A report on History of Poland (1945–1989)

Poland's old and new borders, 1945
Map showing the different borders and territories of Poland and Germany during the 20th century, with the current areas of Germany and Poland in dark gray
Destroyed Warsaw, January 1945
The PKWN Manifesto, officially issued on 22 July 1944. In reality it was not finished until mid-August, after the Polish communist Moscow group was joined by the late-arriving Warsaw group, led by Gomułka and Bierut.
Postwar Polish communist propaganda poster depicting "The giant and the putrid reactionary midget", meaning the communist People's Army soldier and the pro-Western Home Army soldier, respectively
ORMO paramilitary police unit during street parade at the Victory Square, 9 June 1946, Warsaw
Logo of the Polish United Workers' Party
The show trial of Captain Witold Pilecki, sentenced to death and executed May 1948
The Palace of Culture and Science in Warsaw, initially called the Stalin's Palace, was a controversial gift from Soviet leader Joseph Stalin
Avenue of the Roses, Nowa Huta
1951 East German stamp commemorative of the Treaty of Zgorzelec establishing the Oder–Neisse line as a "border of peace", featuring the presidents Wilhelm Pieck (GDR) and Bolesław Bierut (Poland)
Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński, Primate of Poland
Władysław Gomułka
The Fourth Congress of the Polish United Workers' Party, held in 1963
The Polski Fiat 125p, produced in Poland from the late 1960s, was based on technology purchased from Fiat
Standard-bearers of the 27 Tank Regiment, mid-1960s
Dziady, a theatrical event that spawned nationwide protests
Demonstrators in Gdynia carry the body of Zbigniew Godlewski, who was shot and killed during the protests of 1970
Edward Gierek
Queue line, a frequent scene at times of shortages of consumer goods in the 1970s and 1980s
Millions cheer Pope John Paul II in his first visit to Poland as pontiff in 1979
Lech Wałęsa speaks during the strike at the Gdańsk Shipyard, August 1980
25th anniversary of Solidarity, summer 2005 in Gdańsk
General Wojciech Jaruzelski led the People's Republic during its final decade and became one of the key players in the systemic transition of 1989–90
Apartment block residences built in People's Poland loom over the urban landscape of the entire country. In the past administratively distributed for permanent use, after 1989 most were sold to residents at discounted prices.
Adam Michnik, an influential leader in the transformation of Poland

The history of Poland from 1945 to 1989 spans the period of communist rule imposed over Poland after the end of World War II.

- History of Poland (1945–1989)
Poland's old and new borders, 1945

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Jakub Berman

Jakub Berman

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Polish communist politician.

Polish communist politician.

Jakub Berman

An activist during the Second Polish Republic, in post-war communist Poland he was a member of the Politburo of the Polish Workers' Party (PPR) and then of the Polish United Workers' Party (PZPR).

The Curzon Line and territorial changes of Poland, 1939 to 1945. The pink and yellow areas represent the pre-war Polish territory (Kresy) and pre-war German territory (Recovered Territories), respectively.

Polish population transfers (1944–1946)

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The Polish population transfers in 1944–1946 from the eastern half of prewar Poland (also known as the expulsions of Poles from the Kresy macroregion), were the forced migrations of Poles toward the end and in the aftermath of World War II.

The Polish population transfers in 1944–1946 from the eastern half of prewar Poland (also known as the expulsions of Poles from the Kresy macroregion), were the forced migrations of Poles toward the end and in the aftermath of World War II.

The Curzon Line and territorial changes of Poland, 1939 to 1945. The pink and yellow areas represent the pre-war Polish territory (Kresy) and pre-war German territory (Recovered Territories), respectively.

The process was planned and carried out by the communist regimes of the USSR and of post-war Poland.

Jaruzelski in 1981

Wojciech Jaruzelski

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Polish military officer, politician and de facto leader of the Polish People's Republic from 1981 until 1989.

Polish military officer, politician and de facto leader of the Polish People's Republic from 1981 until 1989.

Jaruzelski in 1981
Jaruzelski in 1968
Jaruzelski (right) with Fidel Castro (left) in Poland, May 1972
Jaruzelski in a television studio, preparing to announce the imposition of martial law, 1981
Jaruzelski meeting with Yuri Andropov in Moscow, 1982
Jaruzelski (second from right) with other communist leaders and members of the Warsaw Pact, Berlin, 1987
Jaruzelski with Nicolae Ceaușescu
Jaruzelski in 2006
Jaruzelski's grave at Powązki Military Cemetery in Warsaw

This question, as well as many other facts about Poland in the years 1945–1989, are presently under the investigation of government historians at the Instytut Pamięci Narodowej (IPN), whose publications reveal facts from the Communist-era archives.

Palace of Culture and Science in Warsaw built using Soviet-drawn blueprints in 1952–1955

Socialist realism in Poland

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Socio-political and aesthetic doctrine enforced by the pro-Soviet communist government in the process of Stalinization of the post-war Polish People’s Republic.

Socio-political and aesthetic doctrine enforced by the pro-Soviet communist government in the process of Stalinization of the post-war Polish People’s Republic.

Palace of Culture and Science in Warsaw built using Soviet-drawn blueprints in 1952–1955
Ministry of Agriculture, Warsaw, built 1953–1956
"Manifesto" by Wojciech Weiss, 1950
Socialist-Realist allegories surrounding the Palace of Culture and Science in Warsaw

As in all Soviet-dominated Eastern Bloc countries, Socialist realism became the main instrument of political control in the building of totalitarianism in Poland.

Pilecki in a colorized pre-1939 photograph

Witold Pilecki

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Polish World War II cavalry officer, intelligence agent, and resistance leader.

Polish World War II cavalry officer, intelligence agent, and resistance leader.

Pilecki in a colorized pre-1939 photograph
Pilecki (first right) as a scout, Oryol, Russia, 1917
Location of Białystok in the borders of 1920 Poland
Witold Pilecki as KL-Auschwitz prisoner, KL Number 4859, 1940
Pilecki, Mokotów Prison, Warsaw, 1947
Pilecki in court, 1948
Monument to Pilecki in Kraków
Monument to Witold Pilecki in Warsaw

Several monographs appeared in subsequent years, particularly after the fall of communism in Poland facilitated research into his life by Polish historians.

Powszechny Dom Towarowy Wola in Warszaw

Battle for trade

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Powszechny Dom Towarowy Wola in Warszaw

The battle for trade (Bitwa o handel; also translated as trade battle or battle over trade) was an element of the state politics in the early period of communist takeover of Poland (1946–49) according to which new laws and regulations succeeded in significantly decreasing the size of the private sector in Polish trade, in order to facilitate the transformation of Polish economy from capitalism to Soviet communism's planned economy.

Refugees moving westwards in 1945. Courtesy of the German Federal Archives (Deutsches Bundesarchiv).

Flight and expulsion of Germans (1944–1950)

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During the later stages of World War II and the post-war period, Germans and Volksdeutsche fled and were expelled from various Eastern and Central European countries, including Czechoslovakia, and the former German provinces of Silesia, Pomerania, and East Prussia, which were annexed by Poland and the Soviet Union.

During the later stages of World War II and the post-war period, Germans and Volksdeutsche fled and were expelled from various Eastern and Central European countries, including Czechoslovakia, and the former German provinces of Silesia, Pomerania, and East Prussia, which were annexed by Poland and the Soviet Union.

Refugees moving westwards in 1945. Courtesy of the German Federal Archives (Deutsches Bundesarchiv).
Europe before and after the First World War.
Karl Hermann Frank, Secretary of State and Higher SS and Police Leader in Nazi Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia (right) was born in Carlsbad, Austria-Hungary (present-day Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic).
Adolf Hitler being welcomed by a crowd in Sudetenland, where the pro-Nazi Sudeten German Party gained 88% of ethnic-German votes in May 1938.
The Curzon Line
Votes for the Nazi Party in the March 1933 elections
Polish teachers from Bydgoszcz guarded by members of Volksdeutscher Selbstschutz before execution
Massacred German civilians in Nemmersdorf, East Prussia. News of Soviet atrocities, spread and exaggerated by Nazi propaganda, hastened the flight of ethnic Germans from much of Eastern Europe.
Evacuation from Pillau, 26 January 1945
Refugee camp in Aabenraa (Apenrade) in Denmark, February 1945
Potsdam Conference: Joseph Stalin (second from left), Harry Truman (center), Winston Churchill (right)
German expellees, 1946
Czech territories with 50% (red) or more German population in 1935
Retreating Wehrmacht, Hungary, March 1945
Monument to the expelled Germans in Elek, Hungary
German refugees from East Prussia, 1945
Polish boundary post at the Oder–Neisse line in 1945
August 1948, German children deported from the eastern areas taken over by Poland arrive in West Germany.
Evacuation of German civilians and troops in Ventspils, October 1944
A refugee trek of Black Sea Germans during the Second World War in Hungary, July 1944
Refugee treks, Curonian Lagoon, northern East Prussia, March 1945
Push-cart used by German refugees with some items they were able to take with them
Former camp for expellees in Eckernförde, picture taken in 1951
Refugees in Berlin, 27 June 1945
Refugee settlement in Espelkamp, about 1945 to 1949
Refugee settlement in Bleidenstadt, 1952
Expellee organisations demonstrate in Bonn, capital of West Germany, in 1951
A road sign indicating former German cities
Parade of German expellees in October 1959 in Espelkamp, North Rhine-Westphalia
A stamp issued in West Germany ten years after expulsions began

The Allies settled on the terms of occupation, the territorial truncation of Germany, and the expulsion of ethnic Germans from post-war Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary to the Allied Occupation Zones in the Potsdam Agreement, drafted during the Potsdam Conference between 17 July and 2 August 1945.

Katyn-Kharkov-Mednoye memorial in Świętokrzyskie Mountains, Poland

Katyn massacre

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Series of mass executions of nearly 22,000 Polish military officers and intelligentsia prisoners of war carried out by the Soviet Union, specifically the NKVD in April and May 1940.

Series of mass executions of nearly 22,000 Polish military officers and intelligentsia prisoners of war carried out by the Soviet Union, specifically the NKVD in April and May 1940.

Katyn-Kharkov-Mednoye memorial in Świętokrzyskie Mountains, Poland
Map of the sites related to the Katyn massacre
Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov signs the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. Behind him: Ribbentrop and Stalin.
Polish POWs captured by the Red Army during the Soviet invasion of Poland
Memo from Beria to Stalin, proposing the execution of Polish officers
Aerial view of the Katyn massacre grave
Photo from 1943 exhumation of mass grave of Polish officers killed by NKVD in Katyń Forest
A mass grave at Katyn, 1943
Secretary of State of the Vichy regime Fernand de Brinon and others in Katyn at the graves of Mieczysław Smorawiński and Bronisław Bohatyrewicz, April 1943
Polish banknotes and epaulets recovered from mass graves
Katyn exhumation, 1943
British, Canadian, and American officers (POWs) brought by the Germans to view the exhumations
Lt. Col. John H. Van Vliet Jr communication on Katyn
Monument in Katowice, Poland, memorializing "Katyn, Kharkiv, Mednoye and other places of killing in the former USSR in 1940"
Ceremony of military upgrading of Katyn massacre victims, Piłsudski Square, Warsaw, 10 November 2007
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski laying wreaths at the Katyn massacre memorial complex, 11 April 2011

Katyn was a forbidden topic in post-war Poland.

Collectivization in the Polish People's Republic

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The Polish People's Republic pursued a policy of agricultural collectivization throughout the Stalinist regime period, from 1948 until the liberalization during Gomułka's thaw of 1956.

Review of the 6th Soviet Guards Vitebsk-Novgorod Mechanised Division, Northern Group of Forces, in Borne Sulinowo, Poland.

Northern Group of Forces

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The military formation of the Soviet Army stationed in Poland from the end of Second World War in 1945 until 1993 when they were withdrawn in the aftermath of the fall of the Soviet Union.

The military formation of the Soviet Army stationed in Poland from the end of Second World War in 1945 until 1993 when they were withdrawn in the aftermath of the fall of the Soviet Union.

Review of the 6th Soviet Guards Vitebsk-Novgorod Mechanised Division, Northern Group of Forces, in Borne Sulinowo, Poland.
Former Soviet nuclear weapons warehouse Granit 2 near Szprotawa, Poland
Northern Group of Forces as of 1988

After the fall of communism in Poland in 1989, and with the signs of the fall of the Soviet Union, the new Polish government wanted the Soviet troops to leave Poland.