Kiedy warto powstawać | When is it sensible to rise

 

A question arose: if the Warsaw Uprising is described as "a crime on the nation" – because the decision and execution of the plan to oust Germans from the capital resulted in failure and death of so many civilians – oughtn't we to condemn any decision and subsequent action of the Home Army which resulted in bloody reprisals which targeted mainly civilians?

The difference – it is argued – is only the scale. The principle stays the same.

Well, for one thing, actions such as "Operation Kutschera" succeeded. The Home Army knew that each and every successful execution of a German would entail reprisals against civilian population. Still they carried them out rather than "waiting for the coast to clear itself".

The Warsaw Uprising – as opposed to "Operation Kutschera" for instance – met with bloody reprisals while not achieving the intended goals.

It was St. Thomas Aquinas who said that one of the conditions of a just war is to have a chance of winning it. Was that – bar a miracle – the case with the Rising?

Nobody in their right mind advocates condemning the Home Army as such or – among its members – the heroic fighters who were (mis)led into the Rising by elements hostile to the idea of Polish independence. But let us not forget those individuals who most probably out of not very honorable motives made that fateful decision – for the Uprising to start.