Polish People's Army and Related Topics

1956 Poznań protests

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The 1956 Poznań protests, also known as Poznań June (Poznański Czerwiec), were the first of several massive protests against the communist government of the Polish People's Republic.

Poznań 1956, Kochanowskiego Street; transporting one of the victims

Tanks on the empty Joseph Stalin Square in the center of Poznań

Trial of "the Nine" after riots June 1956

Funeral of one of the victims in June 1956

About 400 tanks and 10,000 soldiers of the Polish People's Army and the Internal Security Corps under the command of the Polish-Soviet general Stanislav Poplavsky were ordered to suppress the demonstration and during the pacification fired at the protesting civilians.

Polish T-55 tanks enter the town of Zbąszyń while moving east towards Poznań, 13 December 1981

Martial law in Poland

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Martial law in Poland (Stan wojenny w Polsce) existed between 13 December 1981 and 22 July 1983.

Gierek in the White House with President Gerald Ford, 1974

Edward Gierek (right) with President Jimmy Carter (left) during his state visit to Warsaw, 1977. The loans and Solidarity were among the chief topics discussed

General Jaruzelski was determined to suppress any opposition along with the Solidarity Movement

A censored regional newspaper that reported about the Bydgoszcz events, in which the militia abused Solidarity members. The censorship was to prevent the slander of state services

The Military Council of National Salvation (WRON), which was founded on 13 December and presided over the military junta. Its Polish abbreviation "WRONa" means a crow bird, and members of the council were known to the opposition as evil "Crows"

ZOMO squads with police batons preparing to disperse and beat protesters. The sarcastic caption reads "outstretched hands of understanding" or "outstretched hands for agreement", with batons ironically symbolizing hands

The former PZPR headquarters in Gdańsk (right). ZOMO machine-gunned demonstrators from the rooftop

Food, alcohol, and cigarettes rationing card

Students in Edinburgh, Scotland collecting signatures for a petition in support of Solidarity in 1981

Jaruzelski in a TV studio announcing the introduction of martial law

Units of the Citizens' Militia and ZOMO race to disperse crowds of protesters

The Polish People's Army, Citizens' Militia (MO), ZOMO special paramilitary units, and tanks were deployed on the streets to demoralize demonstrators, begin regular patrols, control strategic enterprises, and maintain curfew.

Polish Workers' Party

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Communist party in Poland from 1942 to 1948.

The leftist, Soviet-allied Polish armed forces, placed under the authority of the PKWN and then the Provisional Government, were rapidly expanded, ultimately to about 400,000 people in two armies.

Allies of World War II

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International military coalition formed during the Second World War to oppose the Axis powers, led by Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, and Fascist Italy.

The Allied leaders of the European theatre (left to right): Joseph Stalin, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill meeting at the Tehran Conference in 1943

The Allied leaders of the Asian and Pacific Theater: Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Winston Churchill meeting at the Cairo Conference in 1943

Wartime poster for the United Nations, created in 1941 by the U.S. Office of War Information

Wartime poster for the United Nations, created in 1943 by the U.S. Office of War Information

British Supermarine Spitfire fighter aircraft (bottom) flying past a German Heinkel He 111 bomber aircraft (top) during the Battle of Britain in 1940

British Crusader tanks during the North African Campaign

British aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal under attack from Italian aircraft during the Battle of Cape Spartivento (27 Nov 1940)

British soldiers of the King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry in Elst, Netherlands on 2 March 1945

Free French forces at the Battle of Bir Hakeim, 1942

FAFL Free French GC II/5 "LaFayette" receiving ex-USAAF Curtiss P-40 fighters at Casablanca, French Morocco

The French fleet scuttled itself rather than fall into the hands of the Axis after their invasion of Vichy France on 11 November 1942.

The fall of Damascus to the Allies, late June 1941. A car carrying Free French commanders General Georges Catroux and General Paul Louis Le Gentilhomme enters the city, escorted by French Circassian cavalry (Gardes Tcherkess).

Soviet soldiers and T-34 tanks advancing near Bryansk in 1942

Soviet soldiers fighting in the ruins of Stalingrad during the Battle of Stalingrad

Soviet Il-2 ground attack aircraft attacking German ground forces during the Battle of Kursk, 1943

American Douglas SBD Dauntless dive-bomber aircraft attacking the Japanese cruiser Mikuma during the Battle of Midway in June 1942

U.S. Marines during the Guadalcanal Campaign in November 1942

American Consolidated B-24 Liberator bomber aircraft during the bombing of oil refineries in Ploiești, Romania on 1 August 1943 during Operation Tidal Wave

U.S. soldiers departing landing craft during the Normandy landings on 6 June 1944 known as D-Day

Philippine Scouts at Fort William McKinley firing a 37 mm anti-tank gun in training

Soldiers of the National Revolutionary Army associated with Nationalist China, during the Second Sino-Japanese War

Soldiers of the First Workers' and Peasants' Army associated with Communist China, during the Sino-Japanese War

Victorious Chinese Communist soldiers holding the flag of the Republic of China during the Hundred Regiments Offensive

Members of the Belgian Resistance with a Canadian soldier in Bruges, September 1944 during the Battle of the Scheldt

Norwegian soldiers on the Narvik front, May 1940

Pilots of the No. 303 "Kościuszko" Polish Fighter Squadron during the Battle of Britain

Polish partisan of the Home Army (AK), "Jędrusie" unit, holding a Browning wz.1928 light machine gun

Partisans and Chetniks escorting captured Germans through Užice, autumn 1941

Partisan leader Marshal Josip Broz Tito with Winston Churchill in 1944

Chetniks leader General Mihailovic with members of the U.S. military mission, Operation Halyard, 1944

Romanian soldiers in Transylvania, September–October 1944

The dead bodies of Benito Mussolini, his mistress Clara Petacci, and several Fascist leaders, hanging for public display after they were executed by Italian partisans in 1945

The first version of the flag of the United Nations, introduced in April 1945

A British poster from 1941, promoting the greater alliance against Germany

U.S. government poster showing a friendly Soviet soldier, 1942

They were as follows: the Albanian National Liberation Front, the Chinese Red Army, the Greek National Liberation Front, the Hukbalahap, the Malayan Communist Party, the People's Republic of Mongolia, the Polish People's Army, the Tuvan People's Republic (annexed by the Soviet Union in 1944), the Viet Minh and the Yugoslav Partisans.

Anti-Zionist purge in the Polish Army

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The anti-Zionist purge in the Polish Army was the removal of soldiers of Jewish origin from the Polish People's Army, carried out in 1968 following Six-Day War between Israel and Arab countries.

UPA members caught by soldiers of the Polish Army

Operation Vistula

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Codename for the 1947 forced resettlement of 150,000 Ukrainians(Boykos and Lemkos) from the south-eastern provinces of post-war Poland, to the Recovered Territories in the west of the country.

The city of Bukowsko burned down by the UPA in 1946

Monument to Polish soldiers killed by UPA in Jasiel, south-eastern Poland, in 1946

Signature page of Polish-Ukrainian repatriation agreement signed by Khrushchev, 1944

Inscription in Polish and Ukrainian at a church in Beskid Niski, Poland: "In memory of those expelled from Lemkivshchyna, on the 50th anniversary of Operation Vistula, 1947–1997"

The stated goal of the operation was to suppress the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), which had been fighting the communist Polish People's Army in the south-eastern territory of the Polish People's Republic.

Battle of Lenino

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Tactical World War II engagement that took place on 12 and 13 October 1943, north of the village of Lenino in the Mogilev region of Byelorussia.

The monument to the 1st Infantry Division in Warsaw

Poland Medallion 1983: Commemoration of the World War II Battle of Lenino 1943

A military decoration for Polish soldiers who fought in the battle of Lenino

On 7 October 1950, the anniversary of the battle was declared the official "Day of the Polish Army" by the authorities of the People's Republic of Poland.

Janek Wiśniewski's body carried by demonstrators in Gdynia

1970 Polish protests

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The 1970 Polish protests (Grudzień 1970) occurred in northern Poland during 14–19 December 1970.

Monument to victims of the 1970 protests in Gdynia

Monument to the Fallen Shipyard Workers of 1970 in Gdańsk

Monument to victims of massacres during the 1970 protests in Elbląg

Strikes were put down by the Polish People's Army and the Citizen's Militia, resulting in at least 44 people killed and more than 1,000 wounded.

Photograph of a Soviet T-54 in Prague during the Warsaw Pact's occupation of Czechoslovakia.

Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia

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Jointly invaded by four Warsaw Pact countries: the Soviet Union, the Polish People's Republic, the People's Republic of Bulgaria and the Hungarian People's Republic.

Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev and Polish leader Władysław Gomułka in East Berlin, 1967

Brezhnev, Nikolai Podgorny, and East German leader Walter Ulbricht in Moscow

Nicolae Ceauşescu (right) visiting Czechoslovakia in 1968; here, with Alexander Dubček and Ludvik Svoboda

Prague resident attempting conversation with a Soviet soldier.

Soviet soldier with a tank shell – potentially having retrieved it from a burning tank.

Soviet tanks marked with invasion stripes during the invasion

National flag of Czechoslovakia covered in blood

One of the protesters' banners "For your freedom and ours"

Bucharest, August 1968: Ceauşescu criticizing the Soviet invasion

Demonstration in Helsinki against the invasion

Demonstration in Kiel, West Germany against the invasion of Czechoslovakia and Vietnam War, 23 August 1968

Commander-in-chief of the Warsaw Pact Ivan Yakubovsky with Walter Ulbricht in 1970

Erich Honecker, Gustáv Husák, and Walter Ulbricht in Berlin, East Germany, 1971

At approximately 11 pm on 20 August 1968, Eastern Bloc armies from four Warsaw Pact countries – the Soviet Union, Bulgaria, Poland and Hungary – invaded Czechoslovakia.