terms with the Soviet partisans. Smilovitsky is correct in saying that the Home Army came to view the Jews as “pro-Soviet elements,” which they by and large were, but that came later, after the Jews joined in Soviet assaults on Polish civilians (e.g., Naliboki in May 1943) and partisans (e.g., Lake Narocz in August 1943). See Smilovitskii, Katastrofa evreev v Belorussii 1941–1944 gg., 22 (also 14), 138. Smilovitsky’s treatment of Polish-Jewish relations, found at pp. 129–46, is very selective in its use of facts, poorly researched in terms of Polish sources, and decidedly pro-Jewish and even pro-Soviet. The NSZ did not field partisan units in this region, though, beginning in 1943, it briefly maintained a skeletal district command. Its activities were most likely limited to Wilno and perhaps a few other towns. However, as early as fall 1939, the National Party (Stronnictwo Narodowe) organized its clandestine structures in the area, including the Narodowa Organizacja Wojskowa (National Military Organization). The NOW organized no permanent guerrilla units, although occasionally it sent out its special task forces, mobilized for the occasion, to carry out various anti-German, anti-Soviet, and anti-bandit operations. The NOW suffered incredible losses during the great German pacification in the vicinity of Naliboki forest in summer 1943 and it members were later co-opted into the AK. See Kazimierz Krajewski, Uderzeniowe Bataliony Kadrowe 1942–1943 (Warsaw: Pax, 1993), 380. An exceptional case was the Uderzeniowe Bataliony Kadrowe (Shock Cadre Battalions) of the Konfederacja Narodu (National Confederation), a small unit of about 80 men headed by the radical ONR-Falanga leader Bolesław Piasecki, which moved into the Lida area—in the vicinity of the town of Iwie (Iwje)—from Białystok in October 1943, and was incorporated into the Home Army. Piasecki’s group left the Nowogródek area and joined up with the Wilno District of the Home Army in protest of the decision of some commanders of beleaguered AK units to accept weapons from the Germans after the Soviet assault in December 1943. See Jan Erdman, Droga do Ostrej Bramy (London: Odnowa, 1984), 240–41; Krajewski, Uderzeniowe Bataliony Kadrowe 1942–1943, passim; Krajewski, Na Ziemi Nowgródzkiej, 120; Boradyn, Niemen–rzeka niezgody, 39–40; Wojciech Jerzy Muszyński, “Konfederacja Narodu,” in Encyklopedia “Białych Plam” (Radom: Polskie Wydawnictwo Encyklopedyczne, 2002), vol. 9, 311–12. The Shock Cadre Battalions were accused of killing one of their officers allegedly because of his Jewish origin. It has been established, however, that the officer in question turned betrayer after being blackmailed by the Germans, who had arrested his wife; he was thus liquidated as a Gestapo collaborator. See Krajewski, Uderzeniowe Bataliony Kadrowe 1942–1943, 351. According to an unverified and undocumented account, Piasecki’s unit was also accused of executing some Jews who allegedly confessed to being sent by the Germans to ferret out partisans. Piasecki put the blame for that deed on his chief of staff, Wojciech Kętrzyński “Wołkowyski”, whose mother was of Jewish origin. See Jacek Wilamowski, Pętla zdrady: Konspiracja–wróg–polityka. Za kulisami Polski Podziemnej 1939–1945 (Warsaw: Agencja Wydawnicza CB Andrzej Zasieczny, 2003), 73. After the war, Piasecki’s 16-year-old son was kidnapped and murdered in Warsaw by Jewish avengers; the circumstances of that event are described later on.

33 Belorussian historian Zakhar Shybeka mentions an underground organization—the Belorussian Nationalist Party—which was allegedly opposed to both the Nazis and Soviets, but, as historian Eugeniusz Mironowicz points out, that claim has not been substantiated. See Zachar Szybieka [Zakhar Shybeka], Historia Białorusi 1795–2000 (Lublin: Instytut Europy Środkowo-Wschodniej, 2002); Eugeniusz Mironowicz, “Ruch partyzancki na Białorusi w historiografii białoruskiej i polskiej,” in Krzysztof Buchowski and Wojciech Śleszyński, eds., Historycy polscy, litewscy i białoruscy wobec problemów XX wieku: Historiografia polska, litewska i białoruska po 1989 roku (Białystok: Instytut Historii Uniwersytetu w Białymstoku, Katedra Ekonomii i Nauk Społecznych Politechniki Białostockiej, Archiwum Państwowe w Białymstoku, Sekcja Dziejów Ziem Północno-Wschodnich Dawnej Rzeczyspospolitej Polskiego Towarzystwa Historycznego, and Prymat, 2003), 66.

34 On the topic of Byelorussian collaboration see Antonio Muñoz and Oleg Romanko, Hitler’s White Russians: Collaboration, Extermination and Anti-Partisan Warfare in Byelorussia, 1941–1944 (Bayside, New York: Europa Books, 2003). The following “native” units were stationed in Belorussia in January 1944: 46^th White Russian Battalion (Minsk or Mińsk in Polish), 47^th White Russian Battalion (Minsk), 48^th White Russian Battalion (Słonim), 49^th White Russian Battalion (Minsk), 60^th White Russian Battalion (Minsk), 64^th White Russian Battalion (Głębokie), 65^th White Russian Battalion (Nowogródek), 66^th White Russian Battalion (Slutsk or Słuck in Polish), 67^th White Russian Battalion (Wilejka), 69^th White Russian Battalion. For a description of the activities of the pro-German Belorussian forces under the command of Boris Ragula (Borys Rahula), see Duffy, The Bielski Brothers, 233–34. Ragula (Rahula) was the Nowogródek district leader of the so-called Belorussian Free Defence Corps. See Turonek, Białoruś pod okupacją niemiecką, 143. Ragula (Rahula) also directed actions against Polish activists in his capacity as the local leader of the Belorussian National Self-Help and adviser of the Gebietskommissar in Nowogródek. See Krajewski, Na Ziemi Nowogródzkiej, 25, 40, 295. On Lithuanian collaboration see Martin Dean, “Lithuanian Participation in the Mass Murder of Jews in Belarus and Ukraine, 1941–44,” in Alvydas Nikžentaitis, Stefan Schreiner, and Darius Staliūnas, The Vanished World of Lithuanian Jews (Amsterdam and New York: Rodopi, 2004), 285–96. There were also many Ukrainian battalions active in this area as well as Estonian, Muslim, Cossack, and Caucasian formations, but no Polish ones.

35 Szybieka, Historia Białorusi 1795–2000, 352.

36 Krajewski, Na Ziemi Nowogródzkiej, 141.

37 Samuel J. Newland, Cossacks in the German Army, 1941–1945 (London and Portland, Oregon: Frank Cass, 1991), 127–37.

38 The most dramatic confrontation between the Polish underground and the pro-German Lithuanian forces ensued after a series of pacifications undertaken by General Plechavičius’s formation in Gudełki (Gudele), Pawłowo, Adamowszczyzna, and Sieńkowszczyzna, in which dozens of Polish civilians were killed. In retaliation for murdering 38 Poles in Glinciszki on June 20, 1944, the Home Army decided to strike at the Lithuanian garrison in Podbrzezie which was responsible for the massacre. Since the 258^th Lithuanian Self-Defence Battalion had been removed from the garrison, a Home Army unit instead attacked the village of Dubinki (Dubingiai in Lithuanian) on June 21, believed to be a village inhabited by Lithuanians who had provided recruits for the German-sponsored formations, and executed 27 inhabitants. However, some of the victims turned out to be Poles. This harsh reprisal was carried out contrary to instructions from the regional command of the Home Army but had the desired effect of curtailing further Lithuanian pacifications. See Wołkonowski, Okręg Wileński Związku Walki Zbrojnej Armii Krajowej w latach 1939–1945, 193, 196, 235–36, 241–42, 246–47; Jarosław Wołkonowski, “Starcie polsko-litewskie,” Karta, no. 32 (2001): 64–89; Robert Daniłowicz, “Wojna domowa,” Rzeczpospolita (Warsaw), October 13, 2007. The Germans eventually demobilized Plechavičius’s formation for reportedly, among other charges, terrorizing, robbing and plundering the local population. See Rimantas Zizas, Persecution of Non-Jewish Citizens of Lithuania, Murder of Civilian Populations (1941–1944), Report submitted to the International Commission for the Evaluation of the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet Occupation in Lithuania (Vilnius, 2003), 64, 92–93, also published in Christoph Dieckmann, Vytautas Toleikis, and Rimantas Zizas, Karo belaisvių ir civilių gyventojų žudynės Lietuvoje 1941-1944–Murders of Prisoners of War and of Civilian Population in Lithuania, 1941-1944 (Vilnius: Margi raštai, 2005) (Zizas confuses the chronology of “reprisals” and the dates of the assaults on Glinciszki and Dubinki.)

39 As pointed out by Lithuanian historian Rimantas Zizas, proportionately Lithuanians suffered fewer casualties than any other national group under German occupation. Only a few thousand ethnic Lithuanians, out of a population of almost two million, were killed, a toll that includes 500 men who had enlisted for German-sponsored battalions. At least ten of those battalions took part in operations directed against Jews. On the other hand,
Massive repressions and various attacks were executed against the Polish anti-Nazi underground and its members … In general, the policy of the Nazi occupiers (and of the local Lithuanian autonomous administration) toward the Poles was incomparably harsher than toward Lithuanians. Over the entire course of the Nazi occupation of Lithuania, the Polish intelligentsia, clerics, military and others were terrorised and annihilated. As seen from data presented by Polish historian M. Wardzynska [Maria Wardzyńska, Sytuacja ludności polskiej w Generalnym Komisariacie Witwy, czerwiec 1941–lipec 1944 (Warsaw: Mako, 1993)], more than 1000 Poles may have been killed during various massive punitive operations and about 7000 Poles were deported from the Vilnius [Wilno] area for slave labour in Germany.

See Zizas, Persecution of Non-Jewish Citizens of Lithuania, Murder of Civilian Populations (1941–1944), 65, 70–71, 121–23, also published in Dieckmann, et al., Karo belaisvių ir civilių gyventojų žudynės Lietuvoje 1941-1944–Murders of Prisoners of War and of Civilian Population in Lithuania, 1941-1944.

40 Arūnas Bubnys, Nazi Resistance Movement in Lithuania, 1941–1944 (Vilnius: VAGA, 2003). The so-called Supreme Committee for the Liberation of Lithuania (Vyriausias Lietuvos išlaisvinimo komitetas–VLIK) had little popular support and influence and was entirely destroyed by the Germans in May 1944.

41 Teresa Prekerowa’s essay, “Wojna i okupacja,” appears in Jerzy Tomaszewski, ed., Najnowsze dzieje Żydów w Polsce—w zarysie (do 1950 roku) (Warsaw: Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN, 1993), 364–70.

42 There are many accounts attesting to this practice among Soviet partisans. Shalom Yoran who escaped from the ghetto in Kurzeniec recalled: “We asked to be accepted into their unit. We were strong young men ready to fight. They replied that they only accepted men with weapons. … Their answer was clear-cut. No one would be accepted without weapons.” See Shalom Yoran, The Defiant: A True Story (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1996), 124. And later: “The angry commissar replied that he made no exceptions. He refused to take anyone without arms …” Ibid., 158. A Jew who escaped from the ghetto in Lachowicze along with seven others recalled: “We began looking for partisans, after four weeks we found the first group of partisans made up of 25 Russians, they did not want to take us, because we did not have any weapons, they told us to get ourselves weapons, then they would take us in.” See the testimony of Mendel Szczupak, Archive of the Jewish Historical Institute (Warsaw), no. 301/49. Abram Bobrow, who was part of group of Jews who had fled from Pohost Zahorodny, recollects: “Once more, we approached a partisan leader with the hope of being able to fight with his group. Once more, we were turned away for the same reason—no weapons.” See Stephen Edward Paper (as told to), Voices from the Forest: The True Story of Abram and Julia Bobrow (Bloomington, Indiana: 1st Books, 2004), 98. Another Jew recalls a typical reception by a Soviet partisan leader: “Well, do you have a gun? Why didn’t you Jews prepare for this beforehand? Why did you let them take you to that mass grave without fighting back? Why didn’t you come to us earlier to help fight the Germans?” A Jew in that same detachment, who concealed his identity, counselled him: “They don’t know I’m Jewish; it’s better this way. They all hate us. You can’t trust any of them. You’ve got to find yourself a gun. If you don’t have one, they won’t want you. They’ll send you packing. … When a goy asks to join they don’t care; they find a rifle for him somehow. But if you’re a Jew, they won’t take you without a gun. Some Jews came to them from the ghettoes only the other day, but the chief told them to shove off.” See Isaac Aron, Fallen Leaves: Stories of the Holocaust and the Partisans (New York: Shengold Publishers, 1981), 40–41. That same account acknowledges that it was also the practice of Soviet partisans to murder and steal weapons from stragglers, especially Jews, encountered in the forests. Ibid., 162. The nascent Polish partisan units in that area generally only accepted those who had weapons. See Pilch, Partyzanci trzech puszcz, 288–89.

43 Soviet partisans became rapacious and violent plunderers who took food, clothing and personal objects of all sorts, leaving many villages with just a few head of livestock. Assaults and rapes were frequent occurrences during their provision-gathering expeditions known as “bombiozhki.” Once organized, Soviet partisans were very well fed and their allotment of food was on par with those of regular soldiers. In addition to supplying the needs of the partisans, including many from prewar Soviet territories, provisions confiscated from villagers (such as foodstuffs, livestock, and equipment) were “redistributed” to local residents who supported the Soviet underground and even flown to Russia. Among the worst hoarders of stolen goods were the two large Jewish family camps (Bielski’s and Zorin’s) in Naliboki forest, and the smaller groups in the forests in the vicinity of Nacza, Lipiczany and Byteń. See Gnatowski, “Kontrowersje i konflikty między ZWZ–AK i radzieckim podziemiem na północno-wschodnich ziemiach Polski w latach 1941–1944,” in Liedke, Sadowska and Tyrkowski, eds., Granice i pogranicza, vol. 2, 186; Boradyn, Niemen–rzeka niezgody, 81–87.

44 Alexander Brakel, “‘Das allergefährlichste ist die Wut der Bauern’: Die Versorgung der Partisanen und ihr Verhältnis zur Zivilbervölkerung. Eine Fallstudie zum Gebiet Baranowicze 1941–1944,” Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte, vol. 55, no. 3 (2007): 393–424.

45 Gnatowski, “Kontrowersje i konflikty między ZWZ–AK i radzieckim podziemiem na północno-wschodnich ziemiach Polski w latach 1941–1944,” in Liedke, Sadowska and Tyrkowski, eds., Granice i pogranicza, vol. 2, 188.

46 This invaluable book contains sections on Jewish (Chapter 3) and Polish (Chapter 4) wartime collaboration, with both the Soviets and the Nazis, as well as that of other nationalities who lived in prewar Poland. Piotrowski deals with Yaffa Eliach’s charges on pp. 91–94. The excerpts below are reproduced from pp. 98–100 of Poland’s Holocaust: Ethnic Strife, Collaboration with Occupying Forces and Genocide in the Second Republic, 1918–1947, © 1998 Thaddeus M. Piotrowski, by permission of McFarland & Company, Inc., Box 611, Jefferson, NC 28640. . The author’s endnotes have been omitted here.

47 Katyn was the site of the mass grave of almost 4,500 of the 14,500 Polish officers who were taken as prisoners of war by the Red Army in 1939 and executed in the spring of 1940. The discovery of the mass grave by the Germans in April 1943 gave rise to sharp denials (the Soviets accused the Germans of perpetrating the crime) and led to the Soviet Union breaking off relations with the Polish government in exile on April 25, 1943. In 1989, nearly 50 years after the massacre, Soviet scholars revealed that it had indeed been ordered by Stalin. The topic of Katyn has a long and impressive bibliography. Two of the more recent, important titles are by Allen Paul: Katyn: The Untold Story of Stalin’s Polish Massacre (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1991); Katyn: Massacre and the Seeds of Polish Resurrection (Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1996). Herman Kruk, the chronicler of the Wilno ghetto, argues that Polish-Jewish relations took a turn for the worse after the Katyn revelation, since German propaganda blamed the Bolsheviks and Jews in their service for the crime. See Herman Kruk, The Last Days of the Jerusalem of Lithuania: Chronicles of the Vilna Ghetto and the Camps, 1939–1945 (New Haven and London: YIVO Institute for Jewish Research and Yale University Press, 2002), 523–24. Unfotunately, there is some truth to this charge. An inmate of Ostashkov recalled that the deputy commander of that infamous camp for massacred Polish officers was a Jew from Sokółka, a ruthless NKVD captain who was the “terror of the entire camp.” See the account of Jan B. in Jan Tomasz Gross and Irena Grudzińska-Gross, W czterdziestym nas Matko na Sybir zesłali…: Polska a Rosja 1939–42 (London: Aneks, 1983), 388. Based on the testimony of a Polish Jew by the name of Abraham Vidro (Wydra), an article that appeared in an Israeli newspaper in 1971 strongly suggests that Jewish functionaries were implicated in the massacre of Polish officers at Katyn and other camps. See “A Jewish Major [Yehoshua Sorokin] in the Soviet Security Service Confessed: ‘What My Eyes Saw—The World Will Not Believe,’” Maariv (Tel Aviv), July 21, 1971. Russian investigative journalist Vladimir Abarinov believes that NKVD General Leonid F. Raikhman (or Reichman, alias Zaitsev) may have been the immediate organizer of the Katyn massacre. Abarinov also lists other NKVD–NKGB officers, some of them undoubtedly Jews, who were directly involved in the Katyn action. See Vladimir Abarinov, The Murderers of Katyn (New York: Hippocrene, 1993), 170. Based on a large number of sources, Jacek Trznadel identified Lazar Kaganovich as one of those who, along with Stalin, signed the execution order and a number of other Jews implicated in the Katyn massacre (Begman, Elman, Feldman, Gertsovsky, Goberman, Granovsky, Krongauz, Leibkind, Raikhman, Slutsky, Vishnyakova, Vitkov, Zilberman), as well as some who were actual perpetrators at the scene (Abram Borisovich and Chaim Finberg). See Jacek Trznadel, Powrót rozstrzelanej armii: Katyń–fakty, rewizje, poglądy (Komorów: Antyk–Marcin Dybowski, 1994), 94–115, 336. M.P. (“M.P.” denotes the author’s notes.)

48 These matters were raised in a circular dated June 22, 1943 issued by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Belorussia and at a meeting of its Central Committee Bureau convened on June 24, 1943. A truncated version of the circular titled “On the Military and Political Tasks of Our Work in the Western Districts of Belorussia,” was published in Mieczysław Juchniewicz, Polacy w radzieckim ruchu partyzanckim 1941–1945, 2^nd revised and expanded edition (Warsaw: Ministerstwo Obrony Narodowej, 1975), 302. The full text of the circular and the stenograph of the meeting of of June 24 are found in Michał Gnatowski, Białostockie Zgrupowanie Partyzanckie (Białystok: Dział Wydawnictw Filii UW, 1994), 119ff.; Michał Gnatowski, “Dokumenty o stosunku radzieckiego kierownictwa do polskiej konspiracji niepodległościowej na północno-wschodnich Kresach Rzeczypospolitej w latach 1943–1944,” Studia Podlaskie, no. 5 (1995): 211–47; Boradyn, ed., Armia Krajowa na Nowogródczyźnie i Wileńszczyźnie (1942–1944) w świetle dokumentów sowieckich, 35–42; Boradyn, Niemen–rzeka niezgody, 121–24, 236–45; Gnatowski, “Kontrowersje i konflikty między ZWZ–AK i radzieckim podziemiem na północno-wschodnich ziemiach Polski w latach 1941–1944,” in Liedke, Sadowska and Tyrkowski, eds., Granice i pogranicza, vol. 2, 181–85. These directives specifically targeted “Polish groups formed by reactionary nationalist circles” (i.e., the Home Army) and called on the staff of the Soviet underground movement to oppose “Polish nationalists” by every available means, to compromise them in the eyes of the Poles, and to gain the support of the local population for the Soviet authorities. In those regions where the influence of the Polish underground was strong, the Polish units were to be squeezed out; agents were to be introduced into the units to cause their break-up from within and demoralize their members; and trustworthy persons in the units were to be won over to collaborate with the Soviet underground. In those regions were the Soviet underground was sufficiently strong, the leaders of the Polish underground were to be eliminated quietly; Polish units were to be disbanded or absorbed where possible; and disarmed Polish partisans were to be incorporated into Soviet units, and later purged quietly of hostile elements. The prewar Polish territories were considered to be an “integral part” of the Belorussian SSR and “inseperable territory” of the Soviet Union. As we shall see, this blueprint for a concerted assault on the Polish partisan movement was soon to be implemented with considerable success. Soviet propaganda literature disseminated among the local population accused the Polish government of conducting treacherous politics toward the Soviet Union and being capitulatory toward Germany. For an excellent overview of the dynamics of the relations between the Polish and Soviet partisans in this region see Gnatowski, “Kontrowersje i konflikty między ZWZ–AK i radzieckim podziemiem na północno-wschodnich ziemiach Polski w latach 1941–1944,” in Liedke, Sadowska and Tyrkowski, eds., Granice i pogranicza, vol. 2, 177–92. See also Zygmunt Boradyn, “Partyzantka sowiecka a Armia Krajowa na Nowogródczyźnie 1941–1944,” in Jasiewicz, ed., Europa nieprowincjonalna, 729–39, for an overview of the ensuing struggle (that took hundreds of lives on each side), in which the Home Army retaliated against a concerted campaign of aggression directed against it and its civilian supporters by the NKVD–NKGB structures attached to Soviet partisan formations. M.P.

49 That is, Poland’s prewar provinces of Wilno, Nowogródek, Białystok and Polesie, which were seized by the Soviet Union in September 1939 and “incorporated,” for the most part, into the Belorussian Soviet Socialist Republic. M.P.

50 Information about the treacherous Soviet assaults on Naliboki (May 1943), Burzyński’s unit (August 1943), and Miłaszewski’s unit (December 1943) was published in the West soon after the war but made little impression at the time. See Komisja Historyczna Polskiego Sztabu Głównego w Londynie, Polskie Siły Zbrojne w drugiej wojnie światowej, vol. 3: Armia Krajowa (London: Instytut Historyczny im. Gen. Sikorskiego, 1950), 530; Poland, Home Army, The Unseen and Silent: Adventures from the Underground Movement Narrated by Paratroops of the Polish Home Army (London: Sheed and Ward, 1954), 144, 152–58; Antoni Bogusławski’s afterword in Tadeusz Łopalewski, Między Niemnem a Dźwiną: Ziemia Wileńska i Nowogródzka (London: Wydawnictwo Polskie and Tern (Rybitwa) Book, 1955), 244–45. M.P.

51 As People’s Commissar for Internal Affairs in the Ukrainian Republic Serov oversaw the deportation of Polish citizens from Polish territories annexed in 1939. Lavrentii Tsanava, mentioned later, was his counterpart in the Belorussian Republic and fulfilled an analogous role in that republic.

52 According to one Jewish sources, General Ivan D. Cherniakhovskii was a Jew. See Kowalski, A Secret Press in Nazi Europe, 374; Cohen, The Avengers, 146. M.P.

53 Albina F. Noskowa [Noskova] and Alina Fitowa, eds., NKWD i polskie podziemie 1944–1945: Z “teczek specjalnych” Józefa W. Stalina (Kraków: TAiWPN Universitas, 1998), 41–42. This is an expanded Polish-language version of a book that first appeared as Albina F. Noskova, ed., NKVD i polskoe podpole 1944–1945: Po “osobym papkam” I. V. Stalina (Moscow: Institut Slavianovedeniia i Balkanistiki RAN, 1994). M.P.

54 Norman Davies cites similar orders dating from July 20, 1944, which indicate the established procedures for the “liquidation of bandit-insurgent formations”:
3. AK staff officers with operational significance should be transferred to the relevant organs either of the NKVD–NKGB or of Smyersh counter-intelligence.

4. Remaining AK officers should be sent to NKVD camps since otherwise they would occupy themselves by forming Polish underground operations.

See Davies, Rising ’44, 473. M.P.

55 The issue of “tactical collaboration” is discussed in Poland’s Holocaust at 88–90 and commented on later in this work. M.P.

56 The first combat unit fighting in the open was the unit commanded by Antoni Burzyński “Kmicic”. The development of the Home Army is traced in detail in Henryk Piskunowicz, “Działalność zbrojna Armii Krajowej w latach 1942–1944,” in Boradyn, ed., Armia Krajowa na Nowogródczyźnie i Wileńszczyźnie (1941–1945), 7–70.

57 According to the 1931 census, the ethno-religious make-up of the province (województwo) of Wilno, with a population of 1,263,300, was as follows: 62.5 percent Roman Catholic (almost all of whom were Poles, with a smattering of Lithuanians near the Lithuanian border and some Belorussians in the northern part); 25.4 percent Eastern Orthodox (most of whom were Belorussians, with a small number of Russians as well); and 8.7 percent Jewish (by religion). The make-up of the province of Nowogródek, with a population of 1,057,200, consisted of: 40.2 percent Roman Catholics (mostly Poles, but also some Belorussians); 51.3 percent Eastern Orthodox (almost all of whom were Belorussians); and 7.8 percent Jews (by religion). Almost all the Jews gave their native language as Yiddish (occasionally Hebrew); in the city of Wilno, some of the Jewish intelligentsia was Russian speaking (rarely Polish). See Mały Rocznik Statystyczny 1939 (Warsaw: Główny Urząd Statystyczny Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej, 1939), 11, 23, 25.

58 Boradyn, Niemen–rzeka niezgody, 45–48, 141; Janusz Prawdzic-Szlaski, Nowogródczyzna w walce 1940–1945 (London: Oficyna Poetów i Malarzy, 1976), 110, 192, 229; Iauhen Siamashka, Armiia Kraiova na Belarusi (Minsk: Belaruskae vydavetskae Tavarystva “Khata,”, 1994), 131. An entire company of the Stołpce Concentration, for example, consisted of Belorussians. See Krajewski, Uderzeniowe Bataliony Kadrowe 1942–1943, 382. There were also Belorussian Catholics and the Belorussian language was often spoken among Belorussians serving in the Home Army.

59 See, for example, the story of Lidia Eberle (née Lwow), a Russian of noble birth, who first served in “Kmicic’s” unit and, after its destruction by the Soviets, in “Łupaszko’s” unit. She was captured along with Zygmunt Siendzielarz (“Łupaszko”) in 1948 and was imprisoned for more than eight years. See Maja Narbutt, “Ostatni biali Rosjanie,” Rzeczpospolita (Warsaw), February 8, 2002. A group of Frenchmen who deserted from the German Todt organization was also welcomed into Home Army units based in the Wilno area. See Wincenty Borodziewicz, Szósta Wileńska Brygada AK (Warsaw: Bellona, 1992), 89–90, 165, 265–66.

60 In the spring of 1944, four Home Army districts (okręgi) were active in this area: Białystok, Nowogródek, Polesie, and Wilno. Together they counted 1,034 officers, 941 officer cadets, 10,464 non-commissioned officers, and 28,718 soldiers. See Gnatowski, “Kontrowersje i konflikty między ZWZ–AK i radzieckim podziemiem na północno-wschodnich ziemiach Polski w latach 1941–1944,” in Liedke, Sadowska and Tyrkowski, eds., Granice i pogranicza, vol. 2, 181. In the Nowogródek district, the strength of the Home Army was estimated then at more than 5,500 soldiers; by July 1944, it had grown to 7,400, whereas at that time Soviet partisans numbered almost 25,000. See Boradyn, ed., Armia Krajowa na Nowogródczyźnie i Wileńszczyźnie (1941–1945), 76, 86–87; Boradyn, Niemen–rzeka niezgody, 41, 67. There was a similar disproportion in the weapons available to the Home Army and the Soviet partisans; the latter received large quantities of arms and ammunition via airplane drops. See Krajewski, Na Ziemi Nowogródzkiek, 138–39; Boradyn, Niemen–rzeka niezgody, 42. There is no basis in fact for the claims, sometimes encountered in Jewish memoirs, that Polish partisans in this area were well equally equipped and were supplied with weapons by the Polish government in exile and Home Army headquarters. There were no Allied airdrops for the AK in the northeastern Borderlands, as the area was well beyond the reach of contemporary planes. Moreover, the Soviets would never agree to allow Allied supply planes carrying supplied for Poles to land and refuel.

61 Boradyn, Niemen–rzeka niezgody, 55–56, 88, 109–10.

62 Krajewski, Uderzeniowe Bataliony Kadrowe 1942–1943, 382. Another early mission undertaken by the Home Army that also benefited Jews was an attack on the German police station in Worniany on November 5, 1943; more than a dozen people were liberated, including a group of Jews who were taken to the forest and provided with necessities. Ibid., 21; Wołkonowski, Okręg Wileński Związku Walki Zbrojnej Armii Krajowej w latach 1939–1945, 146.

63 For example, in the fall of 1942, drunk Red partisans killed twelve Poles, among them children, in the village of Borki near Stołpce. See Krajewski, Na Ziemi Nowogródzkiej, 143.

64 From a review of Bogdan Musial, ed., Sowjetische Partisanen in Weißrußland: Innenansichten aus dem Gebiet Baranoviči, 1941–1944. Eine Dokumentation (München: Oldenbourg, 2004), by Marek Jan Chodakiewicz which appeared in Sarmatian Review, no. 2, (April) 2006: 1217–20.

65 Generally, the local population was sympathetic to the plight of ordinary Soviet soldiers who been taken prisoner by the Germans. They often supplied them with food and, in the event of escape, shelter. This led to severe repercussions from the Germans who summarily executed anyone suspected of helping the partisans. Lithuanian historian Rimanatas Zizas mentions a number of Poles who were shot dead in 1941–1942 in the Wilno District for helping prisoners of war to escape from camps and supporting them. See also Zizas, Persecution of Non-Jewish Citizens of Lithuania, Murder of Civilian Populations (1941–1944), 107.

66 Boradyn, Niemen–rzeka niezgody, 69–70; Wołkonowski, Okręg Wileński Związku Walki Zbrojnej Armii Krajowej w latach 1939–1945, 210, 232; Gasztold, “Sowietyzacja i rusyfikacja Wileńszczyzny i Nowogródczyzny w działalności partyzantki sowieckiej w latach 1941–1944,” in Sudoł, ed., Sowietyzacja Kresów Wschodnich II Rzeczypospolitej po 17 września 1939, 278; Musial, ed., Sowjetische Partisanen in Weißrußland, 36, 42, 74, 134, 136, 253–54. For further confirmation see Joseph Riwash, Resistance and Revenge, 1939–1949 (Montreal: n.p., 1981), 60 (the relevant passage is reproduced later in this book); and the account of Moshe Meyerson, in Kowalski, ed., Anthology on Armed Jewish Resistance, 1939–1945, vol. 4 (1991), 476, which states: “those of us in the partisan groups began to enlist all of the villages [sic] youth and thus swelled our ranks. Nearly eight hundred partisans were engaged in the task of enlisting recruits.”

67 Testimony of Mark Tayts, as cited in Smilovitskii, Katastrofa evreev v Belorussii 1941–1944 gg., 129 ff.

68 Based on the diary of Irina Erenburg, Razluka: Vospominaniia. Dnevnik, published in Israel in 1998, as cited in Smilovitskii, Katastrofa evreev v Belorussii 1941–1944 gg., 129 ff.

69 Earl Ziemke, “Composition and Morale of the Partisan Movement,” in John A. Armstrong, ed., Soviet Partisans in World War II (Madison, Wisconsin: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1964), 147. Ziemke estimates that for the last year of the war, ten to twenty percent of the entire Soviet partisan movement were former Nazi collaborators. According to another source, the Soviet partisan took in more than 12,000 Belorussian policemen and members of the Belorussian self-defence and some 2,500 members of the Russian National SS Brigade under the command of Colonel Rodionov (transformed into the First Anti-Fascist Partisan Brigade), which had taken part in numerous rural pacifications. See Eugeniusz Mironowicz, Białoruś (Warsaw: Trio, 1999), 160. For a memoir that refers to this phenomenon in the Markov Brigade, see Yoran, The Defiant, 141, 145, 157, 167. According to that author, some of the former Belorussian policemen were actually spies who continued to work for the Germans surreptitiously, and a number of local policemen who attempted to switch sides were shot after “a night of grueling interrogation.”

70 Krajewski, Na Ziemi Nowogródzkiej, 138; Boradyn, Niemen–rzeka niezgody, 70–74.

71 Musial, ed., Sowjetische Partisanen in Weißrußland, 36.

72 Smilovitskii, Katastrofa evreev v Belorussii 1941–1944 gg., 129–46. Smilovitsky provides somewhat different figures elsewhere: “In 1943, 366 Jews fought in the seven detachments of the Lenin Brigade, i.e., out of a total of 1,728 persons. In the four detachments of the For Soviet Belarus Brigade, 176 of 821 partisans were Jews. In the five detachments of the the Forward! Brigade, 103 out of 678 partisans were Jewish, and in the five detachments of the Stalin Brigade the corresponding figures were 93 of 1,075.” See Leonid Smilovitsky, “Antisemitism in the Soviet Partisan Movement, 1941–1944: The Case of Belorussia,” Holocaust and Genocide Studies, vol. 20, no. 2 (Fall 2006): 215.

73 Arad, The Partisan, 113–14.

74 David Meltser, “Belorussia,” in Walter Laqueur, ed., The Holocaust Encyclopedia (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2001), 64. Martin Dean estimates that Jews constituted about 12 percent of the Soviet partisans in this area. See Dean, Collaboration in the Holocaust, 141–42. According to statistics cited by Israeli historian Leonid Smilovitsky, Belorussians accounted for almost half of the Soviet partisans in the Baranowice and Lida regions, and Poles between 0.5 to 1.3 percent. Jews accounted for 12.4 to 28 percent. See Smilovitskii, Katastrofa evreev v Belorussii 1941–1944 gg., 137. Additional statistics for various brigades are found at pp. 151, 300. Information about the numerous Jews dispatched from the Soviet Union, among them many propagandists and NKVD secretaries and members, is found at p. 151 and in the tables at pp. 356–63. For statistics regarding the ethnic composition of various Soviet brigades and detachments in the Nowogródek area in 1943 see Jack Kagan and Dov Cohen, Surviving the Holocaust with the Russian Jewish Partisans (London and Portland, Oregon: Vallentine Mitchell, 1998), 186–87. According to Dov Levin, at least 1,650 Jews who had escaped from the ghettos, labour camps, and other places in Lithuania (including the Wilno region) had joined various Soviet partisan units in the forests. Their approximate breakdown was as follows: (1) 450 were in the fighting units of the Belorussian Partisan Movement, of whom 350 were received into the Vorshilov and Spartak Brigades and some other units in Narocz, Koziany, and Naliboki forests, and the other 100 into the Lenin Komsomol Brigade in Nacza forest. (2) 850 were in the fighting units of the Lithuanian Partisan Movement, of whom 50 were in the Žalgiris Brigade (near Święciany and Narocz forest); in Rudniki forest there were 400 in the Vilnius (Wilno) Brigade, 200 in the Kaunas Brigade, 100 in the Trakai (Troki) Brigade and some other units, while 100 joined other brigades in other places in Lithuania. In addition, 250 Jews were in camps for the fighters’ families and in other Jewish non-partisan forest groups. Not all Jews who reached the forests were accepted by the Soviet partisan units operating there and the partisan command eventually did away with purely Jewish units by disbanding some and replacing Jewish commanding officers by non-Jews in others. See Dov Levin, Baltic Jews under the Soviets, 1940–1946 (Jerusalem: Centre for Research and Documentation of East European Jewry, The Avraham Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry, and The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1994), 263–64.

75 Maria Wardzyńska, “Terror na okupowanej Wileńszczyźnie w latach 1941–1943 w świetle Ereignismeldungen UdSSR i Meldungen aus den Besetzten Ostgebeiten,” Biuletyn Głównej Komisji Badania Zbrodni przeciwko Narodowi Polskiemu–Instytutu Pamięci Narodowej, no. 34 (1992): 109.

76 Teresa Prekerowa, “The Jewish Underground and the Polish Underground,” in Polin: Studies in Polish Jewry, vol. 9: Poles, Jews, Socialists: The Failure of an Ideal (London: The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 1996): 154–57.

77 Ibid. Emanuel Ringelblum wrote in his wartime chronicles: “Hashomer Hatsa’ir [leftist Zionists] had a pro-Soviet orientation and believed in the victory of the Soviet Union and its heroic army. The other Jewish party that had an identical political position was Poale Zion-Left. Because of their political orientation, the Hashomers organized partisan groups along with others, established close contact with the [Communist] Polish Workers’ Party, and generally were prepared to do everything possible for the victory of the Soviet Union and the heroic Red Army.” See Emanuel Ringelblum, Kronika getta warszawskiego: Wrzesień 1939–styczeń 1943 (Warsaw: Czytelnik, 1983), 498–99. The truth of the matter is that many Jewish underground activists opted in favour of the Soviet Union, thereby reinforcing Polish suspicions of their disloyalty, and then reproached the Polish underground for not assisting or turning them away. See also Roman T. Gerlach, “Ani niedźwiedzi, ani lasu, ani nic: Tragedia getta warszawskiego,” Zeszyty Historyczne (Paris), no. 115 (1996): 3–21.

78 One of the members of the Wilno-based “Baza” unit was Eliasz Baran (nom de guerre “Edyp”), who fought under the command of Bronisław Krzyżanowski and perished during a mission in 1943. See the account of Bronisław Krzyżanowski in Bartoszewski and Lewinówna, eds., Ten jest z ojczyzny mojej, 228–32; Krzyżanowski, Wileński matecznik 1939–1944, 137–53; Wołkonowski, Okręg Wileński Związku Walki Zbrojnej Armii Krajowej w latach 1939–1945, 109. Bronisław Krzyżanowski sheltered the family of Eliasz Baran, as well as other Jews, and was recognized as a “Righteous Gentile.” See Gutman and Bender, eds., The Encyclopedia of the Righteous Among the Nations, vol. 4: Poland, Part 1, 411–12. Jan Neugebauer (“Zielonka”), a Wilno journalist, served under Antoni Burzyński (“Kmicic”). He was among the partisans captured by the Soviets in August 1943 and later executed. See Jarosław Wołkonowski, Stosunki polsko-żydowskie w Wilnie i na Wileńszczyźnie 1919–1939 (Białystok: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu w Białymstoku, 2004), 331, n.51. A number of Jews served in the medical corps of the Home Army, such as Professor Michał Reicher of the University of Wilno and Dr. Antoni Banis (“Kleszczyk”), who served under Major Adolf Pilch (“Góra”). See, respectively, Aleksander Dawidowicz, “Shoah Żydów wileńskich,” in Elżbieta Feliksiak, et al., eds., Wilno–Wileńszczyzna jako krajobraz i środowisko wielu kultur: Materiały I Międzynarodowej Konferencji, Białystok 21–24 IX 1989 (Białystok: Towarzystwo Literackie im. Adama Mickiewicza, Oddział Białostocki, 1992), vol. 1, 269; and Pilch, Partyzanci trzech puszcz, 289. Additional examples of Jews who fought in the Home Army in the Wilno area can be found in Dov Levin, Fighting Back: Lithuanian Jewry's Armed Resistance to the Nazis, 1941–1945 (New York and London: Holmes & Meier, 1985), 106; Wiktor Noskowski, “Czy Yaffa Eliach przeprosi Polaków?” Myśl Polska (Warsaw), July 20–27, 1997; Krajewski, Na Ziemi Nowogródzkiej, 536; Tadeusz Gasztold, Nad Niemnem i Oszmianką: Z dziejów Armii Krajowej na Wileńszczyźnie i Nowogródczyźnie (Koszalin: Głos Pomorza, 1991), 16; Halperin, Ludzie są wszędzie, 157. Another example is that of Dora Perewoski (Parovsky), who joined the Polish partisans, helping out with different jobs, after her husband Shmuel was brutally murdered by Communist partisans. See