The last thing Hitler wanted was to find himself fighting a war on two fronts. The majority of the casualties were civilians who fell victims to crimes against humanity and war crimes during the Soviet Union and Nazi occupation. The main causes of these losses are as follows. How many people died during World War II. Since some of the scholarly sources are disputed and differ on the number of casualties in a country, a range of deaths, both for military and civilian, is given. 2000 2050. STANISAWA LESZCZYCKIEGO, Bibliography of Poland during World War II, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=World_War_II_casualties_of_Poland&oldid=1125563779, Total Population of ethnic Poles and Polish Jews (only) in 1939, Murdered in the extermination camps, executions, liquidation of ghettos, Prisons, concentration camps, epidemics, extenuation, bad treatment, Outside the camps: because of extenuation, wounds, injuries, beatings, hard labour, Victims of prisons and concentration camps, Ethnic Polish Victims During German Occupation, Less population Not Capable of Resistance, Population Capable of Resistance-October 1939, Population Capable of Resistance Oct 1939, Total population Capable of Resistance-May 1945, Population of 27,007,000 includes 5,193,000 Poles and Jews in the. Statistics for Polish World War II casualties are divergent and contradictory. The United States went to war. Hitler watching German troops on their way to Poland. They pointed out that Czesaw uczak estimated the total population loss at 500,000 ethnic Poles in the Soviet occupied regions. Institute of National Remembrance (IPN), Warszawa 2009, Lee Ready, World War Two: Nation by Nation, Arms & Armour, 1996, Massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia, University of New Hampshire at Manchester, Central Commission for the Investigation of German Crimes in Poland, Europe at War 19391945: No Simple Victory, Resolve the Ukrainian Question Once and For All: The Ethnic Cleansing of Ukrainians in Poland, 1943-1947, Timothy Snyder, Working Paper, Yale University, 2001. Polska 19391945. Justus Doenecke has written more books on the history of antiwar foreign policy than anyone, and hes still going. He was a member of the Polish United Workers' Party in communist Poland. Non-Jewish ethnic Poles in large cities were targeted by the apanka policy which the German occupiers utilized to indiscriminately round up civilians off the street to be sent as forced laborers to Germany. [36] During the occupation the natural death rate in the General Government increased to 1.7% per annum compared to the prewar level of 1.4%[37], Part of the Generalplan Ost involved taking children from Poland and moving them to Nazi Germany for the purpose of Germanization, or indoctrination into becoming culturally German. Prior to the war the area which became the General Government was not self sufficient in agricultural production and was a net importer of food from other regions of Poland. Americas Hungary-Bashing Has Consequences. Mainly for this reason, estimates of total dead in World War II vary anywhere from 35,000,000 to 60,000,000a statistical difference of no small import. Additionally, at least one million Jews were murdered in the. It is reminiscent in the first instance of Woodrow Wilsons call for a League of Nations in 1916 and 1917, when he was still determined to stay out of the European war. Figure included by IPN in total ethnic Polish war dead of 2,770,000[83], C. The IPN put the war dead in 1944/45 at 183,000. The Polish army fought very well, even though it was vastly outnumbered and heavily outgunned. In 1916, Wilson dreaded giving any commitments to the British, who pressed him to throw Americas weight behind a reasonable settlement. https://www.britannica.com/question/How-many-people-died-during-World-War-II. We cannot know the scale of Ukraines resistance. [53] The classification of the ethnic groups in Poland during the Second Polish Republic is a disputed topic, Tadeusz Piotrowski called the 1931 Polish census "unreliable", noting that it had underestimated the number of non-Poles[54] The official figures for nationality from the 1931 Polish census based on the mother tongue put the percentage of ethnic Poles at 68.9%, Jews 8.6% and other minority groups 22.5%., Tadeusz Piotrowski maintains that the adjusted census figures(taking religious affiliation into account) put the percentage of ethnic Poles at 64.7%, Jews 9.8% and other minority groups 25.5% of Poland's population. Poland had been the victim of many invasions over the years. No, I dont think they were. per capita), Stephane Courtois, The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression, Harvard Univ Pr, 1999, Paul Robert Magocsi. During the occupation, communities were held collectively responsible for Polish attacks against German troops and mass executions were conducted in reprisal. "[66], Source: Wojciech Materski and Tomasz Szarota. The 7TP was the most modern Polish tank at the time of the outbreak of WW2. Those basic parameters were followed until December 7, 1941. This figure was disputed when the communist system collapsed by the Polish historian Czesaw uczak who put total losses at 6.0 million; 3.0 million Jews, 2.0 million ethnic Poles, and 1.0 million Polish citizens from the other ethnic groups not included in the 1947 report on war damages. [84], Source: Wojciech Materski and Tomasz Szarota. Back then, it was all out aid to the allies, while staying out of the war. [75], Sourced from: Wojciech Materski and Tomasz Szarota. Poles in rural areas and small towns were also conscripted for forced labor by the German occupiers. Known as the Luftwaffe. The original and supplementary records have since been transferred to the Modern Military Branch, National Archives and Records Administration located at: 8601 Adelphi Road, College Park, MD 20740-6001. T. Panecki, Wysiek zbrojny Polski w II wojnie wiatowej, pl:Wojskowy Przegld Historyczny 1995, nr 1-2, s. 13,18. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. WW2 German Death Card Sterbebild Panzer Black Wrap Uniform Beret 1941 (Krakau) $37.84 + $13.18 shipping . Polish infantry fought well, but by September 19, the overwhelming German reinforcements had defeated the Poles. As part of my ongoing quest to win favor with the neoconservatives, I would also like to draw attention to another disturbing comparison: Hitlers December 11, 1941, decision to declare war on the United States. Updates? $35.40 + $13.18 shipping . Note: The number in parentheses indicates a negative amount (a negative balance)Source of figures: Kazimierz Piesowicz, Demograficzne skutki II wojny swiatowej Studia Demograficzne, No. President Bidens policy is all-out economic war against Russia, with a strict red line against actual U.S. military involvement. World War II is considered the deadliest arm conflict in human history. Human Losses and Victims of Repression Under the Two Occupations) that estimated Poland's war dead at between 5.6 and 5.8 million Poles and Jews, including 150,000 during the Soviet occupation. Estimates of the total number of people killed during World War II have ranged from 35,000,000 to 60,000,000a significant span, because statistics about the wars casualties are inexact. An estimated 5,800,000 Poles died, which was 20 percent of Poland's prewar population. Current Historical U.N. [83], D. According to Bajer's calculations the number of Polish citizens on the Volksliste was 2,224,000. Only for the United States and the British Commonwealth can official figures showing killed, wounded, prisoners or missing for the armed forces be cited with any degree of assurance. All maps, graphics, flags, photos and original descriptions 2023 worldatlas.com, The Countries That Remained Neutral In WWII. 42 of the medals were awarded for action during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor (15) and 27 during the Battle of Iwo Jima. [57], In April 1947 the Polish government Bureau of War Damages (BOW) published an analysis of Poland's war losses. Tens of thousands of ethnic Germans were killed during the Nazi evacuation from Poland in 1944 and 1945, and as a result of repression NKVD and Red Army or died in post war internment camps. The Government of Russia, following a study conducted by the Russian Academy of Science in 1993, puts the deaths at 26.6 million, including about 8.66 million military deaths. Those causes were nationalism, imperialism, militarism, alliancism, and assassination. The U.S. National Archives has a number of World War 2 Casualty resources that range across the U.S. Armed Forces as well as a number of records regarding other nations. He notes that in general, the numbers declaring a particular language do not mesh with the numbers declaring the corresponding nationality. American war planners knew in 1941 that Germany was the primordial threat, but American public opinion had resided for two years in the same anomalous state as we find today in Ukraine policy. Losses outside Polish territory were 500,000 persons. Around 250,000 of France's 600,000 deaths were military personnel. POLSKA 1939-1945 STRATY OSOBOWE I OFIARY REPRESJI POD DWIEMA OKUPACJAMI. [96] The following is a list of published statistics for Polish casualties in World War II. (1996). The terms of the treaty were harsh and punitive towards Germany, and many Germans . Were going to de-Nazify Ukraine, but not occupy it. A surprise invasion by Nazi Germany in September 1939 caught Poland off guard. Answer (1 of 7): Likely there would be no WWII, but the Soviet action and the results of those would be a question mark. This figure includes 2.9 million Jews, 2.0 million. This article provides a summarization of these estimates of Poland's human losses in the war and their causes. Most Polish citizens who perished in the war were civilian victims of the war crimes and crimes against humanity during the occupation by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. Of these various historical parallels, the two which should most hold our attention are the American postures in 1916-1917 and 1940-1941. [72] The estimates of Franciszek Proch were cited by Tadeusz Piotrowski in his book Poland's Holocaust [73], Source of figures: Franciszek Proch, Poland's Way of the Cross, New York 1987 Pages 143-144. What happen during second word war with Poland vs Germany, similar conflict seen in Russia Vs Ukraine. On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland and started WW2. More ethnic Germans also died outside of Germany. The Polish strategy was to try to preserve the bulk of its army for this future planned offensive, while defending the country. Western technological advances had turned upon itself, bringing about the most destructive war in human . In 1987 the Polish Academy of Science journal Studia Demograficzne published an article by Kazimierz Piesowicz that analyzed the demographic balance from Poland from 1939-1950. The aim of the project was to acquire and "Germanize" children with purportedly Aryan traits who were considered by Nazi officials to be descendants of German settlers in Poland. Pacethe neocons, I think that there are tremendous fallacies in seeing Putin as a Hitler, mainly because he sees himself as an anti-Hitler, but one has to say that Russian decision-making in the last two months does look a bit like Der Fhrers. )"[1], Comparative Poland's War Dead estimated by Tadeusz Piotrowski in 2005 presented on the Project in Posterum website,[77], Causes of Poland's War Dead estimated by Tadeusz Piotrowski in 2005 on Project in Posterum website,[77], An analysis of Poland's war losses by Kazimierz Bajer was published in the journal of the veterans of the Armia Krajowa. 92, 105, 118, and 325, Gross Pages 92-93(Gross cites Polish sources that show pre-war the average per capita grain consumption in Poland of 246.4 kg. )[82], The Polish government affiliated Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) in 2009 estimated total war dead at between 5,620,000 and 5,820,000 persons. No one knew it at the time, but Hitler had taken the decision all by his little lonesome. Germany invaded Poland to regain lost territory and ultimately rule their neighbor to the east. "Straty osobowe i ofiary represji pod okupacj niemieck", "Polish Resistance and Conclusions United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, DC", Andrzej Gawryszewski LUDNO POLSKI W XX WIEKU POLSKA AKADEMIA NAUK NSTYTUT GEOGRAFII I PRZESTRZENNEGO ZAGOSPODAROWANIA IM. Stanislav Petrov, the man who stopped a USSR - US nuclear war by doing nothing. Around 6 million Polish citizens perished during World War II: about one fifth of the pre-war population. Were going to smash all resistance, yet not kill civilians. Bureau odszkodowan wojennych(BOW), Statement on war losses and damages of Poland in 19391945. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). 9.462. David C. Hendricksonis president of the John Quincy Adams Society and the author of Republic in Peril: American Empire and the Liberal Tradition(Oxford, 2018). 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