The Polish tragedy

In case you weren't sure just how much of a disaster Poland went through when their President's plane went down yesterday, here is a who's who of those on the plane.

There were no survivors.

Lech Kaczyński, President



Maria Kaczyńska, First Lady

Ryszard Kaczorowski, last President-in-exile

Krzysztof Putra, vice-Marshal of the Sejm (speaker of Parliament)

Krystyna Bochenek, vice-Marshal of the Sejm

Jerzy Szmajdziński, former Minister of Defence and intended Presidential Candidate for this year’s election

Władysław Stasiak, chief of the President’s office

Jacek Sasin, deputy chief of the President’s office

Aleksander Szczygło, chief of National Security Bureau

Paweł Wypych, Secretary of State in President’s office

Mariusz Handzlik, deputy Secretary of State in President’s office

Andrzej Kremer, vice-minister of Foreign Affairs

General Franciszek Gągor, Chief of Staff

Jerzy Bar, ambassador to Russia

Andrzej Przewoźnik, major historian

Maciej Płażyński, MP, former Marshal of the Sejm

Przemysław Gosiewski, MP, former minister

Zbigniew Wassermann, MP, former minister

Izabela Jaruga-Nowacka, MP, former Minister of Social Policy

Jolanta Szymanek-Deresz, MP, former chief of President’s Office

Aleksandra Natalii-Świat, MP, vice-president of Law and Justice party

Leszek Deptuła, MP

Grażyna Gęsicka, MP

Arkadiusz Rybicki, MP

Stanisław Zając, MP

Edward Wojtas, MP

Wiesław Woda, MP

Sebastian Karpiniuk, MP

Grzegorz Dolniak, MP

Janusz Kochanowski, Ombudsman

Sławomir Skrzypek, President of the Polish National Bank

Janusz Kurtyka, President of the Institute of National Remembrance (state institution for historical research)

Bishop Tadeusz Płoski

and the chiefs of every arm of the Armed Forces.

kthanxbai!

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Marek Edelman

A hero died last week. About 65 years after Hitler wanted him exterminated.

Marek Edelman, who died on October 2, probably aged 90, was the last surviving leader of the armed Jewish revolt against the Nazis in the Warsaw ghetto; having commanded the heroic but doomed struggle in April 1943 he was one of a tiny number of fighters to escape with his life, eventually taking part in the equally ill-fated citywide Uprising the following year.

Edelman was just 20 when the Nazis invaded Warsaw. By November 1940 the invading army had cut off his district from the rest of the city with walls and wire. As the anti-Semitic directives of the occupation were put into force, hundreds of thousands of Polish Jews were forced into the ghetto, inflating its population to almost half a million.

Image via Wikipedia

Conditions became intolerable and in the course of 1941 the ghetto population was decimated by disease and malnutrition. Early the following year however, with Hitler's decision to implement the Endlösung, or final solution to "the Jewish question", plans were put in place to liquidate the ghetto and its remaining occupants entirely.

Go read more at the link: Marek Edelman

kthanxbai!

World War 2 and all that jazz

Yesterday I wanted to blog about the 70th Anniversary of the invasion of Poland by Germany which was the wake-up call that started World War 2. I was worried that it might be a bit too serious, even morose, so deferred it for a day whilst I thought about it.

The Times newspaper of London gave me the push I needed to start the blog when I saw today that they were offering free ring tones of Winston Churchill's famous speech 'We shall fight them on the beaches'.





Bad taste? Modernity gone mad? I think its a sign of the times (no pun intended) when no news source that I read (Fox, Sky, Times, Telegraph, YNet, CNN*) even mention the anniversary of the beginning of World War 2.

Image by wallyg via Flickr

Peter over at Bayou Renaissance Man, has a couple of interesting posts about World War II;

1. September 1st, 1939

German forces have invaded Poland and its planes have bombed Polish cities, including the capital, Warsaw.

The attack comes without any warning or declaration of war.

Britain and France have mobilised their forces and are preparing to wage war on Germany for the second time this century.

2. Dame Vera Lynn - an icon of the struggle and fortitude of the British public through the blitz, rationing, the blackout and the sending off of the menfolk.

So go forth and read about the beginning of the war and spare a thought for the fact that the War changed the world in so many ways, for good and for bad.

kthanxbai!

* EDIT: some news agencies mention the marking of the anniversary but do not contain articles about the start of the war itself

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