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Resisting the Nazi occupation of Poland

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My outlook at the start of World War II
Jan Józef Lipski Social activist
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The National Radical Camp was an extreme fascist right wing. Their boys would run around with knuckle dusters and sticks hunting down Jews. That was their political programme, to kick Jews out of Poland and the best way to do that was to beat them and to make life impossible for them. Among other things, their programme included expelling them from the universities hence the ghetto on the school benches meaning Jewish students had to sit on the left while Aryans sat on the right. Except that not all of the Aryans wanted to, not all of them agreed to sit on the right, and that's why some of them remained standing during their lectures. Many of the professors did the same. In a word, there was a very unpleasant ferment at these universities. Before war broke out, there was already a tense atmosphere which you could say was also an aspect of my political education, and a friend of my father's, who was a legionnaire, invited us all to Krakow for the anniversary of the mobilisation of the corps. My father vaguely supported the Piłsudski camp, but that's the most accurate description – he was vaguely supportive. I saw all those ceremonies, the parades. There was a real sense of excitement in Kraków, although it was already a long time after Beck's speech and people knew that war was coming. In my stupidity, I was pleasantly anticipating what was coming. This, too, was an aspect of my political education.

Finally, war arrived. September 1st. I spent that entire period in Warsaw, at home, in Ochota, where at one point the German tanks came very close but they were repelled. There were bombings and a terrible bitterness when it became apparent that Warsaw was capitulating. So then we entered the period of occupation, and all the while I and everyone of my generation were convinced that under these circumstances there would now be the Polish Military Organisation – POW – as there had been during the First World War. So now something similar would be created, and we weren't far wrong. This was how we more or less hit on what really began to happen, except that a lot of time passed before I joined this conspiratorial movement myself. Meanwhile, I was attending clandestine lessons. These clandestine classes were a wonderful thing because the groups weren't large so, in a word, the teacher had quality contact with the pupils. The circumstances led to an unforeseeable appreciation of the teacher, since we were conspiring against the Germans all together. So we were able to communicate with the teachers very well. There was always one who was more popular, another less so, but this created a wonderful atmosphere. At the same time, I have to say that the Germans, the Gestapo, weren't hunting us down – these clandestine classes – with any great zeal for the simple reason that they were being kept busy by a military resistance which was growing stronger, and they were finding that more interesting. So just attending these classes wasn't especially dangerous in itself except that we had to walk along streets where the Germans rounded people up, and the older we got, the likelier it became that if they caught us, something bad would happen. For example, we could have been deported to Germany to labour camps, or something like that.

Obóz Narodowo-Radykalny, czyli bardzo skrajna faszystowska taka prawica. Chłopcy biegali z kastetami i pałami, uganiali się za Żydami, mieli program polityczny taki, żeby Żydów wyrzucić z Polski, a najlepiej będzie to zrobić, bijąc ich i uniemożliwiając im życia. Między innymi mieli program wyrzucenia ich z uczelni, stąd getto ławkowe, czyli pomysł, że Żydzi mają siedzieć z lewej strony, a Aryjczycy mają siedzieć z prawej strony. Z tym że ci Aryjczycy nie bardzo się chcieli, nie wszyscy godzili się na to, żeby siedzieć z prawej strony w związku z tym było to właśnie stanie w czasie wykładów. Wielu profesorów też tak robiło. No i jednym słowem kotłowało się tam bardzo nieprzyjemnie na tych wyższych uczelniach. No i przyszła wojna; to znaczy przed wojną to była już atmosfera taka pełna napięcia, można powiedzieć, że to też może był jakiś element takiej edukacji politycznej, że przyjaciel mojego ojca, legionista, zaprosił nas wszystkich do Krakowa na rocznicę wymarszu „Kadrówki”. Ojciec lekko sympatyzował z obozem piłsudczykowskim, ale to najlepsze właśnie określenie – lekko sympatyzował. I widziałem te wszystkie uroczystości, defilady. Atmosfera wielkiego takiego podniecenia w Krakowie, a jednocześnie już dawno było po mowie Becka i było wiadomo, że wojna się szykuje i ja w swojej głupocie oczekiwałem z całą taką przyjemnością na to, co... na to, co ma nadejść. To też był element właśnie edukacji politycznej.

No i wreszcie wojna przyszła. Pierwszego września. Cały ten okres spędziłem w Warszawie w domu, na Ochocie, gdzie czołgi niemieckie w pewnym momencie nawet bardzo już blisko tam podeszły, no ale zostały odparte. Bombardowania, straszna gorycz, kiedy okazało się, że Warszawa kapituluje. No i weszło się w okres okupacyjny. Ja cały czas, wszyscy z mojego pokolenia byli przekonani, że w takim razie teraz będzie Polska Organizacja Wojskowa – POW, tak jak w czasie pierwszej wojny światowej. No to zaraz coś takiego powstanie i niewiele się, prawdę mówiąc myliliśmy. Tak mniej więcej trafiliśmy w to, co się naprawdę zaczęło dziać, no z tym że dużo czasu minęło, nim ja sam do tej konspiracji trafiłem. A tymczasem się uczyłem na kompletach. Na tajnych kompletach, to były bardzo piękne rzeczy, bo w niedużym zespole, czyli krótko mówiąc, nauczyciel ma dobry kontakt. W takich warunkach porozumienia z nauczycielem, jakich nigdy se nie można wyobrazić, bo wspólnie konspirujemy przeciwko Niemcom, prawda? Więc świetne dogadanie się z nauczycielami. Zawsze jeden bardziej lubiany, drugi mniej, no ale... ale to stwarzało piękną atmosferę. A jednocześnie trzeba powiedzieć, że Niemcy, gestapo tak z takim wielkim uporem tego nie ścigali, tego tajnego nauczania z tego prostego powodu, że mieli dosyć dużo roboty z coraz silniejszą konspiracją wojskową i to ich bardziej interesowało. Także sam fakt chodzenia na takie komplety nie wiązał się ze specjalnymi niebezpieczeństwami, no z wyjątkiem oczywiście tego, że trzeba było chodzić po ulicach, gdzie były łapanki; a im człowiek był starszy, tym większe było prawdopodobieństwo, że jak złapią, to może coś się złego stać, na przykład wywiezienie na roboty... do Niemiec czy coś takiego.

Jan Józef Lipski (1926-1991) was one of Poland's best known political activists. He was also a writer and a literary critic. As a soldier in the Home Army (Armia Krajowa), he fought in the Warsaw Uprising. In 1976, following worker protests, he co-founded the Workers' Defence Committee (KOR). His active opposition to Poland's communist authorities led to his arrest and imprisonment on several occasions. In 1987, he re-established and headed the Polish Socialist Party. Two years later, he was elected to the Polish Senate. He died in 1991 while still in office. For his significant work, Lipski was honoured with the Cross of the Valorous (Krzyż Walecznych), posthumously with the Grand Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta (1991) and with the highest Polish decoration, the Order of the White Eagle (2006).

Listeners: Jacek Petrycki Marcel Łoziński

Cinematographer Jacek Petrycki was born in Poznań, Poland in 1948. He has worked extensively in Poland and throughout the world. His credits include, for Agniezka Holland, Provincial Actors (1979), Europe, Europe (1990), Shot in the Heart (2001) and Julie Walking Home (2002), for Krysztof Kieslowski numerous short films including Camera Buff (1980) and No End (1985). Other credits include Journey to the Sun (1998), directed by Jesim Ustaoglu, which won the Golden Camera 300 award at the International Film Camera Festival, Shooters (2000) and The Valley (1999), both directed by Dan Reed, Unforgiving (1993) and Betrayed (1995) by Clive Gordon both of which won the BAFTA for best factual photography. Jacek Petrycki is also a teacher and a filmmaker.

Film director Marcel Łoziński was born in Paris in 1940. He graduated from the Film Directing Department of the National School of Film, Television and Theatre in Łódź in 1971. In 1994, he was nominated for an American Academy Award and a European Film Academy Award for the documentary, 89 mm from Europe. Since 1995, he has been a member of the American Academy of Motion Picture Art and Science awarding Oscars. He lectured at the FEMIS film school and the School of Polish Culture of Warsaw University. He ran documentary film workshops in Marseilles. Marcel Łoziński currently lectures at Andrzej Wajda’s Master School for Film Directors. He also runs the Dragon Forum, a European documentary film workshop.

Tags: ONR, fascists, racial discrimination, anti-Semitism, protest, unrest, World War II, opposition, German occupation, underground education

Duration: 4 minutes, 2 seconds

Date story recorded: October 1989

Date story went live: 09 March 2011