BY WILLIAM RUSSELL
A wise person once said, “If you cannot tell the difference between your friends and enemies, you will have only enemies.”
This is true for both individuals and nations, and reflects the realities of the Obama administration’s foreign policy.
The president has signaled his intention to betray America’s most loyal ally from World War II as well as our current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in order to appease Russia’s Vladimir Putin.
He has done so by canceling the missile shield that would help protect Europe and its American interests there from a missile threat from Iran, and solidify the American commitment to Poland and the Czech Republic.
With regard to Poland, he could not have picked a worse day to cancel the program: He chose Sept. 17, the 70th anniversary of Stalin’s invasion of Poland at the beginning of World War II.
This anniversary marks 70 years since the beginning of Soviet oppression of Poland, which lasted until the end of the Cold War.
While Poland has been free and independent of Russia since then, the intimidation of Poland by Russia with threats and constant attempts at coercion on economic, diplomatic and military fronts has continued.
Thanks to rewrites of history to please “Uncle Joe” Stalin in both England and the United States at the end of the war, few Americans and Brits know that no ally sacrificed more for our freedom and the allied victory in World War II than Poland.
Two weeks ago, we remembered the surprise German invasion of Poland in World War II. But no one, especially our president, seems to remember that this was under an agreement between Hitler and Stalin.
On Sept. 17, Stalin sent his troops into Poland to secure his share of the deal by “helping to defend Poland.”
His “gift” to help Poland fight the Germans was the murder of 15,000 Polish officers and cadets at Katyn Forest by his NKVD (later known as the KGB). Every identified Polish soldier in Soviet-occupied areas was sent to the Soviet gulag system.
Under-equipped and undertrained, and invaded from two directions by overwhelming superior forces, the Poles fought extremely well. They inflicted more than 60,000 casualties on the German Wermacht (this is known thanks to excellent German record keeping) and an undetermined, but probably similar, number of casualties on the Soviet Army (thanks to excellent Soviet record keeping) in the opening weeks of the war.
But even after bearing the full brunt of the two major military powers in Europe at the time, Poland never surrendered.
There was no “Vichy” government in Poland during World War II. Poland remained an occupied territory throughout the war, with the Polish Home Army (AK) inflicting hundreds of thousands of casualties on the Germans.
In addition, many Polish patriots died to provide the allies with key parts of the German Enigma secret code machine.
Many Poles also escaped to England and France, where they had to fight for the right to continue fighting for their homeland.
These included the pilots who formed the two highest- scoring squadrons in the Royal Air Force during the Battle of Britain.
Although the Polish squadrons made up less than 10 percent of the RAF fighter force, they were credited with more than 40 percent of the kills against the German Luftwaffe (and this was done primarily flying older Hurricane Hawkers rather than the newer Spitfire fighters).
The Poles in England also formed the Polish Airborne Brigade, whose purpose was to drop into Warsaw to help liberate the city when the time came. But they were used, instead, to reinforce Montgomery’s debacle at Arnhem (many of you remember the movie “A Bridge Too Far”).
But it was not only the Poles who had escaped to England who fought alongside our forces against Germany. After Hitler turned and invaded Russia, Stalin suddenly decided to use the Poles he had been starving in the gulags to fight against Germany.
But instead of fighting under Russian command, 110,000 Poles marched out of Russia and across Iran and Iraq to link up and fight alongside the British in modern-day Israel. They formed the II Polish Corps, the unit that wrested control of the monastery atop the mountain at Monte Casino, Italy, from Nazi hands.
For their contributions to our victory in World War II, our brave Polish allies had one-third of their country given wholesale to Russia by the Yalta Agreement; they were not allowed to march in the Allied Victory Parade in London, to avoid “offending” Stalin; and the members of the Home Army, after all of their suffering and sacrifice in resisting Nazi occupation, were once again sent to the gulags to be starved, tortured and shot.
Sadly, for most Americans, all that remains of the Poles brave and heroic struggle is false image, produced by Nazi propagandists, of Polish cavalry vainly charging German tanks with swords and spears.
With his recent actions, Obama just added one more great insult to a long list of injuries.
Good job, Mr. President.
Do you really think Putin will be your friend now?
William Russell is a retired military officer and GOP candidate for the 12th Congressional District House seat.
