Warsaw Uprising: Encyclopedia II - Warsaw Uprising - Eve of the battle

Warsaw Uprising - Eve of the battle

The Home Army's initial plans for a national uprising, Operation Tempest, which would link up with British forces, changed in 1943 when it became apparent that the Red Army would force the Germans from Poland. The discovery of the Katyn massacre occasioned the breaking-off of Polish-Soviet relations in April, and they never properly recovered. Although doubts existed about the military wisdom of a major uprising, the planning continued.

The situation came to a head as Operation Bagration, the Soviet attack on Germany, reached the old Polish border on 13 July. At this point the Poles had to make a decision: either carry out the uprising in the current difficult political situation and risk problems with Soviet support, or fail to carry out an uprising and face Soviet propaganda describing Armia Krajowa as collaborators and ineffective cowards. The urgency of this decision increased as it became clear that after successful Polish-Soviet co-operation in the liberation of various towns (for example, in the Wilno Uprising), often the Soviet NKVD units who followed behind would either shoot or send to gulags most Polish officers and those Polish soldiers who could not or would not join the Soviet Army.

In the early summer of 1944, German planning required Warsaw to serve as the strong point of the area and to be held at all costs. The Germans had fortifications constructed and built up forces in the area. This process slowed after the failed July 20 Plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler, but by late July of 1944, the German forces had approximately reached their full strength again. On July 27, the governor of the General Government, Hans Frank, called for 100,000 Polish men between the ages of 17–65 to arrive at several concentration places in Warsaw the following day. The plan envisaged them constructing fortifications for the Wehrmacht in and around the city. The Home Army viewed this move as an attempt to neutralise the underground forces, and the underground urged Warsaw inhabitants to ignore it.

The official line of Soviet propaganda portrayed the Polish underground as "waiting with their arms at ease" and not fighting the common enemy. As the Soviet forces approached Warsaw in June and July 1944, the Soviet radio stations demanded a full national uprising in Warsaw to cut the communication lines of the German units still on the right bank of Vistula. On July 29, 1944, the first Soviet armoured units reached the outskirts of Warsaw.

On 25 July the Polish cabinet in London approved the planned uprising in Warsaw. Fearing German reprisal actions following the ignored order to support fortification construction and believing that time was of the essence, general Tadeusz Bór-Komorowski ordered full mobilisation of Home Army forces in the Warsaw area on 1 August 1944.

This decision also possessed ramifications with the Soviet Union. Stalin decried in not being officially consulted on the uprising and suspected subterfuge from her Western allies. In retrospect, both sides were jockeying for regional political alignment, with the Polish Home Army's desire for a pro-Western Polish government and the Soviet's intention of establishing a Polish Communist regime.

Warsaw Uprising - Opposing forces

The Home Army forces of the Warsaw District numbered about 50,000 soldiers, 23,000 of them equipped and combat-ready. Most of them had trained for several years in partisan warfare and urban guerrilla warfare, but lacked experience in prolonged daylight fighting. The forces lacked equipment, especially since the Home Army had shuttled weapons and men east of Warsaw before making the decision on 21 July to include Warsaw in Operation Tempest. Besides the Home Army itself a number of other partisan groups each subordinated themselves to Home Army command for the uprising. Finally, many volunteers, including some Jews freed from the concentration camp in the ruins of the Warsaw Ghetto, joined as the fighting continued.

General Antoni Chruściel, codename 'Monter', commanded the Polish forces in Warsaw. Initially he divided his forces into eight areas:

• Area I (Śródmieście, Old Town)
• Area II (Żoliborz, Marymont, Bielany)
• Area III (Wola)
• Area IV (Ochota)
• Area V (Mokotów)
• Area VI (Praga)
• Area VII (Powiat Warszawski)
• Zgrupowanie Kedywu Komendy Głównej

On September 20 a re-organisation of this structure took place to fit the structure of Polish forces fighting among the Western Allies. The entire force, renamed the Warsaw Home Army Corps (Warszawski Korpus Armii Krajowej) and commanded by General Antoni Chruściel (Monter), formed into three infantry divisions.

On August 1 their military materiel consisted of:

• 1,000 rifles
• 1,700 pistols
• 300 machine pistols
• 60 sub-machine guns
• 7 machine guns
• 35 anti-tank guns and carbines (including several PIATs)
• 25,000 hand grenades

In the course of the fighting the Poles obtained further gear through air drops and by capture from the enemy (including several armoured vehicles). Also, the insurgents’ workshops worked busily throughout the rising, producing during this period 300 automatic pistols, 150 flame-throwers, 40,000 grenades, a number of mortars and PIATs, and even an armoured car.

On August 1, 1944, the German garrison of Warsaw numbered some 10,000 troops under general Rainer Stahel. Together with various units on the left bank of the Vistula river the German forces comprised some 15,000 to 16,000 Wehrmacht soldiers as well as SS and police forces. However, the well-equipped German forces had been prepared for the defence of the city's key positions for many months. Several hundred concrete bunkers and barbed wire lines protected the buildings and areas occupied by the Germans. Also, at least 90,000 additional German troops occupied in the surrounding area. As of August 23, 1944, the German units directly involved with fighting in Warsaw included:

• Battle group Rohr (commanded by Major General Rohr)
• Battle group Reinefarth (commanded by SS-Gruppenführer Reinefarth)
  • Attack group Dirlewanger
  • Attack group Reck (commanded by Major Reck)
  • Attack group Schmidt (commanded by Colonel Schmidt)
  • various support and backup units
• Warsaw Garrison (Group of Warsaw Commandant) commanded by Lieutenant General Stahel

A large section of the personnel on the "German" side, according to Norman Davies (p. 284), came from "collaborationist forces", including Russians who had left in the Tsar's era and Azeris. All of these forces, however, remained clearly subject to the control of the German war machine.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Eve of the battle", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki