"So why is it that while the Germans killed a thousand times more Poles than the Soviets, the Russians are hated a thousand times more than the Germans? It makes no sense to me. Can anyone explain?"
I think this is it: there is no shame, there is no apology, there is no honest admission from the Russian side. <-this sentence is probably the best, ultimate answer for your question.
I will accept that answer, but it still leaves questions.
Sure, that's easy to explain. The Nazi's murdered countless Polish Jews, and countless more Euro Jews in general. Some morons still deny it, but everyone else knows that it's true. Germany has been, an continues to pay dues for that period of it's history. Good for Germany. As a nation, it has taken responsibility for it's past deeds to a great degree. Hitler was a nutcase psychopath, but he was the leader of Germany, and the people share responsibility.
Here, I have some difficulties. There is much anecdotal evidence that when German civilians were paraded through Buchenwald after the US occupied the region, they claimed "We did not know". It was very easy to blame "the Nazis", whoever they were, but very few would admit to actually being Nazis.
The Nuremburg trials passed heavy sentences against those members if the highest NSDAP leadership that were apprehended. Some were sentenced to death, and those sentences were speedily carried out, but the majority were given lengthy jail terms. Yet somehow, apart from Rudolf Hess, they were all pardoned within a few years. The advent of the Cold War led the United States, in particular, to seek to rehabilitate Germany and to recruit former Nazis into the US effort against the USSR, people like Gehlen and Von Braun and others with specific expertise. Anti-Communism became more important than pro-Naziism. This may have been expedient, but it was not right.
That brings us to the zver from Georgia. Despite your fanciful description of how Polish forces fought on all fronts, for all sides . . .
How is it fanciful? Poles fought with the British Army in Italy and Northwest Europe, and with the Red Army in Belarus and on to Berlin. No.303 (Polish) Squadron was the top-scoring squadron in the RAF during the Battle of Britiain, and a Polish Wing was eventually formed within 2TAF in time for the invasion of Europe. Polish soldiers, tankers and airmen distinguished themselves in combat with the Germans in three theatres. All this despite difficulties with languages(s) and predjudices. More credit to them. The Polish people should celebrate their achievements, and I hope they do.
. . . the truth remains that the thought of an equitable distribution of Poland between Germany and the CCCP was a major source of erections for Stalin. By the late thirties, much of Poland was already Soviet territory in the mind of the Georgian beast. By the way, there were no breakdown in relations between Truman and Stalin. Everyone knew at the time that the romance would only last as long as Germany was a threat. Once Germany was defeated, Stalin was able to focus his paranoia in other directions.
I won't pretend to know the mind of Josef Vissariononvich Dzhugashvili. I daresay that is impossible. As for relations between the USA and USSR, they began to disintegrate from the moment Truman took office. Truman was deeply suspicious of the USSR, to a much greater degree than was Roosevelt. The US and UK were determined to avoid the mistakes of Versailles in the postwar German status quo, while the USSR was intent on revenge and determined to cripple what was left of Germany, such that it could never again present a threat. In 1947-48 the issues of currency reform and the Marshall Plan brought the antagonism between the Occupying Powers to a head. The Soviets closed the border between East and West, flexing their muscle, and the Berlin Airlift resulted. There was no looking back.
Back to the point. The reason why so many Polish people focus on the Russian contribution to genocide is that Stalin murdered Poles because they were Poles. Hitler murdered Polish Jews, which was bad enough, but Stalin put on the face of being a friend of Poland, murdered their political and military leadership, and then blamed the acts on Germany. During the Warsaw uprising, he let signals pass to the Poles that the Red army was near, and ready to offer support, yet he stood down his troops until Polish forces were pretty much destroyed, and then moved against the German forces.
I disagree. Stalin was many things, but I don't believe he was a racist. If he ordered people murdered, it was because he saw them as a threat. This had more to do with their intelligence and ability than with race. The Poles murdered at Katyn were not common soldiers but officers, people who had demonstrated an ability to lead and to think, thus potential leaders in anti-Soviet activities. He did not discriminate against Poles in this regard — he was just as ruthless in having the Russian and Ukrainian intelligentsiya culled by the NKVD in the years before and after the GPW.
As for the failure of the Red Army to support the Warsaw Uprising, there I disagree. It may be possible to earn political capital by blaming Stalin for the lack of support, but there is another viewpoint, and I am personally more inclined to accept that one. Bagration was kicked off on June 23, and after six weeks of hard fighting and an advance of many hundreds of kilometers against a determined enemy, the Red Army found itself approaching Warszawa. The Home Army launched their Uprising without consulting the approaching Soviets, then demanded support. The Soviets declined, saying they were at the end of their supply train, their troops were exhausted, and they could take no further action until they had been granted an opportunity to rest, re-equip and regroup. Knowing what I do about armies in the field, this is not an unreasonable or unexpected situation given the elapsed time and the distance of the advance across Belarus. The Red Army was unable and unwilling to enter a large city and embark upon a large-scale urban battle, possibly on the scale of Stalingrad, without substantial re-enforcement and regrouping.
The Warsaw Uprising was unexpected and caught the Red Army by surprise. They were therefore unable and therefore unwilling to blindly support the Uprising. Rather than accept that situation, anti-Soviet postwar historiography has elected to point the blame at Stalin for cynically choosing to let the Home Army be massacred by the Wehrmacht and SS for political reasons. Sorry, but I disagree. Stalin's goal was the defeat of Germany, first, and the postwar settlement, second. If he could have helped the Poles kill more Germans, he would have. That was his primary goal. If any of the Poles had later proved to be troublemakers, he could have had the NKVD deal with them in the manner with which they were accustomed — a single bullet to the back of the skull.
You are writing about this like we had some animosity which was without reason.
No. I can accept that the Polish nation is resentful of the way they were treated by Stalin and his regime. I understand that after 1945 Poland became subservient to the USSR, and for almost half a century the Polish people were unable to pursue their own destiny. This is not hard for me. What baffles me is that I do not hear the same vitriol coming from Czechs and Slovaks, from Hungarians or Romanians, from Bulgarians, or from Letts, Lithuanians or Estonians, or from Finns. They all have axes to grind, yet they choose not to do so. Only the Poles seem to so unforgiving, so vehement. There is no outcry against the Germans, who murdered six million Poles, including Polish Jews. There is no outcry against France or Britain, who promised support against Germany, but who delivered nothing. There is no outcry against the Pilsudski regime, who could have stopped Nazi Germany in its tracks by supporting Czechoslovakia in 1938 instead of joining the Nazis in a land-grab. Instead, all we hear, endlessly, over and over again, is how that dirty Commie bastard Stalin murdered thousands of Poles, betrayed the Warsaw Uprising, and occupied our country.
Sorry, but it still baffles me. The Germans murdered millions of Poles, millions of Poles, and would have murdered millions more had Stalin's Red Army not driven them back to Germany. Stalin was indeed paranoid, perhaps a psychopath, a tyrant who ordered the murder of hundreds of thousands of people, maybe millions of people, from all ethnic groups, people he perceived as threats to his regime. The Poles he had killed were a small proportion of the total, and they were not killed because they were Poles, but because he considered them as potential threats to his regime.
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