Talk:Armia Krajowa/Archive 1

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Contents

Old talk

Is this public domain text?

Apparently.Halibutt 23:07, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

original text seem to be almost the same as MOTLC. While right now article seems to be enlarged, in section about relation of Jews one still can spot many similarities with http://motlc.learningcenter.wiesenthal.org/pages/t061/t06169.html Szopen 16:16, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

AK's Jewish relations

Just a small comment about AK's Jewish realtions...

............................................................................

"The AK accepted only a few Jews (about one thousand) into its own ranks: it generally turned down Jewish applicants. " ............................................................................


I think the main point is that AK was generally anti-communist organization and most of Jews were associated with communist movements. So there you go. It's not that AK wasn't accepting Jews - Jews would not join AK. And the once that did were not communists. Everyone who watched "Pianist" must remember that Jewish guy that initiated the Ghetto Uprising. There was a comment about him in the movie ... "he is a good man, he was in the army, the only thing I can have against him is that he is not a communist ..." --- Actually there was also fear, that Jew being member of AK was in double danger and could be potential danger to fellow conspirators - so I read, at least. Szopen

More on AK and Jews

The AK was anti-Communist but their refusal to deal with Jews had more to do with innate Polish anti-Semitism and the weakness of Jewish resistance than it did with the fact that a number (though not all) of Jewish resistance members were left wing. A a prime example of this is seen in the document Response of the Commander of the AK to the Jewish Request for Arms.


innate anti-Semitism ??? What a stupidity. Millions of Jews living in Poland for centuries, developing their culture, being protected by polish kings - while in whole Europe exiled, murdered, persecuted and... flying to Poland to living save life... For sure, Poles are innate anti-Semits.

Also, is lack of arms equal to anti-Semitism? I don't have a gun at home either - am I an anti-Semite? Halibutt 12:37, May 12, 2005 (UTC)


There were conflicts between desperated hiding Jews and local population and partizan troops (also AK). There were also several Jewish "partizans" committing crimes. Why to pretend nothing happened?

Xx236 11:08, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

Relations with Lithuanians

I will paste here the unsourced text removed from main article, for discussion, rewriting into English, NPOVing and sourcing - assuming any of this is true, of course: --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 22:07, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

As well AK killed lots of Lithuanian civilians in Vilnius region, because the planned Polish state would have included the mentioned region, therefore Lithuanian minority (or majority at some places of it) was unneeded to Poles.

There was a large Lithuanian minority in Wilno Voivodship (see Vilnius region for details) and at some places they constitued majority. Relations between Poles and Lithuanians were strained during almost all interwar period due to the conflict over Vilnius region and Suvalkai region. Armia Karajowa wanted to recreat Polish state including the Vilnius region, and therefore killing Lithuanians there was according to it's agenda; as well these killings happened because of general hatred towards Lithuanians cause of decades-long conflict, which was as well fueled by some actions certain Lithuanian nazi collaborators did. Therefore AK used to murder Lithuanian civilians in Vilnius region; Lithuanian people remembers them in a very bad light and claims that they used to come to Lithuanian farmsteads and kill whole families of Lithuanians including children and elder people. Polish historians however tends to tone down the involvement of Armia Kraiowa in these massacres.

Of course it is true, I tried to write it as neutral as possible, by citing Polish historians point of view as well, and also the allegetions of Lithuanian collaboration with nazis. There was a documentary movie on this recently; appearently it was covered in some Polish newspaper called "Gazeta Wyborcza" too in case you want the info in native language - however, mentioned newspaper presented Polish point of view which downplayed the events, but still recognised that they happened. Everyone agrees that Armia Krajowa killed Lithuanian civilians, however it is the ammount which is disputed, some recognises just a few massacres (usually that is Polish point of view), while some Lithuanian historians tend to claim that AK supposedly did genocide of Lithuanians. You can also read more on this at History of Lithuania, WW2 section. Appearently, massacre at Dubingiai is recognised by Poles (I didn't added that line to that article), while other massacres are disputed.DeirYassin 22:21, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)
This comment is much more reasoned than your original contribution to the article, which struck me as somewhat unbalanced. Indeed there is no denying that the war years in Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine and Eastern Poland were especially brutal, almost approaching a state of a war of all against all in the forests where partisans and bandits of all stripes tried to survive. Innocent and not so innocent people were being killed for all kinds of reasons, with no national group being blameless. So it follows logically that some of these crimes were committed by Polish groups.
However, accusing Armia Krajowa of conducting a conscious policy of genocide is taking things to a whole new level. I have not yet read any serious book which would support this accusation. If you have some specific sources which support this claim, please provide specific citations and we can continue a discussion. Citing "some article in Gazeta Wyborcza" is not specific enough. Balcer 00:55, 24 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I did not accused Armia Krajowa of genocide in my updates to the article; only mentioned those accusations in my entry to the talk page, as some Lithuanians claim there was genocide. To the article I posted a neutral view however. However, if we will not find sources on this we would agree on neutrality, we could post both Lithuanian and Polish opinions and on where they agree/is enough evidence. I don't speak Polish so I cannot search for Polish articles, but here are some Lithuanian sources: http://www.politika.lt/index.php?cid=693&new_id=1456 , http://www.studentuera.lt/?s0=pramogzin&s1=tv&item=1400 - those are about mentioned documentary movie and about statements of interviewed Lithuanians from Vilnius region who remembered actions of Armia Krajowa. The film itself was called "Armija Krajova Lietuvoje. Istorijos akligatvis" ("Armia Krajowa in Lithuania: History's Road Without Exit"). It was easy to find those and more by Google, so you could type Polish words for Armia Kraiowa and massacre and Lithuania, or Armia Krajowa and mentioned town names, and such, and you should be able to find information - probably Polish info will tell there were no major massacres, but still, the fact of this discution and such should be mentioned somewhere in polish too. And western sources might be very hard to find because this is more or less a local issue, and there were lots of various larger violence during WW2.DeirYassin 12:42, 24 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Sure, I tried "armia krajowa masakra litwa" and got 13 hits, none of them having anything to do with what you are alleging. So the approach of "proving your case through a Google search" does not work that well in this case.
Given that you have given no sources that readers of English Wikipedia could understand or easily obtain, could you at least translate from Lithuanian the two articles the links to which you have given and post this translation here. Otherwise, I don't see what the point of further discussion is.
Finally, you did accuse Armia Krajowa of trying to exterminate the Lithuanian minority in the Wilno region, which does sound like genocide to me. But then your definition of genocide might be different. Balcer 18:40, 24 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Translation of http://www.politika.lt/index.php?cid=693&new_id=1456

Journalist Rimas Bružas says that with his movie "Armia Kraiowa (AK) in Lithuania: The History's Road without exit" he wanted to make more historian discutions, which would objectively decide on the actions of this controversial partisan army

"My goal was to raise historian discution, which, I hope, will start from this. If people made decitions, I am glad that they watched film instead of just watching into screen" - R. Bružas told ELTA in Monday, while commenting reactions towards the documentary film about AK actions in Vilnius region during World War 2, which was shown yesterday on TV3.

According to author of film, comments on internet and Polish media shows that supposedly people are getting into history without knowing real facts

"Without knoing history we cannot go forward. We do not question current Polish-Lithuanian relations. The biggest disappointment araises from the fact that historians of both nations uses same documents but makes different conclusions" - journalist told

He said that AK actions up till today is hard but still actual question, that's why the movie was taken with so much reaction. But discutions on this topic supposedly are needed now already, without waiting until "the witnesses will die and documents will rot". R. Bružas irronised "probably about Grunwald battle we should have started to speak only now also".

According to Polish daily "Gazeta Wyborcza" correspondent in Vilnius Jacekas Komaras (Jacek Komar) it was accentated in movie that AK was doing genocide of Lithuanians. One of interviewed expert was supposedly anti-Polish Kazimieras Garšva, chairman of "Vilnija" friendship. This organisation once did public court of AK, which decided that AK in Vilnius region did genocide of Lithuanians.

[Also it is objected that] In the film only the victims of these partisans were interviewed, but not AK veterans, Polish historians, or person of Povilas Plechavičius army, which was made by Germans against AK and Soviet Partisans.

At the end of almost hour-long movie the chairwoman of Lithuanian People Genocide and Resistance center said that there is not enough evidence to show that AK really did it all on purposes of genocide, however her personal opinion is that it was really done to purify Vilnius region. As R. Bružas himself informed, about 500 Lithuanians were killed by AK.

J. Komar for ELTA said that he disagrees with such history interpretation and thinks it should have been more objective about AK actions. Also, supposedly historians should make a stand and not journalists.

According to R. Bružas, AK veterans refused to talk to the creators of film. However, he said that he avoided subjectiveness and only supported the film on documments, witnesses' testimonies and historians' words.

Film was shown just after two days after official visit of Aleksandras Kvasnievskis (Aleksander Kwasniewski), President of Poland, to Lithuania. During the visit it was spoken much about friendly relations of two states. J. Komar did not rejected the possibility, that the film was supposedly ordered by some interested political power.

"It is strange, that there is so much paranoia in people about the influence of Moscow or Russia. It is absurd" - said R. Bružas - "A date for film was set randomly, it was postponed many times. Those who see a conspiracy theory here are wrong". ELTA

DeirYassin 19:06, 24 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for the translation. It is interesting, but it looks to me - so far - as a view of distanct minority (or an uncharted scientific territory, which however falls under the rule Wikipedia is not the place for orginal research). I am still looking for any printed sources, preferably from academic journals (online one can write anything...). From the sources I saw so far I would say that AK likely killed at best several dozens Lithuanians - hardly a genocide. A single (?) massacre, perpatrated by some local unit, without any orders from above - sure, an important tragedy, but it looks rather like an exception then the rule. As a sidenote, how many Lithuanians were killed by Nazis (Gestapo, etc.) and Soviets (NKVD, etc.)? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 20:09, 24 Apr 2005 (UTC)


Thank you for the translation. I like this article, it seems reasonable and balanced. I am glad to see that even in Lithuania there is a reasonable debate about the role of Armia Krajowa, and the issue it not clearly settled yet.
It is interesting to see that the article estimates the total number of Lithanians killed by Armia Krajowa at 500. This establishes the scale of the phenomenon. It also explains why it is so difficult to find information about it. The deaths of five hundred people during a war with millions of victims in Eastern Europe might not seem to be worth the attention of most historians. Just at Paneriai in the Vilnius region about 100,000 Jews, Poles and others were executed.
If you were to make a contribution to this Wikipedia article broadly similar in spirit to the article you translated, it would be a better start. Balcer 20:10, 24 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Added the portion to article, tried to neutralise it even more. As for Piotrus's remarks, yes, there were more Lithuanians killed by nazis and Soviets of course, but I don't think that makes this information any less valuable. In comparement to other WW2 kills, 500 people is not much, but, however, wikipedia should provide info on general importance, not relative importance, therefore this info IMO qualifies as important, same as would be e.g. a mention of organisation which (allegedly) killed 500 Jews or Poles.DeirYassin 08:02, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)

"Armia Krajowa committed at least one massacre of 27 Lithuanian civilians, including women and children, at Dubingiai."

DeirYassin do you have some serious sources? I found nothing on google and altavista.

Only something about this controversial film by R. Bruzas.

"There is an estimation of investigator R. Bružas of about 500 killed Lithuanian civilians overally"

How many of them were Nazi-Collaborators? --Witkacy 16:57, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)

As it was said previously, probably this number of deaths is too small iin the context of WW2 to b emany info about it, especially as internet connections number in Lithuania neither general English knowledge is good enough to get many opinions. I cited the article, and yes, some called the film provocation, especially poles, but as it was also mentioned in the article I translated above, there were previous accusing son Armia Krajowa about this too. Of course, Poles named them all to be anti-Polish; however the fact is that these discutions exist. I did not said in artcile that it WAS so; appearently, only one massacre is with evidence, and Poles I talked to agreed with that. However, all other deaths are disputed, which is what I said in my edits of article. There are people and witnesses who claims that they happened however. And R. Bružas was collecting information for this movie for 4 years, he has done other historical documentary films too about various events of history, so it is not like he would be some simple provocator. As far as I understand, only the number of civilians was given there, as that was the topic of Bružas film; you can read the context in the article I translated above. DeirYassin 18:01, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)

BTW it is Polish historian estimation that 20-27 people died in Dubingiai during AK massacre, some Lithuanian historians claims there were over 200 civilians killed there alone. DeirYassin 18:04, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I still find the mention of the word genocide in the article disturbing. Even if we take the most generous estimate of the numbers killed, which is 500, that is much less than 1% of the Lithuanian minority in the Wilno region at the time. If Armia Krajowa really wanted to exterminate that minority, as the article suggests, they sure were not very efficient in going about it. According to Wikipedia, Genocide means deliberate mass murder of civilians. Does the killing of 500 people over the course of about 4 years, tragic and reprehensible though it obviously is, qualify as genocide? And this in the middle of occupation and war which killed millions in the region during the same years?
I would like to see some clear argument for the use of the word genocide given the relatively small numbers of people killed. The argument that "some historians claim this" is not sufficient for me. Surely we can all think for ourselves here. If some Lithuanian historians want to insist on the word genocide, to me this is only an illustration of their biases, prejudices and professional incompetence, which does not need to be exhibited on Wikipedia. Balcer 18:59, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)

There might have been more than 500, this is just Bružas's estimation, and estimation son this matter differs by much. I am not sure, but maybe those who accuses AK of genocide "found out" bigger estimations. Also genocide i sprobably meant rather to describe deliberate killing of some group/nation/religion and is not so much related to numbers. But I agree that it might seem not neutral, so I removed word genocide now and changed it with explaination instead. DeirYassin 19:07, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)

"I did not said in artcile that it WAS so; appearently, only one massacre is with evidence, and Poles I talked to agreed with that."

So, please show me some evidences.

"BTW it is Polish historian estimation that 20-27 people died in Dubingiai during AK massacre"

What was the names of the Polish historians?

The problem is... that until now, you have not presented any serious sources only informations from one documentary film, which is considered as controversial in Poland and in Lithuania.

In the context of "Relations with Lithuanians" - You also forget to write more about the Lithuanian Police and Lithuanian military units (like that of Povilas Plechaviczius), Lithuanian Schutz-Staffel (SS) Legion etc. which murdered (together with Germans) AK-Soldiers and civilians.--Witkacy 19:41, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I didn't wrote names/leaders of all organisations as well, you never can write all the info and such; besides, there was no Lithuanian SS division, there were plans to create one but certain Lithuanian military leaders did not want this and avoided this by closing down certain then autonomous local units when the possibility of them to be integrated into SS and other German units arose. Your mention of Lithuanian SS kinda debunks your credibility however. But I did mentioned the organisations' actions in article: which was supposedly further spurred by actions of certain Lithuanian military units which were fighting against AK and are also accused of killing civilians (therefore some of the AK actions might have been direct retalliations to actions of these groups, or to actions of Lithuanian collaborators; and vice-versa - some of actions of these groups were done as retalliation for AK actions). . I cannot access Polish sources myself as I don't speak Polish, however you might ask user Lysy, he is Polish and he said he has such sources. I found info in Lithuanian that Polish historians says 20-27 and Lithuanian historians 200 however. Also it is mentioned i article Dubingiai, which was not created by me (you can see in history that I haven't done any edit there), and some other places of wikipedia, also not by me. You might want to ask in History of Vilnius or History of Lithuania as more people including ones who are able to speak Polish and ths cite Polish sources are there.DeirYassin 20:11, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Policies to take into account: Wikipedia:Verifiability, Wikipedia:Cite sources, Wikipedia:Confirm queried sources, Wikipedia:Reliable sources and Wikipedia:No original research. About R. Bružas movie - are there any English reviews? At the very least, an entry in the Internet Movie Database would allow us to confirm its existence. For books, even Lithuanian (or Polish) ones they shoud have ISBN number. Articles should have ISSN number. Of course, authors, publisher, date are welcome as well. Email, usenet of various forum links are not very helpful, and webpages not backed up with academic works are also higly disputable. I hope that DeirYassin using above info can provide us with sources to back his statements - so far we have one 'controversial' film not backed by any academic publications. We can hardly write in our article 'However, one controversial documentary film claims that...'. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 21:35, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Unfortunately, it doesnt seems that IMDB would include new Lithuanian films, even such famous film as Vienui Vieni doesnt has it's article. But do you really doubt the existance of film itself? Polish links were also guven by Witkacy which confirms existance of the film. It is not an orginal resaearch my part of article, I just cited Bružas's investigation as source because if it wouldn't be cited, people would doubt where the 500 figure is from. If you'll know any other sources, e.g. would find some Polish historian's article who would claim that only for example 30 civilians were killed by AK, you would be welcome to add it also nearby as another source. My goal isn't to create any biased things, but rather to provide more info, and that AK is controversial in Lithuania is a fact, the articles, the fact that such movie was created and that there were controversial reactions towards it, etc. prooves it too. I try to write down reasons for this controversy and such. There also was a book by A. Bubnys about Armia Krajowa in Lithuania (info about it here http://news.mireba.lt/ml/191/rytu_L.htm ). This book is not controversial like film so if I'll have time I'll translate this too maybe, as it provides some info about Dubingiai massacre too. Unfortunately, due to lack of internetisation of Lithuania probably, ISBN number is hard to find online. DeirYassin 21:49, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Also although I try my best to confirm what I say, I think it is wrong to ask for too much English evidence here, because it is a very local issue, neither Lithuania nor Poland aren't English-speaking as native language (and due to history, in both countries levels of people knowing English are lower than in western Europe I guess), any films or books about this issue, or newspaper articles would most likely be either in Lithuanian or Polish, and available just in those countries, therefore, (almost) no international opinions. That is one of the major points why it is needed in wikipedia however: we are probably creating the first English information about the issue in the internet; I hope it will be as neutral as possible. DeirYassin 21:56, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)

So.. we have a controversial film (called by a Lithuanian publicist a "provocation"), no names of historians, no other sources, no links on google or altavista and a book without an ISBN number :)

"My goal isn't to create any biased things"

Hmm.., you are using sources like this: [1] " ("It was forbidden to speak Lithuanian [in Poland] publicly until 1950 (by phone as late as 1990).", "The Stalinist Polonisation of the Vilnius territory had begun and was more brutal than that of the Poles during their occupation") - Fantasy stories ;)--Witkacy 22:08, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Well, despite of what is your opinion about Lithuanians, they are not brainwashed or such, so as many people as many opinions. I personally heard both positive and negative opinions about this movie too, including when I was searching for info. However, the fact is that Polish newspaper chose negative opinion to recite - and Veidas is conservative magazine which is quite russophobic and frequently sees Russian provocations/conspiracy at things. I didn't wrote that source myself, just gave a link to it. The point of talk pages is to decide what is truth, so everything's discussable. Name of historian who decided that AK did genocide is Kazimieras Garšva, name of historian who wrote book on AK is A. Bubnys, etc. and I am quite sure if I'd speak Polish I'd find you information on Polish sources too. And book(s) (I believe there were three as I get three release dates, 1991, 1995 and 1999 at different places) have an ISBN number of course, just that, for now, I don't know it, but I'll see if I'll be able to find out more info. DeirYassin 22:16, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)


View from the Polish side

Here is a link to an article with some information from the Polish viewpoint ([2] link). It is an overview of relations between Poles and Lithuanians during the war. It also discusses the role of Armia Krajowa.

A very informative article, but here I will (roughly) translate only the relevant passage:

There exists only one documented case where Armia Krajowa members responded with murder on Lithuanian civilians, in retaliation for the murder of Polish civilians. This happened in the Lithuanian village of Dubinki, whose inhabitants were killed in retaliation for the killing by Lithuanians of the Polish inhabitans of the village Glinciszki. These incidents have been acknowledged as criminal and condemned recently by representatives both of Poles and Lithuanians.

Except for this one case - which at any rate was not in accordance with the policies of Armia Krajowa High Command but was an initiative "from below" by the local unit commander - Armia Krajowa never acted against Lithuanian civilians or national independence organisation. However, it did fight against those who collaborated with Soviet and German occupiers. It sometimes happened that Lithuanians were victims of such actions. However, these cannot be considered anti-Lithuanian acts, as for example in the General Govenrment Armia Krajowa executed Poles guilty of such collaboration. Balcer 00:38, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)

"This happened in the Lithuanian village of Dubinki, whose inhabitants were killed in retaliation for the killing by Lithuanians of the Polish inhabitans of the village Glinciszki."

So.. :)

  • 1) it was not a genocide on Lithuanians
  • 2) it was a retaliation for murdered (about 40 people see: IPN [3] and [4] and PWN Encyclopedia [5], [6]) Poles in Glinciszki (killed by the Lithuanian Police - almost women and children [7])
  • 3) it was an initiative by a local unit commander
  • 4) The victims of Dubinki were Lithuanian policeman (Nazi-Collaborators) and their families (see above PWN Encyclopedia)
  • 5) the action has nothing to do with the "conflict over Vilnius region" or "polonization"
  • 6) is that of such importance? (1/6 of the AK-article is about the relations with Lithuanians..) but for example nothing about Ponary where 100 000 Poles and Jews were killed by Lithuanian police and German units.--Witkacy 00:02, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)
The article on Armia Krajowa is still in the "stub" stage so it is difficult to argue about lengths of various sections. Obviously relations with Lithuanians are a minor issue in the history of an organisation which counted hundreds of thousands of members all over Poland, and concerned itself primarily with fighting the Germans and resisting the Soviets. Still, there ought to be a section on the relatively uknown operations of Armia Krajowa in areas of Eastern Poland, where the Poles were not necessarily the overwhelming majority of the population, and hence to the conflict with the Nazi Germans was added the smaller but still significant conflict with other local nationalities. As part of that chapter, the Dubinki massacre should be mentioned, in a proper context. On the other hand, the way the article is now, this massacre and relations with Lithuanians in general are given too much prominence. Balcer 00:38, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Witkacy - you just read Polish view and adopted that it is fully right, however, history is not like that and all views should be mentioned as Wikipedia is neutral; you cannot read just what you want to read. So, this massacre is the only one Poles admit, and that is mentioned in article, from Lithuanian side there are larger claims by historians I already mentioned. (K. Garšva, A. Bubnys), also, wherether it was intiated by local units or higher command is also doubted. I think the current way the part is written as neutral as possibkle, because both points of view are mentioned. The claims on numbers of deaths as well as who were killed is disputed too. What is disputed is mentioned in article as such and both views are given.
  • Balcer - I agree with you. Wikipedia articles cannot be written at once and yet that doesn't means they should be written starting from the most important parts; they are written from what the editors know. Full article about AK will include lots more info about other AK operations, while Relations to Lithuanians section probably won't be expanded much anymore, so the proportions will be different.DeirYassin 05:41, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Also, there is quite much information about it in Lithuanian, I don't have time to translate everything however; but it is not discution here on who was right or such, or which facts are right. I think enough has been said to proove that both opinions exist (if you want more names, there is also Algimantas Liekis who claims about AKs attempts to disturb Lithuania's seeks for independence because then Lithuania would claim Vilnius region). In the article both sides are represented and both opinions. So I don't see much point in continuing this discution I guess. If you'll want to cite more sources, feel free to do so. If you have any suggestions on what exactly to correct on article, say them (e.g. as there was suggestion to remove word "genocide", which I did). Wikipedia however is not a place for one-sided articles, so it won't be so that only one side would be represented. If there are concerns that AK article is too negative, you might write more in it about some positive things and operations AK done. DeirYassin 10:06, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)


Collected eferences

What I'd like to see is collected in one place: name, title, isbn/etc. and quote/abstracts relevant to this discussion. I think we all have an 'overall' picture, and agree that it can and should be mentioned. Then we can see how many POVs there are, who supports what and write a NPOV paragraph presenting all sides of the argument: X claims that...most Polish historians claim that...etc. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 12:23, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Ok here it is, from Lithuanian side, someone else could do the same list for Polish historians:

  • Rimas Bružas (Journalist, creator of documentary films about historical events): Film "Armija Krajova Lietuvoje. Istorijos Akligatvis" (Armia Krajowa in Lithuania. History's road without exits). Claimed 500 killed Lithuanian civilians, interviewed witnesses and based on documents.
  • Kazimieras Garšva, Rimantas Zizas, A. Šimėnas (Historians): Book "Armija Krajova Lietuvoje" (Armia Krajowa in Lithuania), 1995 (part 1), 1999 (part 2), Vilnijos Draugija, LPKTS, 304 pages, ISBN 9986577292 (source: http://www.mab.lt/mainai1.html ). Based on AK archives found in Bernardinai monastery which documents actions between 1943 to liquidation of AK in 1944 July. Documents, according to the book, prooves that AK had relations to nazis, got weapons from them (in a nazi attempt to "divide and rule" in Vilnius region), followed locals, robbed civilians, were killing active pro-independence Lithuanians.
  • Juozas Lebionka (historian) - article "Vilniškės AK bendradarbiavimo su vokiečiais pirmtakas" (The starter of relations between Vilnian AK and Germans) and few other articles, talks about some person who supposedly started these relations. In the same source it is also talked about many other articles written by some historians, which are also agreeing to this idea. Claims that Dubingiai massacre had 100 deaths, and overally 1000 Lithuanian civilians killed by AK.
  • Juozas Dringelis (signer of independence delcaration, former member of parliament) - citates from AK documents, also supported by book "Geopolitinė Lietuvos padėtis, jos reikšmė Lenkijos ūkiui" ("Geopolitical stance of Lithuania, it's meanin for Polish") - "For that we have to contain Lithuanian claims of Vilnius - it is needed to move borders of Vilnius region westwards, to include Kaunas and it's surroundings", "Current Lithuanian nation has very many features of prehistoric humans. It has flly lost all higher feelings. Dignity, truth, knightism, forgiveness, toughness etc. in Lithuanian society are sounds without meaning". There are more such citates.
  • Arūnas Bubnys - "Fights between Armia Krajowa and Lithuanian militants" talks about 1942-1944 and says that AK Vilnian part was created just to attach Vilnius to Poland.
  • Kęstutis Kasparas another article on this topic from similar standpoint
  • Arvydas Anušauskas (http://www.genocid.lt/Leidyba/13/arvydasa.htm) talks about positive AK role at protecting Poles, talks that conflict was programmed from start, also creation of AK in Vilnius and opposing forces, and why the confrontation started.

And there is info about more articles and opinions themselves, but I guess this will be enough. Other sources for the things mentioned above: http://www.atgimimas.lt/articles.php?id=1113485871 , http://www.xxiamzius.lt/numeriai/2004/07/08/liter_02.html , ttp://www.lki.lt/index.php?asm=305 , etc. Add some Polish sources to the list too if you want DeirYassin 16:59, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC) .

Note also please that these articles doesnt necessarily are saying my views, I just gave them here to show more about this standpoint, as I was asked DeirYassin 17:13, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Its a nice list of polonophobic Lithuanian revisionist "historians" [8]--Witkacy 18:18, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Well, yet again, this opinion exists and is supported by quite much historians of Lithuania, and majority, even Polish historians, accepts that soemthing happened, tjust the scale and such is what is not agreed on. It is always easy to tell "that person is nazi", "that person is anti-something" and such, but these tellings are biased and does not makes information invalid, especially as many of it is based on documents, witnesses accounts and such. It'd be stupid if I'd just e.g. say that all Polish historians who says just one massacre happened are anti-Lithuanian; Wikipedia has NPOV policy, all views and possibilities should be mentioned. DeirYassin 18:23, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)

"Based on AK archives found in Bernardinai monastery which documents actions between 1943 to liquidation of AK in 1944 July. Documents, according to the book, prooves that AK had relations to nazis, got weapons from them (in a nazi attempt to "divide and rule" in Vilnius region), followed locals, robbed civilians, were killing active pro-independence Lithuanians." Pls stop to produce more and more NPOV based on lies.--Witkacy 18:33, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Well, but it is not said as truth. I am not saying "AK collaborated with nazis" - this would be POV. I just said what historians and what investigations/books led to what decitions, this is normal as per Wikipedia rules. Nobody can say if the books are right or wrong, but what I said about those books is a fact. Instead of ranting or reverting, you could add similar Polish sources e.g. "But historian XY in his book "somename" claims that it was so and so") - this would be productive update. I written myself that Poles disagrees with this info and that there are other opinions, I gave examples of some, but I can't read in polish so it's up to other Wikipedia users to present more of those opinions with sources. Deleting of whole section you disagree with is not exactly Wikipedian way DeirYassin 18:39, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Written about that some Poles claims that these Lithuanians who says these things are anti-Polish, I hope that will make things more clear if you are afraid that someone would get only Lithuanian point of view. Is that right/encyclopedic?DeirYassin 18:52, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)

AFAIK AK in Vilnius region DID carry negotiations with Nazis at the end of the war, but DID NOT enter into any sort of special relations. However, NKVD DID prepared falsified documents etc to discredit AK Szopen 06:56, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)
You could provide more info about it in article maybe, like reasons and such, and also later NKVD propaganda? That probably would need a seprate paragraph in article though as it is not exactly relations with Lithuanians DeirYassin 07:25, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Relations with Lithuanians 2

There was a large Lithuanian minority in Wilno Voivodship (see Vilnius region for details) and at some places they constitued majority. Relations between Lithuanians and Poles were strained during almost all interwar period due to the conflict over Vilnius region and Suvalkai region. Armia Krajowa's ideas of Polish state included Vilnius region. Armia Krajowa committed at least one massacre of Lithuanian civilians, including women and children, at Dubingiai (Polish historians claims 20-27 as number of kills, Juozas Lebionka claims 100, some other Lithuanian historians claims 200). The scale of other killings is not agreed on also. There is an estimation of investigator Rimas Bružas of about 500 killed Lithuanian civilians overally, estimation of Juozas Lebionka says 1000; some Polish historians claims there were no other masscares except one at Dubingiai. Many of the opinions are supported by AK documents found in Bernardinai monastery, which describes AK actions between 1943 and 1944; however, some very differing opinions are based on same documents. What is also not agreed on is the reason for these killings: some historians tends to accuse Armia Krajowa of seeking to lower the number of Lithuanians in Vilnius region for purposes of further polonization of region. Other historians tends to claim that the killings were not a planned thing, and were more related to general dislike of Lithuanians by some people in AK ranks, which was supposedly further spurred by actions of certain Lithuanian military units which were fighting against AK and are also accused of killing civilians (therefore some of the AK actions might have been direct retalliations to actions of these groups, or to actions of Lithuanian collaborators; and vice-versa - some of actions of these groups were done as retalliation for AK actions). Some historians claim, based on same documents, that the fight between Lithuanian militants and AK was purposefully spurred by nazis by giving weaponry to both sides (sources: book Armia Krajowa in Lithuania, ISBN 9986577292 ). Cause of these reasons AK, despite of it's actions in saving Poles of Vilnius, same as Soviet partisans, are considered to be controversial organisations in today's Lithuania. ---

Moved everything deleted from article by user Witkacy from the main article back there, as it was already agreed here by themajority as far as I understand that the relations are worth mentioning. Now I written it as neutraly as possible, by providing different opinions with different sources. If you know any other sources and other, yet unmentioned, opinions, please tell them, they will be added too. If you don't however, and just remove the portion because it doesn't fits with your point of view, then that shouldn't be done, it's a disruption. DeirYassin 18:19, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The above text is written in a very poor English and I am afraid it needs to be rewritten to be understandable - thus it cannot be included in our present article. On the other hand, I would like to stress here that I agree with DearYassin and Balcer that *some* note of this must be included in the text. I dont think that the above text is accepable. Besides being poor English, it contains too many weasel words: 'many, some, other historians'. References collected above are a good start and should be used to source every accusation in the above text. We also need Polish references. There should also be an explanation of why this matter is controversial. I won't have time to do much on Wiki until 3rd May, so I will constribute to our discussion here afterwards. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:57, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Ok, I agree with you that it needs more Polish references and that my English is not good. I hope you will be able to find/provide those references and will correct some of the things. I say "some Polish historians" because I do not know who exactly, it should be easier for you to find as you know Polish. I would like to invite everybody to contribute positive changes to this article, I mean, providing more sources and such. And there is no factual inacurracies in the article now BTW: I did not written in the article something like "AK dealt with nazis" or "AK massacred many Lithuanians", but just say what some people said, and it is truth that they said that. If it would be written in article that e.g. some early US presidents made racistic remarks, it would be truth, but it wouldn't mean that blacks really are as these remarks would say or such. And you can and if you know, should add more information about Polish opinion. But both opinions can and should (as Wikipedia is neutral) coexist, there is no need to delete Lithuanian opinion either as that would be POV. I hope after May 3rd this article will get better, or that someone else will improve it and neutralise it even more before that DeirYassin 19:04, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)
The quality of English is not that much of a problem, as it can be easily improved by other editors. I have a problem with the whole style: Professor X on the Lithuanian side said this, professor Y on the Polish side said that. This approach misses the point of Wikipedia and misuderstands the nature of the NPOV idea, in my opinion. The point is not to list opposing and sometimes extreme views in parallel, but rather to hammer out some kind of compromise.
DeirYassin, I notice than in your approach you often list a bunch of opinions, and then you cover yourself with the disclaimer that these are not necessarily your views. This makes arguing with you somewhat frustrating. Please, why don't you simply write what YOU think? You have read the sources, you understand the issues, trust yourself. Wikipedia is created by users themselves, not users assembling the opinions of others and listing them without any judgement as to their quality. If you do this, we can have an argument with you, and not some Lithuanian historians we unfortunately never heard of and cannot read. Balcer 19:19, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I actually do write my opinion most of ime, same was here previously, and I think it was more neutral maybe. Now however I was asked for more sources and such at this article, so now I tried my best to write only somone else's opinion and thought this way it wouldn't be disputed that much as I didnt claimed that any opinion is truth. I think maybe references could be deleted, and e.g. it could just say something like "up to 1000 Lithuanians died" (or maybe average 500 figure) "20-200 Civilian Lithuanians killed in Dubingiai depending on various claims". But well, then, yet again, some people will say that this is without evidence or without source, that is why I included it into article. I hope eventually decition will be reached and they could be removed or written separately bellow article. Why I posted even articles I dont agree with is that I was asked for references from various historians and who thinks what by Piotrus; I provided what I was asked for. I have some doubts myself over some things however, e.g. AK and nazi relations, but well, if these views are used to support things in article, then they all should be fully mentioned. DeirYassin 19:35, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Ok, now we are getting somewhere. You have doubts about AK and Nazi relations, other participants in this discussion reject this out of hand and are deeply offended by the accusation. So, why should this idea which none of us supports be in the article? I have removed it.
Next on the agenda: reasons for the killings. Please, let us know what you think the reasons for the killings were. Balcer 21:28, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)
The following is my opinion and I do not say that it should be icnluded in article, I say it just because I was asked to. In my opinion it is naive to think that during those years, which were violent in general, AK did not kill any or almost any civilians. As for numbers, I'd think myself that 500 might be most realistic maybe, given the existing documents, witnesses accounts and such. As for reasons I think myself basically what was written previously in article, that it was spurred by general dislike between Poles and Lithuanians especially in the Vilnius region at the time so therefore there (IMO) were violence towards Lithuanian civilians more than towards other civilians. Which was maybe attributed by knowing that some Lithuanians fight against AK, and therefore e.g. if Lithuanians kills some AK fighter their friends might have attacked Lithuanians at some village. Now there exists evidence also taht AK wanted to attach Vilnius to liberated Poland. I don't know however if that was orders from above or actions of some local units or orders from some local leaders - very hard to say here (I think however that later two are more likely. Maybe it was some generic order from high command like not to allow Lithuanians to take too much control in the area, which was interpreted this way by some local leaders or units - again, this is just my guess, Im not claiming it was so), I think different opinions should be given at some places where they differ much by both sides, because well, we are 4 or 5 people here discussing it, and some of opinions shared by considerable number of people might not be supported by any of us but that does not make them less viable. And, yet again, this was my personal opinion. DeirYassin 07:25, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)
In general the reason why I am reluctant to post my own opinion because that contradicts Wikipedia's rules as I understand, it is original research. We are not discussing here who is right, I am quite sure we wouldn't ever reach compromise on this because opinions and claims are simply too different; instead, we are discussing on what to put in the article. And article can represent several opinions too in cases where opinions are too different to *merge* them, in those cases it is more NPOV to leave a few opinions I'd guess. But that is my opinion lol.DeirYassin 08:42, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Thanks for the comment. Now we can have a more reasonable discussion, hopefully. First, the numbers of victims. In situations like this, these are often very difficult to establish to the satisfaction of both sides. For now, I would have no problem with a compromise listing the claims of Polish and Lithuanian historians as to the number killed side by side. Of course this is subject to verification, if the Lithuanian historians you are quoting turn out to be unreliable or extreme in their views. This is the problem: we who don't speak Lithuanian and don't follow Lithuanian historiography have a great deal of difficulty in determining which of them are reliable and which are not. Just so that I don't seem to be picking on Lithuanians, I can only tell you that I consider some Polish "historians" to be highly unreliable or very heavily biased.
Still, I am puzzled. You write I don't know however if that was orders from above or actions of some local units or orders from some local leaders. To me and most likely the other editors involved here, the notion that the Armia Krajowa High Command ordered the extermination of the Lithuanian minority in the Vilno region is totally incredible and highly offensive. This is probably the main reason why the disputed tag has been attached. Given that nobody involved in this discussion strongly believes such an "ethnic cleansing" was ordered from above, we should not be including this view in the discussion. I have made the necessary change, which reflects what seems to be a concensus view here.
Anyway, over the weekend I will go to my university library, find more of the relevant sources, and try to expand the section on the operations of Armia Krajowa in the Wilno region. Stay tuned. Balcer 18:27, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)
As I said afterwards, that IMO other two theories were more likely than the first one (other two being local ruler's decition or decition of particular soldiers/groups of soldiers), so maybe it is ok to remove that then. As for historians, I put the estimations which I could fin donline, being 500 and 1000 for whole killings, and 100 to 200 in Dubingiai. As for Kazimieras Garšva, from what I heard about him from other places, he is accused by Poles of being anti-Polish sometimes, but these estimations are not from him. Maybe I think Bružas would be the most reliable of those (just in my opinion), because it is most known and also did other such investigations of historical events and said he was going through documents and witnesses and such for 4 years, and he's quite known independent journalist. But that is just my opinion of course. DeirYassin 19:16, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)


As a sidenote: in your previous comment you are most certainly referring to the Operation Ostra Brama. Halibutt 11:35, Apr 29, 2005 (UTC)


After such longf discussion we ahve a very biased text, which even does not contain the word

GLINCISZKI (Glitiškes). Lithuanians cooperated with Germans, I understand it partially, but it's not the reason to rewrite the history of WWII.

Xx236 10:56, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

AK is NOT "the largest underground resistance army during WWII"

This statement, "The Home Army, the largest underground resistance army during World War II, formed the armed wing of what subsequently became known as the "underground state", is not true. The most eminent, well-known underground resistance army, which operated during WWII is the Yugoslavian National Liberation Army or People's Liberation Army of Yugoslavia (see the article at in Wiki, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partisans_%28Yugoslavia%29, and at least the external reference herein). The estimate of real guerillas (not just the elusive "membership", used in that "article" ) is app. 300 thousands at the end of 1943 and app. 600 thousands at the end of 1944. Of course, the real deeds of the YNLA and its role are incomparable with that of the Armia Krajowa (with is, besides, not a monolith organization, as claimed in the sentence "resistance army"). If not take the definitions too strictly, the partisans of Belarus, could be thought a resistance army, however based not on national(istic) grounds. The number of real figters in Belarus (1944) was 143 thousands and 250 thousands of reserve (123 thousands of them were armed). Of course, their activity (estimated 500 000 nazi troops and collaborates were shot-up) again incomparable with that of the AK, especially if one compares the population of the countries (data from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Soviet_Encyclopedia). The activity, relative number of real fighters and the role of the Greek guerillas are (personal opinion) also exceeds that parameters of AK. Please, authors of that article, check the data and correct the alleged sentence.

Yes, and a short subjective after-word: most poles I have met in my life (except few, but very notable exceptions) were not able to control their "national arrogance" towards all other nations, and couldn't be sober rating their history. I am sorrow, that the venerable Wiki suffers from "historians" of that kind (I meant most articles, considering Polish history). IB

Activity of partisans in Belarus is sometimes very exxagerated, especially when you are reading either soviet or basing on soviet sources (I've read many satyrical jokes bsaed on this: usually many of those "partisan" activities included robbing local populations and attacking AK units, which then they exxagerated as fighting with fascist - great example are things like great victory at Koniuchy, where, few dozens of nazi collaborators, such as children and woman, were shot - especially that number: half million of Axis soldiers! Wow! I wonder why I've never spot that figure in any other source!). I don't know enough about guerillas in Greece to comment.
As for our national arrogance, why, it is mainly because we Poles were have God-given right to be sober and arrogant. And seriously, I have met on usenet many English, French and others and I couldn't lose the feeling that they all are arrogant !@!$#@ who are treating me like white Europeans were treating blacks in Africa in XIX century. WOw! It talks! It's hard not to develop some thick-skin in such circumstances.
But you are probably right about YNLA so I will change the sentence to "one of biggest resistance movements". And BTW AK was the army. Hence the name. Armia Krajowa. Home Army. Legally considered armed forces of Polish-government-in-exile in Poland.

Szopen 13:51, 9 May 2005 (UTC)

As a footnote to what Szopen wrote (well said, pal), probably YLA and the Home Army had similar numbers, I can't judge which had more members at which point. However, it is to be noted that the Ak was nowhere near that successful in liberating its own territory. Mostly because the Yugoslav resistance did not have to fight the Soviets as well, but still the fact remains that the Tito's partisans were far more successful in 1944 and 1945. Whether stronger in numbers - I don't know. Halibutt 14:01, May 9, 2005 (UTC)
Just ignore such anon provocateurs... i guess "IB" is a sockpuppet - one of the known polophobe users :)--Witkacy 15:22, 9 May 2005 (UTC)
I had a similar discussion some weeks ago on Talk:Polish September Campaign. Anon has a point - 'the biggest/most powerful' is POVed. However, 'one of the biggest/most powerful' is certainly right. EOT. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 16:12, 9 May 2005 (UTC)

As an NPOV compromisse I propose the next statement: "The Home Army, ONE of the largest underground MOVEMENT during World War II, have formed the armed wing of the "underground state" (państwo podziemne), officially represented by the goverment-in-exile.

( became known as the "underground state" (państwo podziemne) - it is a national POV, the goverment-in-exile is the known concept).

The changes, which are based mainly on logical grounds (make it better concerning style and subject) revises the next logical points: 1. It is ONE of the largest...

Agreed Szopen 11:56, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
And applied. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 13:54, 10 May 2005 (UTC)

2. MOVEMENT, but not army - it was became an army only in '44, but the article claims that it is functioned as army from '39. Explain, how AK as army was active before '44 (in other words except Operation Tempest) againist the nazi troops. This explanation is very important for the whole article and it is now missing. Without such explanations the number of 150 000 shot-up nazi troops is highly unreliable, because of very short actual time span - half year only)

AK was the army. Examples of activity: Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (fights of one unit inside ghetto, actions on bonifraterska (sp?) etc. Since 1943 it organised partisan units. Despite, AK would still be army EVEN if it had not made any military actions. Army does not cease being army just because it's not active in some period of time, isn't it? It was army because it was officially called army, because it's member had officers, subofficers, because officers and subofficers were trained, because all members were swearing military oath and had military commander responsible to Polish government-in-exile Szopen 11:56, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
Perhaps calling it a 'partisan army' would clarify the matter? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 13:54, 10 May 2005 (UTC)

3. "undeground state" could be included only as a particular specification, tied to the more known concept. Again, for NPOV, you should do a reference to Armia Ludowa (associated with the liftish forces, the moral clients of the USSR), and create that article (including the communication between AK and AL). The lack of knowlege about the real deeds of the AK except Operation Tempest and about its evolution is the serious defects of the article. The wlole article is seriously "POV-ed" from national (in other words internal) point of view (sorry for calembour). I am not pole as the most people in the world and I am intersted in "external" point of view, which means the connection of AK to the overal political processes, its influence by the west etc. I recognize, that it is not so easy to change the POV globally, but it should be done. IB

AL activity was abysmal. AK did carried sabotage, had military intelligence, had propaganda unit (including sections dealing with sabotage and propaganda and intelligence INSIDE Germany - even in Berlin). AK usually did not enforce fighting since it was army, not bunch of armed bandits, hence it even ordered Hubal unit to disband because of repercursions it may cause to civilians. OTOH, AL didn't care about civialians. AK usually allowed actions which were direct reactions to Nazis activity (e.g. actions during deportations of Zamojszczyzna or fights with Ukrainians as reactions to Vohlyn massacres etc etc ). Operation Tempest is largest and best known AK action. Some of them, in Polish, are listed here : [9]

Note that htis list of 106 actions is just chosen: the same page informs us that KEDYW alone made at list 407 actions. Effects of those actions is close to 7.000 destroyed or damaged locomotives, 38 blowed up bridges, desoyted 28 aircrafts, more than 500 cars, more than 19.000 train cars _before_ the "Tempest". Some of AK duties were to fight armed bands, which were tolerated by Nazis, and which robbed and terrorised local population in some areas. Some of these bands were under nominal leadership of AL.Szopen 11:56, 10 May 2005 (UTC)

I believe all resistance movement besides AL were linked in main body, added link to AL article in See also. Also, noted in lead that AK was the dominant resistance movement in Poland. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 13:54, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
As to the actual number of combat-ready partisan troops, it is extremely hard to judge. After 1939 there was a number of Polish Army units that were left behind the lines and simply found their reffuge in the forests. Other units were acting mostly as urban guerilla and were being prepared for an open conflict (see Operation Tempest). Yet other group of people (usually estimated at ca. 50.000 at the end of 1941), the co-called leśni (forest people) were mnostly composed of people who had to retreat to the forests because of Nazi and Soviet terror. They formed the core of the future army as they had to fight for their lives against German units (both Wehrmacht and SS). Among the best known examples of such activity was the Jodła inspectorate of the AK (Kielce-Radom, Swietokrzyskie Hills area), where the countryside was effectively controlled by the AK back in 1943, while only the cities were held in German hands.
Finally, as pointed above, there were units of the Home Army that were conducting armed raids on German facilities and sabotage. These were not acting openly as the German retaliation would be too harsh for the civilians (collective responsibility...), but still had lots of successes in disrupting the German supply lines for the Eastern Front. Among such units was Kedyw and then Wachlarz.
Other thing is that there already is an article on Polish Secret State and the very term does not seem POV at all to me. It's simply a historical name for quite a unique phenomenon in the scale of the world: a state without a territory, but with all institutions of a modern state, including press, courts, parliament, government, police, armed forces and so on. Halibutt 12:35, May 10, 2005 (UTC)
A very interesting subject, which definetly deserves much expantion. Although - wouldn't 'Polish Underground State' (Google 2,470 hits) be a better translation of 'Polskie państwo podziemne' then 'Polish Secret State' (104 hits including wiki and mirrors)? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 13:54, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
Perhaps yes. On the other hand, the term was coined by Jan Karski in his (English language) book Story of a Secret State, which was has not been translated to Polish until after the war. That's why I decided to promote the "original" name over the more common translation. Feel free to move it though, as both translations seem equally correct to me. Halibutt 20:04, May 10, 2005 (UTC)

NPOV dispute

Could someone enlighten me what is actually disputed here? Isn't it high time we removed the NPOV tag from the text and corrected the article if there is a need to do so?

Also, it seems that the Lithuanian part is the most disputed. Perhaps we could simply migrate it to a separate article (say Armia Krajowa in Lithuania or something similar) and continue to work on it there? Halibutt 12:46, May 22, 2005 (UTC)

I don't think we should move it anywhere; maybe there could be a link to a "main article" like that, but that is only if somebody will write a more detailed information about AK in Lithuania, which would be too long to keep here. If we'd start creating new articles for every section, then nothing would remain in this article, e.g. AK relations with Jews, List of major operations and such would also go to new articles. But the usual practice is to write some info in main article, and if there is more info about that subject than create an additional article on that sub-subject with link from the subject article ("Main article: Armia Krajowa in Lithuania"). Now I think the disputed tag maybe could be removed and things left as is, because there weren't any discutions on this topic for a long time. DeirYassin 13:53, 22 May 2005 (UTC)
Ok, I'm removing the tag. As to the Lithuanian and Jewish parts - I still believe these topics are rather a sidenote to the article, not the main part of it. Any ideas what to do with it? Halibutt 18:52, May 22, 2005 (UTC)

Pics

I'm starting the gallery of new pics. So far only one uploaded, but there will be much more of them. See the Talk:Polish September Campaign and Talk:Warsaw Uprising for other galleries of recently-uploaded pics --Halibutt 12:39, May 30, 2005 (UTC)

Gallery removed while archiving, due to fair use... only applicable on main namespace, not on talk namespace. thadius856talk|airports|neutrality 16:24, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

copyright violation?

The sections "Origins", "Structure" and "relations with jews" are almost literally translated from "The Encyclopeia of the Holocaust", an Hebrew Encyclopedia published in Israel by Yad Vashem and a private publishung house - "Sifriat Poalim". As much as this translation violates copyrights, those sections need reediting. Almog 05:51, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

Intelligence work

It seems like the section 'Operations' should at least mention some of the intelligence work done by the AK, since up until Burza that was its main activity. I remember reading (will try to look up the source) that supposedly 80% of the Allies' information about German war production came from the AK (through forced laborers). A paragraph or two on Operations Most II and III - the recovery of tested V2 rockets, and the intelligence work with regard to V1 and V2 in general would be nice. I'm new to this Wiki thing so I hesitate to do it myself. radek 12:04, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

Welcome to Wiki. Don't be afraid to edit, be bold! Some information about Most operations and such are at Polish contribution to World War II, don't hesitate to copy any material to expand AK article. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 16:40, 4 August 2005 (UTC)
Thanks for the encouragment. Here's what I have on the AK and the V-1 and V-2 so far: Home Army and V1 and V2. I hesitate to put it into the article (is this the right place for it?) as it is too long (though the article I think is too short...) it could use editing and I need to Wikifiy it. radek 11:21, 12 August 2005 (UTC)
Good job. For starters, make sure it [linked] from related articles. Wikifying is quite easy, read links from welcome I posted on your talk page for a turorial on that. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:29, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

Relations with Lithuanians references?

Unless references are provided to back this section, I think it should be removed from the article, possibly moved here until the time proper references are provided. All controversial additions should have a source, and this is without a doubt a controversial issue. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 20:30, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

I believe that the two articles on the PWN encyclopedia are worth noting.
  • [10] Glinciszki, Glitiškes, a village in Lithuania, to the NW of Niemenczyn. In the interbellum within the Polish borders; 1941-44 under German occupation; On June 20, 1944, a patrol of the 5th Home Army Brigade under Łupaszko had a skirmish against Lithuanian police unit, in which 4 Lithuanians were killed; as a reprisal 100-men-strong unit of Lithuanian police from Podbrzezie murdered 38 Poles. As a consequence, the 5th Brigade, against the order of the Commander of the Wilno Home Army Area, on June 23 committed a reprisal action on the village of Dubinki, where 27 Lithuanians were killed. For the murders of Glinciszki and Dubinki the HQ of the Wilno Area, wishing to avoid further blood spill, replied with a demonstration of power of the AK units between 25 and 29 of June of 1944 (no arms were used
  • [11]Dubinki, Dubingiai, a town in Lithuania, N of Wilno, at the Dubinki lake. A 14th century town remnants, in the interbellum within the borders of Lithuania, a summer residence of president A. Smetona; 1941-44 under German occupation. On June 23, 1944, a reprisal action (the only such action in Lithuania) of the 5th AK Brigade took place there against the orders of the Commander of the Wilno AK Area, against the Lithuanian policemen (and their families), the ones to take part in the murder of Glinciszki; 27 people perished
This sums up pretty well the common knowledge. What are the exact reasons behind the higher death toll estimates? Not that I wanted to downgrade the suffering of anyone or anything, but simply there is a huge difference between 27 victims and 1000 victims... Halibutt 14:19, 6 November 2005 (UTC)
Yes, I've also seen the 38 and 27 figures in other sources and have never seen thousand mentioned. OTOH I don't quite follow the PWN logics in AK responding with a demonstration of power to the Dubinki murder ? --Lysy (talk) 14:39, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

A comment on the side: I have a translation of an article "Armia Krajowa murdered Vilnians" by Pranė Dundulienė from "Voruta" magazine, 13-14, 1991. It is an account of a Lithuanian witness of how Vilnius was liberated by Armia Krajowa. First she describes of how they were hiding in the basement together with the Poles. Then a group of armed men with white-red bands appeared. They were looking for Lithuanian men. They found four. One of them was saved by the Polish women from the basement. The remaining 3 were shot on spot. Of course the witness could not be sure if the murders were from Armia Krajowa, but they were wearing Polish emblems and spoke Polish. OTOH she was surprised (shocked) as she recognized one of her Lithuanian neighbours among the Poles. --Lysy (talk) 15:44, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

Piotr Łossowski in "Litwa", Warszawa 2001, ISBN 83-85660-59-3 p. 187 writes that Lithuanian police murdered 39 Polish civilians, including children, in Glinciszki on June 20th 1944 . In retaliation, the commander of 5th Brigade of AK, Zygmunt Szendzielarz, murdered 27 Lithuanians, including women and children in Dubinki, on the Lithuanian side of the border. This was the single and sole case in AK history according to Roman Krab-Żebryk, a researcher of the subject quoted by Łossowski. --Lysy (talk) 16:12, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

Almost the same facts can be found in "Litwa na przestrzeni wieków i jej powiązania z Polską by Jerzy Żenkiewicz, Mikołaj Kopernik University 2001, ISBN 83-231-1240-1. He also mentions that the Glinciszki massacre was an act of retaliation for the death of 4 Lithuanian policemen killed in action. He gives exactly the same numbers as Łossowski (39 and 27 respectively) and gives June 23rd as the date of Dubniki murder. --Lysy (talk) 16:19, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

After such long discussion we have a very biased text, which even does not contain the word Glinciszki (Glitiškes).Lithuanians cooperated with Germans, I understand it partially, but it's not the reason to rewrite the history of WWII. Xx236 10:56, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

Lithuania collaborated with the Nazis and the Home Army acted for the Allies. What about Sauguma police and Ponary mass executions? The conflict cannot be reduced to national reasons. Xx236 12:00, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

A quote from the article: "This was supposedly further provoked by actions of some Lithuanian military units which were fighting against AK and who in turn were accused of murdering Polish civilians. Therefore some of the alleged AK actions might have been direct retaliation to the actions of Lithuanian groups, the police, or other Lithuanian Nazi collaborators". So it indeed mentions the influence of Lithuanian actions on AK actions and vice-versa (but not Ponary). Ponary, however, was commited primarilly by the Germans only with some aid of Lithuanian collaborators (see this article for example); it is not related to the events mentioned in the article.

Your source is about the Holocaust, it doesn't inform about non-Jewish victims. You even don't mention the Paneriai article. If you have better data about the massacre, edit that article. The problems with Lithuanians deserve about 1% of the HA article. Either the section should be shortened or the whole article enlarged. Xx236 07:32, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

It seems the Paneriai article mentions it this way as well: "Between July 1941 and August 1944 Paneriai became the mass murder site of approximately 100,000 victims, the vast majority of them Jews, many from nearby Vilna. The executions were carried out by German units of SD and SS with help from local Lithuanian police unit Ypatingasis Būrys.". Indeed however, Armia Krajowa was more than organisation related to Jews or Lithuanians - but this does not means the sections should be shortened or deleted but, instead, it means that other sections should be expanded. I believe it is possible to write much more about the positive things the AK did. I am not in Poland nor Lithuania however and my ability to access various books on the topic is limited. The Polish members of Wikipedia, however, could indeed write more about AK history, AK operations, AK leadership and other related topics. D'Italia 07:47, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

People who have provided references here in the talk page ccould you please add them to the article itself? D'Italia 17:18, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

"approximately 70 to 90% of the victims were Jews from nearby Polish and Lithuanian cities, while the rest were mostly members of Polish intelligentsia and Home Army" Paneriai The story about Polish POWs is probably false. Xx236 08:42, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

It was not said that no Polish people were killed in Paneriai. It was said however that the majority (but not all) of those killed were Jews, that the main perpetrators of Paneriai were Germans rather than collaborators and that this is not related to the AK-perpetrated killings (unlike, for example, Glitiskes/Glinciszki, which is related it seems - though I know not much about that particular subject and I base my words only on what Lysy and Halibutt said above in this talk page) and therefore not related to this particular article. These claims are correct. D'Italia 09:46, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Ponary

Not related. While some AK attacks indeed were retalliations for Lithuanian attacks, it was not for Ponary but for other events that are already mentioned. In Ponary mostly Jews were killed BTW.) "mostly", but thousands of non-Jews were also killed. What about the lithuanian Sauguma? Xx236 07:18, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Besides, most of those killed were Poles, regardless of their actual ethnicity. //Halibutt 13:51, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
We are talking about ethnicities here rather than citizenships; the Nazis repressed populations based on their ethnicity. Besides, talking about nationalities in this particular case is very difficult - fact is that in 1939 when Lithuania took control of Vilnius all the local population was given Lithuanian nationality (with the exception of those people who had come from the other parts of Poland during the interbellum, but this was a minority). D'Italia 19:37, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

Collaboration

The issue of supposed collaboration of AK with Germans in Vilnius area was considered as faked by NKVD - what's the position of serious Polish historians about that issue now? Szopen 12:40, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Read a book by Tadeusz Piotrowski, a professor of Sociology of the University of New Hampshire, author of "Poland's Holocaust: Ethnic Strife, Collaboration with Occupying Forces and Genocide in the Second Republic", as well as an extremely pro-KGB "Ukrainian Ethnic Cleansing and Nazi Enslavement; and their emigration to America" and even more pro-KGB "Vengence of the Swallows: Memoir of the Polish Family ordeal under Soviet Aggression". The author happends to be connected to KGB of course, despite being a respected scholar and the critical to Soviet accounts he gives in his book is just to help hide his connection. In Poland's Holocaust he quotes specific examples and memoirs of the AK officers who served in Wilno area. Here are links to the book pages: [12], [13], [14]. Please add the info to the article. I would like too but I am not sure when I can have time to do it myself. --Irpen 16:45, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
In Eastern Poland/Western Ukraine/Belarus one had a strange situation where 4 forces were struggling against each other (Germans, Polish Home Army, Soviet Partisans and Belorusian/Ukrainian nationalists). In this unusual situation, it was to be expected that at various times two groups would enter into ad hoc, temporary local alliances to combat another group. This often happened even against explicit orders from higher command. The principle here was: The enemy of my enemy is my friend. It would be really surprising if such things did not happen. However, while this should be mentioned, it should be kept in the proper perspective. In Western Poland where the Poles were in the majority such local alliances with the Germans were almost unthinkable. Balcer 22:02, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
I fully agree with Balcer. I have no intention to write an entire section on this issue for this article. But I think a brief mention is in order and if anyone wants to write an article on that, elaboration belongs there. --Irpen 22:14, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
In western Poland annexed by the Reich there was not much of a choice. However, in central Poland such "alliances" did take place. In Holy Cross mountains cease fire agreements were quite common, not to mention Polish soldiers buying arms from the Wehrmacht. //Halibutt
Yes, of course there is an exception to every rule. But if I recall correctly, the really significant "alliance" was between the Germans and the NSZ, not the Home Army, and it only developed in the final months of the war when things became very fluid and the Nazi state was collapsing. Of course it is quite likely that local partisan groups and local German forces reached various low-level "live and let live" understandings between themselves. Such often unspoken agreements naturally occur even between soldiers of professional armies, if they fight in static positions. As for buying arms from the Wehrmacht, that is in a different category altogether, of course. Balcer 00:38, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

As to what Halibutt wrote: Yes, and still I have no intention to write a separate project called "Collaboration between of the Home Army with the Nazis" and append it to the article (sounds familiar, anyone?). Similarly, at least for now, I have no intention to write a separate article on that, while it is certainly encyclopedic. I thought the passing mention of the issue with a ref is just exactly as much as is needed and chose to add a short sentence to the existing section which seemed to me the most appropriate one (Lithuania). I hope my addition, even if modified, would survive as well as the controversy about the relationship with Jews. Yes, the AK was not anti-Semitic, but some of its members were. Where all them just former NZS members who switched to AK? Possibly so. Do we need a paragraph or even a section on the murders of the Jews here? No! Not until someone wants to write an article on the issue out of the section.

I hope we are starting to build a tradition of not flooding the broad articles with a narrow details for a POV reasons and will all learn to choose the articles for the information appropriately (or, perhaps, that would stimulate us to start the narrow articles when there is none).

Someone, please move the info about the Brest parade from the Polish September Campaign (wide topic article) to Battle of Brześć Litewski (narrow article). Or, please move the info on Rydz' "Victor's parade" from Kiev Offensive (narrow article I added it to) to Polish-Soviet War (corresponding wider article) or even to History of Poland. I hope, everyone agree that the first option makes more sense. --Irpen 00:46, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

At this point the Brest parade gets exactly one sentence in the Polish September Campaign article. This to me is such a brief mention that I find it hard to understand why you object to it so strongly. And it was not a completely trivial event. Google Print lists at least three books that mention it (search result). I personally do not insist on it staying in the article, but at the same time I do not understand why your objections about it are so strong. Balcer 01:07, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
Again, couldn't agree with Balcer more. If a local collaboration between the forces of some of the local commanders of the Nowogródek Home Army Area (17,000 people at most) deserves a mention in the article on the entire Armia Krajowa (roughly 500,000 people), then why not the parade? //Halibutt 09:34, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

Lithuania cooperated with the Nazis in many forms since the Kaunas pogrom. Poland was an ally, even if after 1943 discriminated by others and tactically some HA troops cooperated with the Nazis. Lithuanians murdered the Poles in Ponary, not Poles - Lithuanians. Xx236 13:52, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Yes, the AK was not anti-Semitic, but some of its members were.

Yes, the SU was not anti-Semitic, but some of its members were. Do we have "Anti-Semitism" section in the Soviet Union article? I doubt very much. Xx236 13:59, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

There are some interesting facts about anti-semitism among Soviet partisants here.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 04:01, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Relations with Lithuanians, revisited

In light of the recent expantion of this section (which is always welcomed), I'd like to ask if somebody (preferably the user who expanded it) could elaborate on the references used. As they are in Lithuanian language I am afraid I cannot verify them. My main issue of concern is whether they are academic - thus were they published in peer reviewed academic journals, who are their authors, are the articles reviewed in English language publication? It would be great if we could get any English language academic citation to back up some of the more controversial statements. Note that one of the sources ([15]) was published in 1989, meaning it was likely affected by the Soviet censorship and control, making it possibly unreliable. Finally, I wonder if there are any Polish sources and what do they say abou this issue?--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 21:56, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

It is problematic to find English articles on AK in Lithuania. This topic is too specific and not very interesting for the world. Mokslo Lietuva is an academic journal. Other ones cited are not academical. Voruta is a paper for Lithuanian history, Atgimimas is one of the most serious papers in Lithuania, XXI amzius has weakest journalists and I will avoid using its publications when possible. 1989 was last year of USSR, and Lithuania already had free press. Atgimimas, paper where it was published was the most popular proindependence paper, it was not under control of government. Besides , this particular article of 1989 is based on undergraund Antigerman Lithuanian paper "Karinės ir politinės žinios" (Military and Political News) of 1944, i.e. it republishes news of 1944. I cannot wait to lay my hands on book AK in Lithuania, where primary sources on AK activity in Lithuania are published. AK crimes in Lithuania is not controversial topic - there is consensus in Lithuanian historiography about that- terror and genocide is fact. Sigitas 22:29, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
this particular article of 1989 is based on undergraund Antigerman Lithuanian paper "Karinės ir politinės žinios" (Military and Political News) of 1944

So these are claims of partisans that fought against Poles? --Molobo 22:46, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

AK crimes in Lithuania is not controversial topic - there is consensus in Lithuanian historiography about that- terror and genocide is fact.

Surely genocide and terror would be noted by historians in Poland ? Murders of Jews and Ukrainians are quite often covered by Polish historians. --Molobo 22:47, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Is the author or authors by any chance involved with Vilnija organisation ?

--Molobo 22:53, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for your quick reply, I have taken the liberty of ilinking some terms that I believe are notable and should have articles of its own. Molobo, if you reply, please remember to 'append' your post to the right with : so we have a thread, a discussion is much easier to follow then. As Molobo notes, this controversy would surely be covered by Polish sources, and likely at least mentioned by some English ones, although it is obvious that it would be of most interest to Lithuanian scholars and readers; on the other hand such sources are most likely to be biased and thus this is why I am asking if we can find any non-L (and preferably non-P) references to back up those claims.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 01:22, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
I don't live in Lithuania therefore I don't have access to libraries where academical publications are stored. I only can provide sources that a publicly available on Internet. Sigitas 12:12, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Cut out part: "German administration was arming Armia Krajowa in Vilnius region. It is documented that commissaire of Vilnius Region Vulff armed Armia Krajowa. In winter of 1941 alone Armia Krajowa received from German administration more than sixty horse carts loaded with guns [1]." One soviet source is not enough for such a claim that if true would turn upside down polish WWII history Mieciu K 22:51, 6 June 2006 (UTC) Mieciu K 22:55, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

60 carts seems like "a lot", although I may be mistaken. What I find dubious here is the date: that AK has recieved the arms as early as 1941. In the sources mentioned at Talk:Soviet partisans in Poland we had estabilished a credible reference (Piotrowski, in English on Google Print: [16], [17], [18]) that do confirm that AK has received some arms and munitions from the German, however it has happened only in Dec'1943, when Germans were feeling the end decided to start cooperation with more extremists elements in Polish resistance. I find it really, really dubious that Germans would want to work with Polish extrimosts as early as 1941. In all of this we are also forgetting an important issue. In most cases the elements of AK that collaborated with Germans where in fact not mainstream AK but Narodowe Siły Zbrojne. NSZ, loyal to endecja, would certainly not be averse to fighting Lithuanians, and some of its units apparently operated with AK and/or were even intergrated into AK structures, thus when commiting attrocities this led to the generalization that it was AK doing them. Sigitas, could you check your sources if the make the distinction between AK and NSZ? While I am sure there were cases of AK commiting violent acts against the Lithuanians, I think the article should clearly state whether this was an exception or the rule. To anybody who has not doen so yet, I'd strongly recommend reading the well referenced article on Soviet partisans in Poland for some additional ideas, concerns and possible sources.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 01:22, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

I also found this information which I recomend to read (it is in Polish) Shares some light on those accusations[19] --Molobo 22:53, 6 June 2006 (UTC)]

And this one [20],[21]

--Molobo 22:55, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Could anyone provide short translation of ot these Polish articles? It is Engish encyclopedia and it is not OK to delete stuff without explanation in English. Sigitas 23:16, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
I did not delet stuff I just moved It to the talk page so we can talk about it. Anyway it is very kind of the NKVD and their polish comrades that during the stalinist times when they tortured, and murdered AK members and created fake evidence of the AK's cooperation with the Nazis they never mentioned those 60 cartloads of wepeons. I wonder why. Mieciu K 23:30, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
As I mentioned earlier, this is indeed a controversial and dubious fact, however we may consider leaving in the article, mentioning that it is mentioned by a single (?) academic (?) Lithuanian source. See also WP:RS for some applicable policies. I sincerly hope we can keep this discussion in a friendly spirit and work together to improve the article.
I will take a look at the Polish articles and try to summarize them for you soon, on that note perhaps you could expand your description above and briefly summarize all of the lithuanian publications so we know what their main point is?--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 01:22, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
1) Gazeta Wyborcza (a fairly respected Polish newspaper - but not academic source), Feb'01, Litewska prokuratura przesłuchuje weteranów AK (Lithuanian prosecutor questioning AK veterans): Some Lithuanian Polonia cites this as an example of antipolonism. A representant of the veterans (who were questioned as witnesses, not as accused) said that they were civil but he resents the accusations (they were questioned about whether they fought with and killed L.). It seemed to be one of many investigations related to the IIWW. Polish ambassador and Lithuanian prosecutor seemed to have reached common ground quickly when L.p. annouced they will investigate a matter of Glinciszki massacre, where Lithuanian partistants killed 38 Polish civilians for the 'crime' of collaboration with AK. Their talks were condemned by Vilnija organization who demands that AK be prosecuted for their crimes. Polish historian Jarosław Wołkonowski replied that Vilnija wants to divert attention from Lithuanian police (Sauguma) which collaborated with Germans during the IIWW. Vilnija presented a list of 238 cases where AK supposedly murdered Lithuanians. Wołkonowski replies that less then 100 were indeed killed by AK, rest were murdered by Soviet partisants or other groups. Other issues are mentioned, including the comment of a Vilnija spokesman that Polish assasins loyal to AK still operate in Lithuania and their threats are one of the reasons he cannot divulge the identities of many of the people who provided him with his information. Wołkonowski stresses there was no organized action by AK against L.'s and any acts were exceptions to the rule. Volnija spokesman replies that all Polish historians are biased and they will obviously deny AK crimes. The article also mentions that Lithuanian view of AK has been twisted by the propaganda of organizations like Vilnija. A Lithuanian historian Arunas Bubnys admits that there were no mass murders by AK (the only exception being Dubinki), but that AK was guilty of some war crimes against individuals or selected families; however any accusations of genocide or widespread actions are false and have an underlying political motive, admiting that one of the motives can be a countereaction to the accusations of widespread German-Lithuanian collaboration. Another Lithuanian historian, Dalia Kuodyte, notes that some new documents indeed give a basis to said that some elements in AK had planned to 'delithuanize Vilnius', however as far as AK actions are concerned in reality we have seen only sporadic excesses not sanctioned by AK main command. That's the end of my summary of article 1): long, but it was an interesting reading.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 01:42, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
2) from GW as above, W Wilnie pojednają się dziś weterani litewskiej armii i polskiej AK (Today in Vilnius veterans of Lithuanian army and AK will forgive each other), by Jacek J. Komar, 1st Sept'04. It seems a common declaration was issued in conciliatory tons. An article from '"Veidas"' alleging AK commited attrocities during the Wilno Uprising is criticized. It also notes that in May 1944 an intense 10-day battle between AK and pro-German Lithuanian units under gen. Povilas Plechavičius, initated by PP forces who undertook a major action against Polish and Soviet partistans. It also describes German brutal repressions against PP forces when later they refused an oath to loyalty to Hitler. Finally it differentiates between PP and Lithuanian police who is accused of anti-semitic actions.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 01:49, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
3) from Przewodnik Katolicki (10/2004) by Grzegorz Górny. This seems like a much more smaller and possibly less reliabe source. I am getting tired, so I'll note just a few points: the article is a critique of the decoration by above mentioned general PP by L. president Pakas. It notes that some of the Lithuanians murdered by AK were German collaborators, thus their murder was not directed against L. but against G. The article seems to be more Polish POVed and lists more controversial actions by L.s, including the Ypatingas Burys organization massacre at Ponary were supposedly 100,000 Polish citizens, mostly Jews, were murded.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 01:55, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Continuing our discussion of the text, I am not happy with the following part: "In 1995 in Vilnius was found archive of Armia Krajowa for Vilnius Region, and copy of archive was donated to Poland. This collection of documents was not published in Poland" ref. This is rather weaselish, as it does not answer the questions: 1) found by whom? 2) was it published in Lt? 3) donated to who, exactly? Government? University? Person? Finally, this seems to create an impression that the info was supressed in Poland. I'd suggest that this is reworded, and verified.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 19:19, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

No problem. Perhaps we could use ithis info later knowing more details. Sigitas 19:21, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

I just realised that we have some useful material above: see #Relations with Lithuanians, #Relations with Lithuanians 2 and #Relations with Lithuanians references? sections.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 02:32, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Now this section became too big, and it is still not concrete enough, thus it will grow until we be able to remove less valuable pieces. Maybe we should move it to a separate article? Sigitas 18:46, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Halibutt suggested in the PR that we should do so with all 'relations with...' sections. I am just not sure what subarticle would be appopriate. Controversies over AK? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:57, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
Lithuanian articles on this topic are usually named "AK in Lithuania" or similarly, Poles would probably be against such title.. Sigitas 20:34, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Glinciszki (Glitiškės) massacre

It would be nice to create a related article on events in Glitiškės. It is interesting topic. Sigitas 12:39, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for creating this article. On Polish wiki I found two related articles: the fairly long one on pl:Aleksander Krzyżanowski, and a tiny stub on pl:Sauguma. I will translate AK time permitting soon, but I didn't find much about the Sauguma police.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 17:20, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Plechavicius - colaborator or resistant?

If Plechavicius would be colaborator of nazis he wouldn't be arrested and put to concentration camp and his organisation banned and persecuted by nazis. Plechavicius was resistant of nazi regime. Should we call AK colaborators for their dealings with Nazis and Soviets? We should if we call Plechavicius colaborator. Sigitas 17:33, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

He is the main reason why a Waffen-SS division was never formed in Lithuania and resisted those efforts to the end. He wanted to form an army for self-defense of Lithuanian territory. His call to all members of the "Local Lithuanian Detachment" to flee to the woods with their weapons on the eve of his arrest seeded the post-war anti-Soviet partisan resistance. heqs 18:02, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
While I have become aware of the PP existance only yesterday, a brief examination of the available sources indicates to me that he was indeed a collaborator. He worked under the command of Nazi Germany, his forces were engaged in the battles against the enemies of Nazis (Soviets, Polish resistance). How else can we refer to him? Considering he was a military man perhaps an 'ally' would be a better term, just as the forces of Vichy, Mussolini, many Balkan countries and such. Certainly his later break up with the Nazis and turning against them is significant and I would not oppose to amending it in the text to reflect the fact that he fought against them later.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 19:11, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
Local Detachment had only Lithuanian commanders, and disobeyed orders of Germans. Armia Krajowa also waged battles against enemies of Nazis, i.e. Soviets. Is AK collaborator? Sigitas 19:17, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
LLD most apparently didn't disobey the German orders for the first months of their operation. The organization was initially created with German official approval. It is also very likely that the organziation received suport (money, arms) from the Germans as an official part of the German military structure. Therefore in its early history it was obviously allied and/or collaborated with Germans, nonwithstanding the fact that it turned against them later. AK was not created with German approval/support, never received orders from Germany or official suport (with the exception of some few extremly rare cases, and those seem to involve NSZ, not AK, as described above), and finally unlike LLD which was initially created to help Germans, AK was created from the start to fight the Germans. The differences are glaringly clear, I believe.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 19:31, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
Let's not confuse co-belligerence and collaboration. I guess it's a matter of perspective. The Germans played on nationalist sentiments when they formed local/ethnic forces. To some people, the most significant issue will be that at first it was subordinate to the Germans, to others, it's that when it came down to it they were loyal only to the Lithuanian cause. heqs 19:40, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
Receiving arms is not a collaboration. As said before, LLD had only Lithuanian commanders, its own agenda, and German orders were ignored, which resulted in ban and persecution of LDD . Sigitas 19:42, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
I certainly agree that there are many reasons we should not view Lithuanian alliance with Nazis as something simple; as many other nations they were in it more to escape the Soviet opression then because they approved of Hitler's schemes. On the other side of the coin would be of course the unfriendly attitude of L. nationalists to Poles (and vice-versa - although I am sure there were notable examples of cooperation, and perhaps it would do us all good if we would try to write a little about those 'better' aspects from time to time). Co-belligerence is a nice link and a good one to use to expand/replace on the instances where collaboration is used. Legionas, I'd recommend you look through Google Print and provide some evidence to back such statements. I will repeat that PP was obviously a German enemy later, but in the begining he was either their ally or collaborator (although of course his primary motivation was not to help Germans, but Lithuanians).--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 19:59, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
On an aside (sort of), can someone who speaks Polish briefly tell me what this is about: [22] ? It seems to be some kind of announcement of cooperation between the Lithuanian Genocide and Resistance Research Centre and the Polish Institute of National Remembrance, is that right? Thanks, heqs 02:38, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
It talks about the 2nd Polish-Lithuanian Conference on "Polish-Lithuanian Relations 1939-1989" and mentions some others. It mentions signing of a cooperation but doesn't say between whom (countries? universities? no idea). --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 05:26, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
Found it: here's a page in english about the conference: [23] heqs 18:01, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
I think Plechavičius initially was a colaborator of the Nazis, the problem is that the word has some pejorative connotations. It seems that we may be lacking a correct NPOV word here. It might also be that cooperation with the Nazis was seen somehow different from the Polish and Lithuanian perspective. I think the best we can do is to search some possibly neutral sources. I'd like to point out here, that in some cases AK also was receiving weapons from the Nazis. --Lysytalk 20:47, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

These are some of the sources I've been using lately:

  • Roger D. Petersen: Resistance and Rebellion: Lessons from Eastern Europe (2001) p.153 p.164 p.165 p.166
  • Tomas Lane: Lithuania: Stepping Westward (2002) p.57 p.58
  • Nigel Tomas: Germany's Eastern Front Allies 2: Baltic Forces (2002) p.7

heqs 21:24, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Tnx for the links. How are they relevant here, though?--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 01:03, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
How are they not? I was replying to Lysy. heqs 02:26, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for the pointers. They certainly give some background of the situation. They however seem to confirm that Plechavičius initially collaborated with the Nazis, although his goals were apparently different. Whether his effort deserves to be criticised or praised is another issue. --Lysytalk 07:08, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
I initially brought up the term co-belligerence on this page with reference to Sigitas' comment "Armia Krajowa also waged battles against enemies of Nazis", but given the information I have (an army under Lithuanian command, to remain in and defend Lithuanian territory), I am increasingly coming under the impression that PP was a co-belligerent, not a collaborator. heqs 08:10, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

I think the key question is whether the Nazis did occupy Lithuania or not. If we consider them to be occupants, then military cooperation with them would be a treason and can be called "collaboration". If the Nazis were not occupants but a friendly army that liberated Lithuania, then "co-belligerence" would be adequate instead. --Lysytalk 11:01, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Of course Nazis occupied Lithuania and no one is disputing that. However, preparing local army for defence against Soviet aggressors was a patriotic thing and not a treason. Even if German weapons were used. We should not apply name "collaborator" in this article regarding Plechavicius, because people can also call him "resistant". "Collaborator-resistant Povilas Plechavicius" sounds just too cumbersome. Sigitas 13:35, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Isn't it possible that he was both ? His intentions might have been noble, but some facts remain. I'm sure you know the story of Konrad Wallenrod by Mickiewicz. Plechavičius perfectly matches the definition of collaborationism. The problem is that this is a pejorative term, while his collaborationism is more difficult to be judged. But then, history of may famous people is far from being black or white only. --Lysytalk 16:26, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

I disagree that it perfectly matches the definition. Consider the subtleties of the situation in Lithuania in Feb.-May 1944, and that the entire resistance had swung from boycotting the German mobilization attempt of 43 to fully supporting the PP recruitment. It was apparent that the front would soon arrive, and the nature of the Nazis as an occupying power shifted and weakened somewhat. A quasi-autonomous army that was liquidated for failing to subordinate, hardly seems like it was a textbook case of collaboration with an occupier. heqs 17:34, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

That's what I meant exactly: he was collaborative initially, but rebelious later, not the other way round. I understand that the situation was not that simple and that's what I just referred to above when I wrote it was probably neither entirely "black" nor "white". --Lysytalk 18:23, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Sauguma - or Lithuanian police in general

Sauguma is the name mentioned in the GW article linked above. It has a stub on Polish wiki ([24]). Legionas removed the link to Sauguma from the text with the edit summary: "I'm not familiar with the structure of Lithuanian police during the war but organisation with the name "Sauguma" never existed. " It is misspelled word for security". According to WP:V it is not reason for the removal: we have a verifiable source for its existance, and especially as Legionas admits he is unfamiliar with the organization of L. police perhaps they used such a mispelled title? In any case, I am sure that Lithuanian police and/or Sauguma are notable and deserve article, especially considering that the articles I summarized above note that much of the information about AK-L relations is very related to the aspects of L. collaboration with the Nazis, which certainly should be described somewhere at least as well as our current AK controversy section is.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 19:25, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Go ahead, just have in mind that unreferenced wikipedia stub is not good enough source. I probably missed this "verifiable source". Sigitas 19:38, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
Certainly the stub is not an acceptable reference. The newspaper articles are a start, although we should look for academic English language publications, like [25]. This and this give another name to consider: Schuma, although I believe that considering this is an English Wikipedia, we should start with Lithuanian police article. If you could possibly write a general entry, we can later add a history section and then write something about the controversies of the IIWW. I don't think that it would be appopriate to start the Lithuanian police with information about the IIWW collaboration with Germans, which certainly represent only the small part of the history of this organization. PS. A very useful ref.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 19:48, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
Could you please remind me in which article "Sauguma" name was mentioned? I genuinely believe there is a mistake here. It is most sure misspelled word "saugumas" (security), which would not be a official name of any organisation anyway. Sigitas 10:13, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
Lithuanian police Sauguma, secret Lithuanian police Sauguma. Considering the relative high correlation between this term and Polish sources [26] I expect it is a Polish-only term, and English/Lithuanian versions would be different. There are some reliable sources using it, like this page of Instytut Pamięci Narodowej. It would appear that Sauguma was not Lithuanian police but rather a Lithuanian secret police agency, something like gestapo, NKVD or Urząd Bezpieczeństwa. Moreover the quick look at the sources mention that Sauguma was subordinate to Gestapo and its members came from an Iron Wolf (Lithuania) organization (which already has an article on en wiki, but it is a tiny stub with no refs). Btw, I found information about one more massacee of Polish civilians, probably by Sauguma: 1,200 at Święciany (mentioned IPN link). Interestingly the article mentions that the perpetrators were executed by Germans for oversteppong their authority. It is possible it was Sauguma who was responsible for Glinciszki massacre, too[27]. I hope you can find something relevant in Lithuanian sources, for now I think I have enough Polish ones to have a stub with some credible references (IPN), but I'd prefer not to use Polish-only refs for such a controversial issue.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:27, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
There is one source about Lithuanian police during Nazi occupation with chronology:

"Lithuanians were for the most part formed into auxiliary support units for security operations. The first formal unit to be formed was known as the Lituanische Hunterschaften which was later used as a foundation for a series of self defense units known as Selbschutz-Bataillonen. The Selbschutz-Bataillonen units were later brought under the control of the German organization of uniformed frontline police, the Ordungspolizie, and renamed as Schutzmannschaft-Bataillonen or Schumas. The Schuma units were universally renamed and reformed into Polizie-Bataillonen in May of 1943. Nearly all units were formed in battalion-sized units consisting of between 500 and 600 men each. They were primarily assigned to rear-area security duties, but as the Soviets drew nearer to Lithuania, they also saw service fighting the Soviets directly. These Lithuanian units numbered a total of 35 Battalions during WWII, consisting of units numbered 1-15, 251-257, 263-265, and 301-310. 13 of these units, numbers 263-265 and 301-310, were never fully trained and were disbanded before they could be employed in combat. These units were posted variously to Poland, Belorussia, the other Baltic countries, and even as far away as the southern Ukraine. As the Soviets approached, the Germans took to grouping 3 or 4 Lithuanian Polizie-Bataillonen into regimental-sized units know as Lituanische Freiwilligen-Infanterie-Regimenter. Three such units were formed as the Soviets reached the border and they were sent directly to the front in the attempt at holding back the Soviet onslaught in late late 1944 and early 1945. The duties of the Lithuanian units was mainly rear-area security and anti-partisan operations, with occasional frontline service. As they served as auxilliaries to the Ordnungspolizei in the occupied areas of the Soviet Union, they often supported of the SD Einsatzkommando's nefarious cleansing operations. The Lithuanian units were often put under control of the RSHA - the Reich Main Security Office, and the HSSPF - the Höhere SS-Polizei Fuhrer of the Ostland regions, and were at times participants in operations against civilians and those deemed bandits in the rear areas of the Eastern Front." [28] Sigitas 11:03, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

I think Schutzmannschaft ("Defence troops" or "protection crew") is the word you're looking for. [29] heqs 11:42, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
"The Schuma units were universally renamed and reformed into Polizie-Bataillonen in May of 1943". So in 1944 when conflicts with AK escalated those units were not called Schuma or Schutzmannschaft anymore - but Police. Sigitas 11:56, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
Correct name for "Sauguma" is "Saugumo policija" (Security police) as it is called in article on Kaniuchy massacre [30]. It was secret Lithunian police, and we should call it in wikipedia "Lithuanian security police". This is also name used by the US government - "Nazi-sponsored Lithuanian Security Police, the Saugumas." [31]. I also found an article on Lithuanian security police structure in 1941-1944 , ask if you have any quostions [32] Sigitas 13:18, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
I created stub for Lithuanian Security Police but it's main task was information gathering not fighting with partisans. Lithuanian Security Police did not fight with AK, they were only spying on AK. Sigitas 16:23, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
I also created a decent stub lately - the one on Saugumas... What should we do with it? //Halibutt 18:11, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
Merge? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:33, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

In related news, who are the two individuals mentioned at Collaborationism#Lithuania? We should probably restore the link to Sauguma/LSP too, I think.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:29, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

"Kisielaitis, now 80, volunteered for the Lithuanian 2nd Auxiliary Police Service Battalion (later known as the 12th Lithuanian Schutzmannschaft Battalion) in 1941. During 1941-42, this battalion assisted in the execution of at least 130,000 people, primarily Jews.". So, Kisielaitis was policeman (ordinary police - not Security Police). Klimaitis was antisoviet insurgent during the outbreak of war. He formed his antisoviet unit, fought retreating soviets and was involved in killings of Jews. I cannot say how well these accusations are founded. There is none articles in Lithuanian on Klimaitis. He may be just urban myth. Sigitas 22:17, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
One stub ready. For the other - check here and here. //Halibutt 20:19, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

"Most Polish and Lithuanians historians claim..."

Article currently says: "Most Polish and Lithuanians historians claim that the massacre at Dubingiai was unique [4]". There are two problems with that: 1) it is not clear what "unique" means in this context. Does it mean that it was the only killing or that it was different killing from others? 2) Can anyone translate part of this article which says that most of Lithuanian historians regard this as an unique incident? To most Lithuanian historians this incident is only unique by larger number of victims than usually. Sigitas 17:34, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Well, this is what is meant by that: that it was basically the only event classifying as massacre, all other events (or accusations) were about murder of individuals or at best, families/small groups of several people.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:16, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

AK and the Holocaust - a useful review

I stumbled upon a source that should be quite useful in this and some other articles. A critical Review by John Radzilowski of Yaffa Eliach's Big Book of Holocaust Revisionism, published in academic journal: JOURNAL OF GENOCIDE RESEARCH, vol. 1, no. 2 (June 1999), City University of New York. As any serious academic publications, it is well referenced and the refs should prove useful for various articles.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 02:37, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Fascinating, I must say. No wonder every now and then one hears about Polish concentration camps... //Halibutt 07:11, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
Quite an old review. I have read it long ago, but I decided to never cite it because of the site... Szopen 07:24, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
I don't know about the site, but the journal and the author of the review both seem reliable. Journal of Genocide Research [33] is indexed by ingentaconnect ([34]), and Radziwilowski seems to be affilited with University of Minnesota[35]. Finally, I have also confirmed the article's existance via EBSCO database [36].--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 16:36, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Genocide?!

Genocide is a very strong word. The recently added fragment contains it, making it very controversial: "Lithuanian General Prosecutor Office in 1999 established that "partisan units of AK, not recognising return of Vilnius region in 1939, were performing genocide of population of Lithuania, i.e. terrorised, robbed, murdered civilians of Lithuanian, Jewish and Russian ethnicities, hoping that these actions will help reoccupy area after the war"[37] First, can we have a source other then the 'XXI amžius' newspaper? Second, what was the Polish government reaction, and did Lithuanian gov. ever commented on this? This is an 7 years old information, it may very well be obsolete.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 16:13, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I will try to elaborate this. I know that investigation of General Prosecutor in killings by AK did not end yet, and that in an AK case there are over 200 murdered victim names. I saw it recently somwhere , cannot find it right now. Sigitas 21:29, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
Besides, the fragment mentions that the AK "did not recognize return of Vilnius region in 1939", which seems a complete nonsense. Firstly, the AK was not formed in 1939. It was created in 1943, so it could not support anything four years before. Secondly, the Vilniaus kraštas (Vilnius region) was never a formal entity, so I doubt the AK commented on it anywhere. //Halibutt 22:52, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
"Firstly, the AK was not formed in 1939. It was created in 1943, so it could not support anything four years before." That doesn't really make sense... an organization certainly can support/oppose something that happened before it formed! heqs 04:51, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
So, you can blame me for not signing the declaration of independence of the United States even though I was born several centuries afterwards? //Halibutt 20:44, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
I don't understand what you mean... heqs 23:53, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
Putting metaphores aside, Halibutt means that the sentece as translated by Legionas is somewhat confusing: either the translation is incorrect or the article makes a mistake claiming AK existed in 1939. Anyway, can we have an academic (or at least, official Lt. governmental) source stating AK commited genocide? A tabloid article is hardly a reliable source on such a controversial statement.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 00:04, 17 June 2006 (UTC)
1) I don't see where it claims that AK existed in 1939. It just says AK didn't recognize the return of Vilnius to Lithuania in 1939. You and I could form an organization in 2006, and we could choose to not recognize the same thing... it could be our sole purpose in forming the organization. 2) Some people use the term genocide a little more freely than others. Lately on wikipedia I've found that some people are applying a very literal interpretation of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide definition. If some unit(s) of AK "intended" "in whole or in part" ... to "destroy" Lithuanians as a group, they may have been guilty of genocide. (I am playing devil's advocate here) heqs 08:06, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Ah, the "return" part must've mislead me. The author meant the return of Vilnius to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania then, right? Otherwise it's a weasel term for "the Home Army did not support the Lithuanian claims to the Polish city of Wilno"... As to the genocide - I'm not going to comment on that one. Sorry, but naming one, quite controversial situation in history with the G term is a tad over the top for me and resembles more of an attempt to prove some point than to present mere facts. But maybe it's just me. //Halibutt 14:56, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
 :) Try to see it from both sides... (Wilno) heqs 18:20, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Yup, I try hard. And I know why the Lithuanians wanted that city so badly. However, this does not mean that we should twist facts to support a strange vision of history - or to suggest it to our readers. If we call Lithuanian claims on a Polish city (and regarded as such by the League of Nations and all countries not allied to Nazi Germany) with such words (return), then it suggests a certain level of sympathy towards that view - and certain legitimacy of such claims. At the same time, we're not even mentioning the status quo at that time nor are we mentioning the point of view of the majority of the world at that time. It's not NPOV that way. //Halibutt 20:14, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Okay, I'm not opposed to changing the wording in the article... my comments were more general in nature. heqs 02:22, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

GA concerns

I have been reviewing for GA status and have concerns that should be able to fixed quickly

  • two images have Template:PolandGov
  • This warning is very specific and states that the image concerned cannot be used on Wikipedia. Either remove the image or comply to copyright conditions.
  • the references first 2/3rds of the article are referenced from 1 source and this is cited 14/15 times, are there any other source for this information that can be cite? Then there's 17 other references some cited multiple times to cover the last third of the article.

I have place the nomination on hold, besides these the rest of article is interesting. Gnangarra 14:06, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

    • I am not sure what we can do with the references - this is the source we have at the moment. While it is cited frequently, note also that the density of referencing in the latter sections of the articles are much higher then in average Wiki article. As for the PolandGov tag, I hope Halibutt will brief us on his odyssey (i.e. trying to get clarification form the PolandGov itself :>), but worst case scenario is that all of those images can be used under fairuse (PolandGov already told us they are happy to see their images on Wiki, it's just this non-commerical part of the license that is the problem).--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 16:21, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
      • Thanks for the response, I can see that these are being addressed. They are outside the control of the editor so I'll pass in good faith. Congratulations to the editors of this article Gnangarra 23:46, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
Check the talk page of that template for the latest news. Sadly, I was too busy lately to call that guy again and ask him again to send the mail he promised me. In short, I have his word that there is no problem with usage whatsoever, but he also promised me to send us the decision by their lawyer - yet so far I did not receive it. I'll add it to my to-do list for Monday and we'll see. BTW, I found the guy in LinkedIn :) //Halibutt 01:36, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the debate was no consensus. The vote was evenly split and there were reasonable arguments for using both names. -- Kjkolb 08:09, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Comments

It seems that this should be Polish Home Army (what links there) or Home Army (what links there). "Armia Krajowa" is widely used in English sources, but much less often than "Home Army"; "Polish Home Army", which seems like the proper name, is used in more official contexts or when the context is less explicit.

Google Books:

Google Scholar:

Regards, heqs 14:16, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

See Talk:Home Army (disambiguation) for some good arguments why this should be moved to Home Army. Feel free to start a WP:RM and let's see what others would want to say. My personal stance is that Home Army is English (WP:UE) but Armia Krajowa is more 'distinct'. I feel this article can exists as well under Home Army and Armia Krajowa, and would likely abstain in the vote (unless arguments or one or the other party convince me to join their side).-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  15:36, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
Not sure I agree, Home Army has several other meanings, try a search like this (many of those hits still deal with AK, but many do not). heqs 18:44, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
I've now filed the request for Polish Home Army at Wikipedia:Requested moves#31 July 2006. heqs 17:23, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

I am afraid I will have to oppose that, as per disambig talk mentioned above in 90%+ cases Home Army = Polish Home Army. I would not oppose a move to Home Army, but I see no reason to support it, neither, so far.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  19:29, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Halibutt's searches on that talk page are far from the whole story. It's as if I only searched for "Polish Home Army" on Google here. Please look again at this search - roughly half, if not less, are about AK. Many are about the plans of the Hitler assassination plotters, historical reserve forces of UK and US, "home army" as a general term like "home guard", and a handful about other countries' resistance movements or reserves. The disambiguation page needs to be cleaned up/improved a bit, but as for AK, the proper English title is "Polish Home Army" per my initial evidence. "Home army" is far too general a term to be claimed by one country; having Home Army be about Polish Home Army is not that much different from having Army be about Polish Army. heqs 20:12, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

For reference:

heqs 20:21, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Btw, shouldn't we rename Wehrmacht or Luftwaffe or Heer, too?-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  14:00, 1 August 2006 (UTC)
Possibly Luftwaffe or Heer, but I doubt that the english translation of "Wehrmacht" was ever used much. heqs 03:39, 2 August 2006 (UTC)
I must say I'm confounded by the continued suggestion to use Home Army. Would you move or redirect Luftwaffe to Air Force, or German Air Force? heqs 03:49, 2 August 2006 (UTC)
Please have a look at Heer - it is in fact a disambiguation page like Home Army should be. heqs 20:09, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Voting

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Further discussion

  • Indeed the "vote" was split but sorry to say I'm still waiting for "reasonable arguments" against the move. heqs 20:37, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

1.When you translate Home Army back into Polish you get Armia Domowa (House Army) which seems like a bad joke. It would be a much better idea to translate Armia Krajowa into Domestic Army (as in loty krajowe->domestic flights translation) if you want this article to be moved to an English title.

No, it wouldn't, because that term has never been used.

2. I and probably many other people prefer original names like UCK to invented/translated names like KLA.

WP:UE.

3. Like Afrika Korps the Armia Krajowa name is 50% English compatible as IMHO in the context of World War II most people will correctly guess that "Armia" stands for "Army".

The difference is that Afrika Korps is more common (than Africa Corps) by a factor of 10.

Perhaps you could find Some WW II-era British documents and see how they refered to the AK? Mieciu K 12:36, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

The english name has quite clearly always been Polish Home Army. If that isn't obvious from the above searches of books and journals, I don't know what is. Here's a Google Books search refined to the years 1939-1960: "Polish Home Army" - 63 hits / "Armia Krajowa" - 8 hits. 1939-1946: "Polish Home Army" 5 hits / "Armia Krajowa" - 0 hits. heqs 22:00, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
That's publication date - I am not suprised you get so few hits. Try 1960-2006 :) -- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  22:32, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
Mieciu K asked for WW2 era documents. heqs 22:39, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

For Legionas and Lokyz

It would help if you could read Polish. The paragraph you are questionning is based on the following paras, unfortunately I don't have the time to translate them for you right away. source-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  03:58, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Działań AK na Wileńszczyźnie nie można nazywać ludobójstwem. Jednak mordowanie niewinnych cywilów, czym ma splamione ręce ta organizacja, można nazwać przestępstwami wojennymi. Zresztą nie były to masowe mordy, gdyż z reguły zabijano wybrane, pojedyncze rodziny. Jest nam znany tylko jeden fakt masowego mordu. Jest to akcja AK w Dubinkach - twierdzi Arunas Bubnys, młody litewski historyk, gorący krytyk AK na Wileńszczyźnie.

- Nikt nigdy nie wydał rozkazu, aby zabijać Litwinów czy przedstawicieli innych narodowości tylko dlatego, że są Litwinami, Żydami czy też Rosjanami. Litwini, mówiąc o ludobójstwie polskich partyzantów, mają jasny cel. Obrzucając ich absurdalnymi oskarżeniami, chcą wybielić swoich policjantów, którzy uczestniczyli w mordowaniu Żydów - twierdzi Jarosław Wołkonowski.

Czy rzeczywiście termin ludobójstwo używany jest po to, aby litewska kolaboracja wyglądała bardziej niewinnie na tle AK splamionej ludobójstwem i współpracą z Niemcami?

- Trudno mi odpowiedzieć na to pytanie. Mówienie o ludobójstwie AK ma niewątpliwie podtekst polityczny. Należy zrozumieć tych Litwinów, którzy tak twierdzą. Może to być swoista samoobrona. Najpierw 50 lat Sowieci nazywali nas nacjonalistami i faszystami. Potem nadszedł rok 1990 i Izrael zaczął nas nazywać mordercami i kolaborantami. Swoje dodała i Polska, która w tamtym okresie mówiła o niemiecko-litewskiej okupacji Wileńszczyzny. Być może dlatego pojawiają się próby udowodnienia, że Litwini nie są demonami, które w Europie wyróżniają się okrucieństwem - twierdzi Arunas Bubnys.

A brief translation:

The activities of the Home Army in the area of Wilno should not be called a genocide. On the other hand the organization has its hands stained with murdering innocent civilians, which could be called war crimes. Besides, these were not mass murders, as in most cases among the killed were selected families or persons. We know of only one example of a mass murder, which was the action in Dubinki - stresses Arunas Bubnys, a young Lithuanian historian and an ardent critic of the Home Army in the area of Wilno.

"Nobody has ever issued an order to kill Lithuanians or members of other nationalities solely because they were Lithuanians, Jews or Russians. Lithuanians, when speaking of genocide done by Polish partisans, have a clear aim. Throwing absurd accusations at them, they are trying to whitewash their own policemen, who took part in murdering the Jews" - claims Jarosław Wołkonowski

Is really the term genocide used exclusively to make the Lithuanian collaboration look more innocent when compared to the Home Army stained with collaboration with the Germans and with genocide?

"It's difficult to respond to that question. Speaking of AK's genocide has a clear political context. We should understand the Lithuanians to claim so. It could be considered some sort of a self-defence. At first for 50 years the Soviets called us nationalists and fascists. Then the year 1990 came and Israel started calling us murderers and collaborators. Poland did also add to that, underlining the German-Lithuanian occupation of the Wilno area. Perhaps that is why there are attempts to prove that Lithuanians are not daemons of cruelty unusual in Europe - claims Arunas Bubnys"


//Halibutt 08:44, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Ok, You were right, i was looking at other reference. Altough - you should also correct a place in the article about document found in Bernardins monastery, because in the same article there is such a statement:
"Inne zdanie na ten temat ma Dalia Kuodyte, dyrektor Litewskiego Centrum Badania Ruchu Oporu i Ludobójstwa. Uważa ona, że do powstania takiej opinii przyczyniła się sama AK. - Dobitnie świadczą o tym dokumenty AK znalezione w 1995 r. w klasztorze benedyktyńskim w Wilnie. Są tam raporty o potrzebie oczyszczenia Wileńszczyzny z Litwinów. A to można nazwać ludobójstwem - twierdzi Kuodyte."
Doesn't it seem strange, to cite a favorable statements for AK, and not to mention unfavorable. Also in nthe list of references there is another article of Arūnas bubnys, where is a list of AK heroic acts, all of them documented and referenced.--Lokyz09:25, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't reports not enough to commit a crime? Suggesting that there is a need to expel Lithuanian settlers from Wilno area and indeed expelling or exterminating them are two different things. Besides, Home Army was a huge organization and I wouldn't be surprized if there were reports on the life on Mars preserved in its archives somewhere. Which does not yet mean that they indeed were on Mars back in 1943 or 1944. //Halibutt 10:31, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
to answer your question I should've read thise documents. Neither I, neither you didn't, and Kuodyte did. So who does have right to decide whether there is any data about war crimes? BTW, reports may mean reports about done actions. I've cited this paragraph only to show, that a phrase in an article "in those documents there are no evidences" might be wrong--Lokyz 11:03, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
"Są tam raporty o potrzebie oczyszczenia Wileńszczyzny z Litwinów. A to można nazwać ludobójstwem" (There are (in that place) reports about the need to clean/ethnic cleansing Wileńszczyzna from the Lithuanians. and that could be called genocide. Technically speaking Mr. Kuodyte is mistaking genocide and a crime against humanity (Deportation or forcible transfer of population), and those two are not the same. Mieciu K 11:44, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
I took the liberty of stressing the need in your post: it clearly indicates that this was all (idiotic and dangerous) talk about some future 'need', not about some 'done' actions. As we well known, there indeed where (fringe) elements within AK that were anti-Lithuanian; this further serves to confirm that they were talking about such actions (which as Halibutt notes is not that suprising, extreme conditions and large size of AK meant that is certainly had its share of nuts and extremists, thankfully they were few and didn't get that much opportunity to carry out their crazy plans). And Lokyz, please note that according to the sources we have none such actions ever took place (massacre of one village is not genocide, as Bubnys notes). I would much rather see an article about Vilnija, as this appears to be just such an organization of extremists with little academic support, and citing their numbers, without any disclaimer, seems as good as citing statements by the Stalin Society.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  12:12, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
As for I Vilnija I do not have any proper source of information, so let me not judge it. I'd rather wait for more information, than misjudge someone. And the article presents them as some ultrafascits, that are hunting for AK members heads untill now. Doesn't sounds very conwincing.
Personally I didn't say nothing about war crimes, I just said that phrase: "Most Polish and Lithuanians historians claim that the massacre at Dubingiai was unique [7]. This view is supported by AK documents [citation needed] that were recently found in Bernardines monastery in Vilnius." MIGHT not be right, and unreferenced statement about "nothing found in the documents" is contradictionary, unless there's citation. Bubnys (looks like in the cited article he alone represets "most lithuanian historians") does not speak about documents, Kuodyte - on other hand does. And she does not seem to support "nothing in documents" version.
In this case I've found strange that you cite one article as fully negating genocide, and one paragraph later there is a very contradictory statement, by someone who has (unlike we do all) seen those documents. Again, you try to interprete Kuodyte's words, without knowing what document's she's referring to. This leads me to an conclusion about selective choice of citations, a "phrase hunting", but it seems just another case of it, so I'm not surprised.
Reports, that I did mention earlier, are not from Vilnija. They're in another Bubnys article, and they're based on Lithuanian antinazi underground (not Local Detachment or Security police) press and German officers report: list of AK actions against Lithuanians is really impressive. It's not a source I've found out, it's already there as a reference. I mean this one: Arūnas Bubnys. Armija Krajova Rytų Lietuvoje (Armia Krajowa in Eastern Lithuania). "Atgimimas", 9 June 1989, No. 22 (35)]. I mention i here, because it seems kind of strange to me, that after using such articles as a reference someone states - nothing happened.--Lokyz 12:48, 7 August 2006 (UTC) P.S. why need, why not urge? And of ocurse, killng few people there, few there is not massacre. It's simple murder.
The monastery documents section was seemingly badly referenced and overinterpreted, I deleted it, as well as some duplicated or unreference dinfo, clarified some other issues and added an academic reference accessible via Google Books. Feel free to clarify other issues if you have sources at hand.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  15:12, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
A simple question - whether and unreferenced statement "nationalist organization of Vilnija" could be reworded into at least contrawersial reputation organization - to balance this article further. Because it seems that "nationalist" is a little wrong - this organisation does not state any antinational sentiments, they're just biased on some contraversial issues. And again - I do not go into editing wars, just asking for a fair treatment.Lokyz 19:55, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
Again, I'd advocate we write an article about it. I tried to but there is no material in English I could find and all Polish sources portray it as a fringe, nationalist organization (like All-Polish Youth, for example), so I wanted to see what you think of it, as I may not be too NPOV in that case (given that I can only rely on Polish sources).-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  13:45, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
As I've stated before I do not have enough proper information, although they do not seem seem to be nazis, just a bunch of elder guys, who are exploiting unresolved things (not national hate or hands salute). And once again, I have to admit, it just seems to me - because i do not have proper information. I'll try to look for it.Lokyz 19:24, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
I am not saying they are nazis, but nationalists, there is a difference. From what I have read they seem to be encouraging anti-Polish sentiments, and are actively involved in maintaining the Polish-Lithuanian rift. Controversy can take many forms (Federation of Expellees is another example to consider). PS. I looked up a few sources, again, this time I had a slightly better catch. First, I found a book which calls Vilnija 'extremists'. Unfortunately two other books which mention this keyword have restricted pages, but their titles are rather telling (Taming Nationalism?: Political Community Building in the Post-Soviet Baltic States and Understanding Ethnic Violence: Fear, Hatred, and Resentment in Twentieth-Century Eastern Europe). Next I found an article in English (offline, check Google cache) calling Vilnija a "Nationalist Lithuanian group". At the official site of Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs I found documents calling Vilnija "an association known for nationalistic and antipolish stance" (znanego z nacjonalistycznego i antypolskiego nastawienia stowarzyszenia) ([38]). I can quote more Polish sources, but as mentioned, they are certainly not NPOV, so I limited myself to the governmental page only - yet again it is telling I have not found a single one that seems supportive of it, and note that the first ref I quote (the book) is not Polish. Therefore I would like to move we remove the Vilnija statements from this article, they seem not reliable. PS. It is likely there are other names this organization uses, perhaps you can offer a few other terms to google?-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  19:45, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
Sorry, no idea for other names for this orgnization. I believe it's the only name. And - yes, they're radicals - I can admit that. And about Google - i think library would be an answer. And looking for a name - Kazimieras Garšva it would be also worth a try.
As for nazis - it was just a reaction to All-Polish Youth - they seem nazi, at least from the article and picture. As for Antipolish sentiment - sadly it happens in nowadays Lithuania. Also does in Poland - does anyone remember story of a monument for Antanas Baranauskas, which was poured with paint on teh opening day few years ago. (sorry, I know this one is offtopic).
A separate article would be solution - but well, I do not have time to or a wish be a Devil's Advocate. Lokyz 20:05, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

"...he also notes that any accusations of genocide or widespread actions are false and have an underlying political motive". There are no such word as "widespread actions" in interview of Bubnys. It must be removed from the article. Sigitas 11:14, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

If you prefer, let's stick to the term he uses (mass murders), that's fine with me, and please add ref to the ongoing investigation addition.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  15:32, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
You cannot say that there were no mass murders. At least one mass murder indeed happened according to Bubnys. Sigitas 20:46, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
An exception which proves the rule. Have you even read the article (part of which Halibutt translated above)?-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  22:50, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Focus

The article should contain informations about Armia Krajowa, rather than about Lithuanians. Xx236 13:54, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Article in Polish Xx236 14:10, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

I do agree then when this article gets lenghty, or those subsections unproportionally long, they should be split into their own articles. I am not sure if this needs to be done now, though.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  14:33, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

The problem AK-Jews is much more important and should obtain here more place than Lithuanian complaints. Later Byelarus victims. Xx236 12:57, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Documented complaints. Why should they be irrelevant?--Lokyz 13:19, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
  • 1. Red Army article doesn't contain any paragraph about Soviet war crimes (hundreds of thousands of victims). Such (perfectly documented) accusations don't dominate the article.
  • 2. According to some Jewish sources tens of thousands Jews died killed by Polish partizans, including the Home Army troops.
  • 3. According to some sources thousands of Byelarusian people died killed by Polish partizans. Even if some of them collaborated with Nazis or Soviets, many others were victims.
  • 4. As you perfectly know, you haven't quoted any document about killings outside Dubingiai.

Xx236 13:41, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

You might discuss Red Army article in an apropriate place this is certainly not the one.
About accusations of killing Jews and Belarusians - provide refrenced sources, not rumours.
I perfectly know, that Dubingiai massacre is well documented, even in Polish literature.
Please take some time to adjust your tone to be more collaborative, this is not your private yard, so there's no need to command and point others what to do.--Lokyz 14:02, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

This article is about Armia Krajowa, not about Lithuanian opinions about Armia Krajowa.

Red Army article is an example, you pretend you don't understand me. Are you cooperative the way you believe to be?

Start you both AK and Lithuanians article. Why is it a problem for you?

Xx236 14:25, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Indeed this section has reached size appropriate for a separate article. Sigitas 14:31, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
I do not have problems. You seem to have problems understanding how Wikipedia works and basic principles of polite communication. In short - please write something yourself, without pointing finger at someone. Unless you don't have nor facts neither any idea what you're talking about.
No this is not an "Lithuania POV" section, this is only proof that AK had commited crimes. Any other sections are welcome. If the article gets big enough, it will be split.
And please translate into English what do you mean by saying: "Start you both AK and Lithuanians article". Thank you.--Lokyz 14:44, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
This is quite POVed addition, although salvagable. I am rather disappointed by the removal of sourced information like rogue AK troops acting against specific orders of Krzyżanowski which forbade reprisals against civilians<ref name="Piotrowski-L"/>, which IMHO clearly shows the bias and POV of the recent additions. I NPOVed and improved the English of the recent edits, plus I added some citation requests, in few cases I expect they can be easily answered because the entire para is referenced from a single source. I also removed some glarring errors, like that AK started operations against in 1943 - it was of course fighting them since its very creation before 1943, and did not start operations against the Soviets, it was Soviets who started operations against AK. I also removed the strange accusation that AK killed many Jews in Lithuania, the Jewish sections documents that AK had no anti-semitic policy rather well. Last but not least, I think that the entire section is still higly biased into portraying AK as villains and Lithuanians as victims, we need to remember that Lithuanians were at that time allied to Nazi Germany, and that Poles suffered as well (Tadeusz Piotrowski notes that thousands of Poles died at the hand of Lithuanian collaborators, and tens of thousands were deported.), this desperatly needs to be balanced.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  15:58, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
Polish propagandists inflated tens of victims to thousands. Balance this. Sigitas 16:30, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
regarding the AK antisemitism: On 12 Nov 1943 AK shot 20 Jews in Eishishkes, In march 1944 AK shot/hanged 12 Jews in Barunai. Don't remove referenced info. Sigitas 17:26, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
Sigiatas, are you feeling all right? Or are you calling Tadeusz Piotrowski a Polish propagandist?-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  16:59, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
"regarding the AK antisemitism" So? What proof do you have that these acts were in any way encouraged or tolerated by the AK command? Mieciu K 18:15, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
Proof is how widespread killing of jews was. AK was especially brutal towards Jewish partisans. It is the same article of R. Zizas. Sigitas 18:44, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
"Widespread"? what do you mean by "widespread"? During the summer of 1943 AK had around 380 thousand members inclueding 10 thousand officers. Calling the entire organisation antisemitic because of the actions of a few individuals unencouraged (and punished if such action was possible due to the tactical and strategical situation in that area) by the high command is pure slander. Mieciu K 19:24, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
We are talking about Vilnius branch of AK. It was only 9000 strong. Sigitas 19:48, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
This is the disscussion page of the wikipedia Armia Krajowa article and not the, and not the Vilnius branch of the Armia Krajowa article, can you prove that more than 5% of members of Vilnius branch were responsible for acts of antisemitic violence? Even if more than 5% were involved, this was during a war when carefull selection, examination and persecution of AK members by the AK "internal afairs departament" and AK "justice depatament" was sometimes almost impossible. Mieciu K 20:02, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

You are free to write (in an encyclopedic way providing sources) that the AK command was sometimes unable to control some of the autonomous units in far away regions. And if those individals shared the views of pre war polish far right wing political organisations then they sometimes commited actions that today might be viewd as criminal (even if they thought they were justified e.g as reprisal actions against the lithuanian police members and their families). These actions were neither tolerated, nor encouraged by tha AK high command, but keeping the integrity of the AK forces, strategiacal situation meant that "criminal actions" were sometimes not immidietly punished by the AK command (probably the same could be said about french resistance in the dispiuted french-german boarder regions). Mieciu K 20:14, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Please note that I do not say in the article that AK was antisemitic. I just say that AK killed many Jews in Lithuania. Sigitas 20:45, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
Yes, there were some Jews killed by the AK by but "many" (dozens?, hundreds?), definietly less than the Germans (tens of thousands in Lithuania alone), less than Lithuanian collaborators, and even communist units killed Jews if they considered them capitalists/bourgeoise, Jewish resistance killed Jewish collaborators, Jewish collaborators killed or contribiuted to the deaths of other Jews, everyhing needs to be put into the context of WWII in Lithuania or other regions wer the AK operated Mieciu K 21:04, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
Are you trying to say that AK was simply better, because "there were some Jews killed by the AK". Some means this one does not count? Or does it mean AK did not intend to do, it was just an accident? Like with Lithuanians killed - "this one was just revenge, not planned action". Ok, ok AK are heroes, they just didn't know how to use guns. This one is getting annoying - Lithuanian collborators are the worst (accenting only Lithuanians, nevermind army tey served), germans are a liitle bit better, and AK - killed just some. Don't you find that murdering any one is a crime ? BTW did you know, that all the Lithuanian policemens who did kill civils in Glintiškės were executed by Lithuanian firing squad. Someow I didn't hear that murderers of Dubingiai civils or at any other place in Lithuania were punished in any way.--Lokyz 21:25, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Somehow I didn't hear that murderers of Dubingiai civils or at any other place in Lithuania were still alive after the II world war or were under the authority of the Polish goverment after the II world war. I am just saying don't judge the entire organisation because of the criminal actions of a small percentage of it's members, that would be a generalisation and a simplification unacceptable in an encyclopedia. Every large organasation has problems with it's mebers eg the catholic church, but that doesn,t make the entire organisation a criminal organisation. Mieciu K 21:38, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
Yes, executed... would you know more about that? I remember reading somewhere that they were executed by the Germans, who didn't want Lithuanian Security Police to take other such undependent actions, but I can't find a ref for that. As for the Jewish issue, 'many' is a weasel word, and it creates a mistaken impression that AK was perfoming some significant anti-Jewish actions, which is obviously not true. Further, this section describes the Polish-Lithuanian relations, so if we want to talk about their impact on Jewish population, as Mieciu pointed out we should start with the much higher casualties inflicted on the Jews by LLS and other Lithuanian collaborators first. PS. There is no 'white' and 'black', but as shades of grey go, AK was much 'lighter' then LSP.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  22:20, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
You should make difference between colaborators and freedom fighters. Lithuanian Secret Police (sounds as if it was formed by Lithuanian Government) was a nazi founded organization and had little in common with Lithuanian state. Yes, it was criminal organization, I can state this not for the first time. Although covering crimes committed by orgnization who is "not a criminal, just has rougue members" sounds not very convincing. Note, that i do not say whole organization was criminal. Just by covering it's crimes and pointing finger to others - theyr'e much worse as our side, you reach as shade of gray that does not differ from black. Murder is murder. And motives do not matter.if you do not agree with this, there's nothing more to discuss.--Lokyz 22:42, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
So who were the Lithuanian freedom fighter? Lithuanian Territorial Defense Force (1944), whose activities according to the current lead were limited to 'brief engagements against Soviet and Polish partisans'? Few months ago I suggested (IIRC to Sigitas) that he should create an article on Lithuanian resistance, and I am still waiting. AK was engaged in the fight against Lithuanian collaborators, and not, to any of my knowledge, against Lithuanians themselves; a good example of this is the citation from Piotrowski's book about order of Krzyżanowski, AK commander of Vilnius region, which forbade reprisals against Lithuanian civilians. There were indeed some highly theoretical debates between underground and emigree Polish politicians about the shape of future Polish borders; they were obviously not practical, and the fact that they did not envision great future for Lithuania is not suprising, considering Lithuanian stance (pro-German, anti-Polish). And yes, there were rogue groups, usually connected to former endecja and then Narodowe Siły Zbrojne who were very supportive of such slogans and unfriendly to Lithuanians, in extreme and exceptional situations engaging in violence, criminal acts, murders and once, an entire massacre. They were exceptions, not the rule. I am not stating anything new here, but I would very much like to read about those 'cover-ups' and other conspiracy theories that you write above...-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  00:32, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
If AK would only fight Nazi collaborators, Maryte Lesniauskaite would not be raped by AK until she died, and AK would not carry dead Lithuanian babies on bayonet, and Trimonyte 11 months old would not be shot in Azuozeriai. Stasys Balke in Posalciai village would not be killed for just not knowing Polish language. Priest Zabulionis would not be killed for refusing to give a mass in Polish. Sigitas 09:37, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
Sad stories, if not referenced, but this is an encyclopedia, not a book of grievances. I could bring examples from Piotrowski's book about similar actions by Lithuanians, and I am sure many more from some Polish books, but please, let's try to keep this academic.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  19:43, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
Well, I do not judge anyone. I'm just asking, why do you dispute obviuos facts, and why AK veterans do not want to make aware to public names of those who did commit crimes? By doing this this organization, that I do respect for bravery and determination to fight for independance of Poland would clean it's name from any occusations. Or do you believe that "vile" members of organization are just some minor annoyance, that does not deserve to be mentioned?--Lokyz 21:45, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
I will not answer those questions because they are about things I know little about, war crimes do not expire In Poland so if the Lithuanian prosecutors want to prosecute someone they are free to enquire the polish side. If you want to mention the crimes of the individuals from the AK, feel free to do so but perhaps this is not the right place since this is a page about the actions of the entire AK (maybe an article about the "Rouge" AK units). The AK as a whole, In the light of what I know can not be considered an organisation where criminal acts were often as they were commited by a small percentage of it's members. Mieciu K 21:59, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
Small percentage? Prove it. Historians and witnesses don't agree. How was this "small percentage" punished if their actions were not acceptable in AK? Sigitas 09:23, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
It is you who is trying to prove that criminal acts were frequent enough to be mentioned in the main AK article."Just as giving undue weight to a viewpoint is not neutral, so is giving undue weight to other verifiable and sourced statements. An article should not give undue weight to any aspects of the subject, but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight appropriate to its significance to the subject. Note that undue weight can be given in several ways, including, but not limited to, depth of detail, quantity of text, prominence of placement, and juxtaposition of statements." (WP:NPOV). Which individuals from the AK were not prosecuted? What kept the Lithuanian authorities from pressing charges against living persons after 1991? Mieciu K 12:32, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
I don't know and I don't really care why it takes for the Lithuanians prosecutors to investigate AK crimes so long. How is it related with the scale of AK terror? Sigitas 12:43, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
If the people who commited those crimes are still alive then the issue of "AK terror" should be left to prosecutors and judges and not historians. "scale of AK terror"? I don't remeber you citing any statistics. I want to say that these acts were "rare and caused by individuals", you want to say that there were "many acts of terror and they were planned/ tolerated at the higher level of command" tham In dubio pro reo (Expresses the judicial principle that in case of doubt the decision must be in favor of the accused), in this case the accused is the AK. Mieciu K 13:07, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
I'm not buying this ridiculuous argument that wikipedia should only consist of court proceedings. If no one was sentenced for murdering people it doesn't mean people were not murdered. There is no doubt that ethnic cleansing happened, and that at least hudreds people were killed by AK in Lithuania. Sigitas 14:51, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
You may believe whatever you want, but Wikipedia is no place for original research. We have citations that prove the numbers are disputed form below 100 to close to a 1000. Feel free to add more estimates if you have them.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  19:43, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
Sigitas, I have one, very small questions. Why you are so keen in adding the references about criminals from AK into main AK article, but seems that you are far less reluctant to add similar info about burning Polish villages by units of Local_Lithuanian_Detachment? besides, "hundreds" of people is disputed number, as seen in discussion and in article. Szopen 17:12, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
I just don't have such information on Territorial Defence Force. You are free to add any related and verifiable information you wish. Yes, we can dispute hundreds or thousands. I can provide 450 names of Lithuanians killed by AK right now. Sigitas 18:18, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
Referenced?-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  19:43, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
Yes, referenced. Sigitas 20:03, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Please stop putting in slander about AK receiving support from Germans (this is already discussed in Piotrowski book and few wagons of supplies are hardly any noticeable quality), or those preposterous claims about AK murdering Jews in Lithuania. As Mieciu pointed out, it was LSP and other collaborators that murdered Jews, not AK.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  19:43, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Split?

The article is about 45kb long, the Lithuanian section is 17kb. This is now big (and disproportionate) enough to warrant its own section. I suggest leaving a brief summary here (about the lenght of other relation with...) and move the current version to an article entitled Polish-Lithuanian relations during the IIWW.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  22:15, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

GW_2001

What is GW_2001? Reference of this source is lost. Can anyone help to restore it? Sigitas 14:45, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Nevermind, I did it myself. Sigitas 14:58, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

What is a formal procedure for dealing with vandals?

Reversing and twisting referenced information is unacceptable. Piotrus twists information as he likes without even familiarising with a source. My info is not original research, while version of Piotrus is just a lie. "AK killed Lithuanians judged to be collaborators"? How could so many babies and todlers be collaborators? Why persecution of Jews was removed? Such behaviour is unacceptable. Sigitas 19:02, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Please stop your personal attacks and getting emotional, and start respecting WP:NPOV. PS. Consider also if you want to continue with that course of action: both me and Halibutt have a habit of answering such conflicts with creating relevant, Featured Class, articles, like on Katyn Massacre or Warsaw Uprisings. Perhaps the only way to solve the current dispute about this article is to write detailed article about Polish-Lithuanian relations during the IIWW, and of course to substantially expand the section on Lithuanian collaboration with the Nazis during the IIWW, as it forms and important part of explanation why AK was often engaged in fights with LSP and similar Lithuanian units. I added a few sources to the begining of the P-L paragraph for people who want to check some related readings.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  21:40, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Remember about NPOV

We are here to describe the current research, not argue for rights, wrongs or 'the truth'. Here is an academic publication which clearly states that both Lithuanian and Polish historians have not yet agree on one single variant of what has happened in Lithuania and nearby areas during the IIWW. Therefore we must present both the Polish and Lithuanian perspectives, clearly stating which is which, so if we are using Polish sources we have to say 'Polish historian A argues that' and if Lithuanian, then 'Lithuanian historian B argues that', instead of weasel terms portaying one side's POV as an undisputable fact. Other policies to consider are WP:RS and WP:V, especially the part about using offline sources in non-English lanaguages (rule of thumb: allowed but use with caution, as they are very hard to verify). And of course, WP:CIV, WP:AGF, WP:NPA and related policies are a must.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  00:05, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Piotrus is removing my referenced stuff without provideing alternative referenced version. Such behaviour is unacceptable. I have a scanned version of my source, and I can share it with everyone wishing to verify my statements. Sigitas 10:46, 10 September 2006 (UTC)
I am not removing any referenced stuff, unlike you. Please stop your POV pushing.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  14:52, 10 September 2006 (UTC)
Yes, you are. You removed part about hunting Lithuanians during the battle for Vilnius, and persecution of Jews, and plans of Polish partioes to occupy entire Lithuania etc. We will not move on without sorting this. Sigitas 17:16, 10 September 2006 (UTC)
Please past here the exact parts I am removing and your references for them. In case of statement that the main activity of AK was persecution of Lithuanians and Jews, or that German support was directed not for Lithuanians but to AK, I'd very much appreciate something more then one Lithuanian publication, as per WP:RS and WP:V it's obviously presenting a POVed side and thus is not a very reliable source, especially as it is going against virtually all of the other references we have and seems to be a very minority interpretation. Also please explain your reasons for deletion of the following referenced information:
a) The issue of Polish and Lithuanian relations during the Second World War is a controversial issue, and most modern Lithuanian and Polish historians still differ in their interpretations of the related events, many of which are related to the operations of Armia Krajowa on territories inhabited by Lithuanians and Poles. In recent years a number of common academic conferences have started to bridge the gap beteen Lithuanian and Polish interpretations, but significant differences still remain[39].
b) A significant number of Lithuanians started collaborating with the German occupiers[40][41][42][43], with some in the Lithuanian government engaging in the program of ethnic and racial purification, targeting Jews, Poles and other non-Lituanian ethnic minorities.[44]
c) that the primary target of AK when it came to Lithuanians were collaborators
-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  03:03, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

MedCab case

Mediator: Addhoc. Involved Parties: Legionas, Piotrus, Lysy, Szopen, //Halibutt

Would any other involved parties add their name to the list. Thanks, Addhoc 12:09, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Starting Mediation

Firstly, could we agree to break out of this edit war. I appreciate that from the perspective of Legionas, the current version is the 'wrong' version, however, if we are going to resolve this dispute, we have to start from somewhere.

In this context , could we start by discussing the contested introduction to the "Relations with Lithuanians" section:

"The issue of Polish and Lithuanian relations during the Second World War is a controversial issue, and most modern Lithuanian and Polish historians still differ in their interpretations of the related events, many of which are related to the operations of Armia Krajowa on territories inhabited by Lithuanians and Poles. In recent years a number of common academic conferences have started to bridge the gap between Lithuanian and Polish interpretations, but significant differences still remain."

Addhoc 12:34, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Sidenote: Hopefully I'll not make the mediation more difficult by suggesting to change the "most modern Lithuanian and Polish historians" into "many modern Lithuanian and Polish historians". However I do expect that this is not the point of contention and do not want to drift the mediation at the very start so I don't expect any answer (rather just a reminder for myself as I don't want to touch the para that's going to be discussed now). Other than that the section seems reasonable to me. --Lysytalk 13:11, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for your suggestion, which I think would be an improvement. Addhoc 15:00, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
To me the intro seems like a decent description of the problem, as the matter is indeed considered controversial (apparently). What Lysy wrote above is a decent suggestion as well, as we don't know if most or just one historian differs. We know for sure that there is a guy somewhere who differs, but he might pretty well be alone in that. //Halibutt 13:53, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I would suggest the relevant policy is as follows:

  • WP:NPOV - extract below relating to viewpoints
  • If a viewpoint is in the majority, then it should be easy to substantiate it with reference to commonly accepted reference texts;
  • If a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should be easy to name prominent adherents;
  • If a viewpoint is held by an extremely small (or vastly limited) minority, it doesn't belong in Wikipedia (except perhaps in some ancillary article) regardless of whether it's true or not; and regardless of whether you can prove it or not.
  • WP:V - extract below is the policy in a nutshell
1. Articles should contain only material that has been published by reputable sources.
2. Editors adding new material to an article should cite a reputable source, or it may be removed by any editor.
3. The obligation to provide a reputable source lies with the editors wishing to include the material, not on those seeking to remove it.

Although WP:NPOV policy is written around the concept of majority and minority, there is acceptance within the editing community that in some cases there is a virtually even division, in which case equal weight should be given. Addhoc 15:00, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

To better understand the controversy, would you (anyone) be able to show, specifically which parts of the section in question need support in sources ? what is actually questioned here ? So far I understand that one could wonder whether the "most", "many" or "some" wording would be more appropriate. I think "most" (or "many" as well) would need a reputable citation support. The problem might be that most of the sources on the subject are in Polish or Lithuanian (or their derivatives), therefore difficult to verify within the limited community. Would the "some" wording be contentious as well ? --Lysytalk 16:00, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

I have yet to hear why Sigitas/Legionas is removign this referenced para. I have also explained my POV and dissatisfaction with Legionas edits at Wikipedia talk:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2006-09-10 Armia Krajowa in Lithuania.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  17:17, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

I removed Piotrus's changes thus restoring my perfectly valid information, which I believe was simply vandalised. Sigitas 18:03, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
Legionas, if your best arguments will remain claims that your POV is 'perfectly valid', and others are 'vandals', I am afraid we are not going to move much forward.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  18:22, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

OK, how about this then:

'"The issue of Polish and Lithuanian relations during the Second World War is a controversial issue, and some modern Lithuanian and Polish historians still differ in their interpretations of the related events, many of which are related to the operations of Armia Krajowa on territories inhabited by Lithuanians and Poles. In recent years a number of common academic conferences have started to bridge the gap between Lithuanian and Polish interpretations, but significant differences still remain."

Does it sound all right ? Is anything missing or contested here ? --Lysytalk 18:43, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

There certainly is disagreement between wikipedians, but I didn't really see disagreement of Lithuanian and Polish historians. Probably disagreements exist, but they are not manifested in this article. I provided position of Lithuanian historians, now its up to Poles to provide alternative version if there is one. So, how many Lithuanians were killed by revenging AK troops around Dubingiai in the end of June of 1944 according to the Polish historians? Which Polish historians don't agree that AK killed 20 Jews in Eisiskes on 12 November 1943, and killed 12 Jews in Barunai in the end of March, 1944? Which Polish historian doesn't agree that AK punished father and son Sadowski for hiding the Jews? If it is argued that different views exist I'd like to request to share the details of disagreement. Sigitas 19:06, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
If you'd care to read the English-language ref I provided, you will clearly see that the Polish and Lithuanian historians have different POVs on that issue. Further, if you'd have read the Wikipedia article about Armia Krajowa you'd see that we have an estimate of a Polish historian for less then 100 Lithuanians killed, and Lithuanian historians for up to 1000 (Vilnija is not reliable, so I am ommitting it). Since this is the first time you provide more details on the accusations of AK killing Jews (places, names), let us look at available references, although I prefer to search English, not Polish (or Lithuanian), as they are more easily verifiable, accessible and neutral. Eisiskes, 1943 - I cannot find a single reference to this event, but I found 1800 Jews killed by Lithuanians in 1941. 5 Jews shot in 1946 by FORMER members of AK, plus a note that Polish AND LITHUANIAN nationalists killed Jews post-war. This event is also confirmed here, but with no mention of AK; the pogroms in Poland post-1945 are described in History of Jews in Poland, and are not very relavant to this article. Barunai, 1944: no references. Sadowski and Armia Krajowa - no refs. Sadowski and Home Army - no refs that seem relevant. Any other information you'd like for me to verify?-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  19:34, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
So, no disagreement of historians so far found. Apparently, Piotrus did not find any Polish historian disagreeing with the facts provided by R. Zizas. Sigitas 19:45, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
LOL, that's one of the most obvious cases of twisting one's words that I have seen. Nobody has disagreed because nobody thought to argue about such a minor and exceptional cases. Anyway, Legionas, I will quote our mediator Addhoc, quoting WP:NPOV: "If a viewpoint is held by an extremely small (or vastly limited) minority it doesn't belong in Wikipedia". As thse events you mention are not quoted by anybody except those few Lithuanian historians you mention in this single publication (or to be specific, likely only one of those historians in what looks like an edited volume), those few isolated incidents cannot be used to accuse AK of such actions, when we cannot verify such accusations with other sources, and we have plethora of others to the contrary. PS. The fact that this Lithuanian book is very hard to verify by others does not add to your argument.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  20:38, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
Hi Sigitas, I'm new to this debate, so I could be easily be wrong. This reference: "Dovile, Budryte (Sep 30, 2005). Taming Nationalism?. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.. ISBN 075464281X. " says the following: "In comparison, Lithuanian-Polish inter state cooperation, inspired by the desire of the two countries to join NATO, was an incentive to revisit painful issues in Polish-Lithuanian history. After the two countries signed the Friendship Treaty in 1994, Lithuanian and Polish Historians began to meet in joint scholarly conferences. In 1999, they discussed one of the most divisive and painful issues in Lithuanian-Polish relations. The theme of the conference was 'The Resistance Movement in 1939-1945: A lesson from Lithuanian and Polish Histories'. The actions of Armia Krajowa in Lithuania were discussed during this conference for the first time by a group of Polish and Lithuanian historians. Although the participants of the conference did not change their opinions, they agreed to respect differences in historical interpretations." This clearly implies there is some disagreement between historians, unless I'm missing something. Addhoc 18:38, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
It indeed implies that some disagreements exist, but is not specific enough. I agree with this statement, but i would suggest to show in the article where the actual disagreements lie. Sigitas 10:38, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
It is shown. The varying casualties estimates are a good example; attempts by some Lithuanians to portray AK as primarily anti-Lithuanian are another good example, and confirmed by Lithuanian historian Bubnys himself.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  16:09, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Disputed Paragraph

Could we discuss the folowing disputed paragraph:

"Relations between Lithuanians and Poles were strained during most of the interwar period due to conflicts over the Vilnius region and Suvalkai region, areas whose population was a mixture of Poles and Lithuanians. Germans relocated Lithuanian families to Vilnius region from Western parts of Lithuania by force, and this complicated situation. During the war these conflicts resulted in thousands of deaths, as groups on both sides used the opportunities offered by the war to commit violent acts against those they perceived as enemies."

Addhoc 11:33, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

I have taken the liberty to move this section up to the main medcab section, where we have been discussing this para anyway. As this para is disputed by Sigitas, I think we all will appreciate his reply to why he persists in deleting most of this paragraph; as I think no other editor finds it objectionable.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  15:37, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, do you know if there's a reference specifically for this paragraph? Addhoc 15:43, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
Don't appear to be there ATM, but I think that the first and third sentences are rather NPOV and semi-obvious, and can be easily referenced with some of our existing refs. The middle sentence about German relocation of L. families should have its own inline citation; plus we may want to note that Poles were deported from Vilnius by the Soviets ([45], [46]. etc.), further changing the population balance and antagonizing the Polish population. PS. Adhoc, since you said you have recently begun to read about those issues, you may want to see our well referenced article on Treatment_of_Polish_citizens_by_occupiers#Treatment_of_Polish_citizens_under_Soviet_occupation for some relevant information.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  16:05, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
I'm not sure if the "thousands of deaths" should not be referenced as well. While obvious to me, this may be not so clear for every reader. --Lysytalk 16:11, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Second sentence is supported by Rimantas Zizas. Armijos Krajovos veikla Lietuvoje 1942-1944 metais (Acitivies of Armia Krajowa in Lithuania in 1942-1944). Armija Krajova Lietuvoje, pp. 14-39. A. Bubnys, K. Garšva, E. Gečiauskas, J. Lebionka, J. Saudargienė, R. Zizas (editors). Vilnius – Kaunas, 1995. This paragraph is OK. Sigitas 13:23, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks! Addhoc 13:25, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

After some thinking I have reservations regarding the "thousands of deaths". AK probably killed 4000 locals in "ethnic Lithuanian lands" but many of victims were Belarussians, Jews and Poles. Thousands of Poles would be killed by Germans with or without Lithuanian administration in place. Sonderkommando Ypatingasis burys in Paneriai were killing people not because they "took the opportunities offered by the war to commit crimes" but because they were forced to. Sigitas 09:47, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, what about the villages burned by Plechavicius men? They weren't forced to kill and murder Poles? Szopen 11:11, 26 September 2006 (UTC)
You should evaluate these data carefully. I know for sure that at least some of the villages burned by Territorial Defence Force were simply invented by Polish propagandists, for example killings in Grauziskes, when Territorial Defence Force didn't even reach this place before being destroyed by AK. Sigitas 15:46, 26 September 2006 (UTC)
I've never heard about killings in Graużyszki, as indeed, Plechaviczius men were defeated earlier; however, In Sienkowszczyna (quite near Grauzyszki) Plechaviczius men were burning houses and killing people - probably that's why they were so easily defeated, since AK attacked while the butchers were busy with shooting the civilians. As for Burys being forced to kill Poles, well, they were all volunteers; Szopen 07:00, 27 September 2006 (UTC) EDIT: plus Pawłów, Adamowszczyzna, Tołminów
Witnesses say they there ambushed marching by AK, which probably was tipped by Germans. I don't know much about these events though. Burys' members volunteered to assist germans initially, but not to kill people in paneriai. Most of them only were aknowledged of their role in killings after arrival to Paneriai and had no option to say "no" (Arūnas Bubnys (2004). Vokiečių ir lietuvių saugumo policija (1941–1944) (German and Lithuanian security police: 1941-1944). Vilnius: Lietuvos gyventojų genocido ir rezistencijos tyrimo centras. Retrieved on 2006-06-09.) Sigitas 10:24, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
This is sad, but the same could be probably said of many Germans who did not go to army to murder civilians but then had no choice. I think the times were difficult and we're really often too easily assigning blame. On the other hand thousands of people were murdered in Paneriai and this also requires some justice and we cannot pretend that nobody killed them. --Lysytalk 11:12, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
Yes, it can indeed be said about many people involved in war. We cannot say "used the opportunities offered by the war to commit violent acts against those they perceived as enemies" as this wording would mean voluntary and enthuasiastic participation in killings, when in fact Burys' people volunteered for escorting Jews to Ghettos, not for killings in Paneriai. Sigitas 12:49, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
Exactly what I meant. The "thousands of deaths" seems to be an oversimplification of the rather complex situation and may easily lead to misinterpretations. I'm not sure how to rephrase it in a NPOV, yet meaningful way, however. Maybe just remove this sentence from the lead ? --Lysytalk 10:25, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

I just wondering is this case is over? M.K. 09:17, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

This article is about the Home Army

BTW - why the academic name Home Army has been repalced by Armia Krajowa? How many people understand the name and know how to spell it?

The article is about an army. With all due respect to even 100 victims the article about the 300 000 organization cannot be dominated by such a subject. Even the Warsaw Uprising is linked, why not Lithuanian obsession? Xx236 15:33, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I don't quite understand you. Are you suggesting that the Lithuanian/Polish controversy over Armia Krajowa should be ignored ? I would certainly object that. --Lysytalk 15:50, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
Name of the article is discussed at #Requested move section. As for importance of Lithuanian aspect, I agree it is disproportional now and should be moved to it's own article with a summary here, but certainly it should be mentioned in this article (albeit in a shorter form), see #Focus section.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  17:03, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
OK, how about forking it into a separate article then ? --Lysytalk 17:14, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
Agree, per what I and others said above.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  21:52, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Tagged sentence

Would anyone object if the following sentence was removed... "Polish underground held a very negative attitude towards Lithuanians and independent Lithuanian state" This sentence doesn't have a reference and the mutual animosity is mentioned in the paragraph starting with "Although Lithuanian and Polish resistance movements had the same enemies - Nazi Germany and Soviet Union - they never became allies. The main obstacle in forming an alliance was the question of Vilnius..." Addhoc 19:19, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

I have no problem with removal, it is a strong sentence that would be controversial even if referenced.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  20:35, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
I'd like to hear an opinion from someone who put this sentence here (like informing him first), and even an explanation, why it is not referenced.It was one of crucial phrases, AFAIK, in this discussion.--Lokyz 20:47, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
I think the other paragraph that you mention already characterizes the situation and does it in a more comprehensive way. There's been animosity between Polish and Lithuanians since Poles took Vilnius in 1920s and it's obvious that the mutual attitude was rather negative. It only starts to change now, after almost a century. The sentence in question does not bring any new information to the article and is unnecessarily inflammatory, POV-biased and contains a speculative extrapolation. --Lysytalk 21:03, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
It was a fact supported by further referenced info on Polish plans to occupy Lithuania. Sigitas 10:35, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Ok, we can keep the sentence for now, although I agree with comments that it should be reworded to have a more formal, impartial tone. Addhoc 13:09, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
I don't really like the sentence as it has a very general and non-encyclopedic form, assumes that Polish underground was homogeneous, uses emotional but unspecific phrasing like "very" and seems to be a result of ethnic prejudices more than anything else. We can skip it for now if we can move forward, but I'd comment it out or tag it and return to it later in another pass. --Lysytalk 13:32, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Stepping back

Now section on AK in Lithuania is becomming more and more biased. Even personal opinions of single journalist are included as the certain facts. I'm stepping back for a while, we will see what decision of moderator will have regarding the actions of Piotrus. See the discussion on moderation page [47]. Sigitas 10:44, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

70-100 civilians

Sigitas, in the article you wrote: In total number of victims of Polish revenge action in the end of June of 1944 in Dubingiai and neighbouring towns of Joniškis, Inturkė, Bijutiškis, and Giedraičiai (town), was 70-100 Lithuanian civilians. Where did you get the 70 number from ? --Lysytalk 12:27, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

From Bubnys. He says, and I quote: "Especially brutally [AK] killed residents in Dubingiai area in the end of June of 1944. By an unfinished count, more than 70 peaceful Lithuanians, including old people and small children, were killed by Polish partisans". Zizas and Garsva say approximate number was 100. Sigitas 14:00, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Numbers

I tried to find some references for AK numbers. Membership are rather easy - from 250,000 to 380,000 for 1943/1944. However the numbers of those killed by AK and its casualties are more difficult. There are some unsourced numbers of wiki, but so far sources information I managed to find come from this pdf also accessible in this html form, official and referenced (but not inline) leaflet from Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. AK casualties are 34,000 up to mid-1944, plus 20,000-30,000 deported afterwards (no data on casualties after mid-1944). Polish wiki has an unsourced number for 100,000 casualties till 1944 and 50,000 deported or killed post-1944. But the number of those killed by AK is even a bigger mystery. The pdf states that 'partisant troops' (meaning AK) active from 1943 killed 1,000 Germans. Now, that seems rather low, especially considering the same document gives for example a number of 5,700 assassination attempts (it would seem that most of them were unsuccesfull and there were few unexpected casualties on the German side?). It seem to refer to German casualties from minor combat, and does not count their casualties from the Warsaw Uprising (10,000) mentioned later in the article, nor (I'd assume) casualties from the rest of the Operation Tempest actions. Even so, consider two other numbers we have on Wiki: Polish resistance movement in World War II states that Polish underground resistance killed 150,000 Germans. Granted, AK numbers would not count those from before 1943, but considering that non-affiliated units like AL were less then 1/5 of AK size totalled, we have a big discrepancy. Further, Polish contribution to World War II has another unsourced number, arguing for a significant increase in German casualties in Poland after creation of AK in 1943: German losses to the Polish partisans ranged at 850-1700 per month in early 1944 compared to about 250-320 per months in 1942. With some rough averages that gives us ~1,500 for 1939, ~3,000 for years 1940-1942 (~12,000 total) and ~16,000 for 1944. Let's throw ~10,000 for 1943 and 1945 and we get ~50,000 casualties, 1/3 of the 150,000, but more then 11,000 that canbe safely estimted from that pdf. Anyway, if you can dig up any more hard data, it would be much appreciated.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  21:24, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

This is rather consistent with AK activities in Lithuania. Engagements of AK and Germans were rare. AK generaly avoided conflicts with Germans. R. Zizas concludes, that military losses of germans inflicted by AK in eastern Lithuania did not correspond military potential of AK available. Sigitas 14:38, 15 September 2006 (UTC)
I am sure that since Germans used Lithuanian collaborators to relieve their troops for other duties, AK directed part of their actions againt Lithuanians. Whether 'most' of AK actions were against Germans or Lithuanian collaborators it is hard to say (do you have any data on that), and of course there is the issue of are losses among Axis powers (which would include collaborators) aren't sometimes abbreviated by some authors as Germans. Statistics can get pretty difficult in such cases. Btw, IIRC our discussions correcty historian estimates of Lithuanian casualties inflicted by AK range from 100 (Polish estimates) to 1000 (Lithuanian e.), right (not counting Vilnija claims, obviously)?-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  14:52, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Why one should not rely on soviet data

Based on Boradyn's "Niemen - rzeka niezgody":

"White Polish bands" burned villages of Turejsk and Zaborze. According to the (soviet) report, AK burned 350 houses, killing many civilians. From Polish statistical data it seems, that those villages had no more than 30 houses each. It's hard to believe they grown tenfold during 20 years. And from March the 15th order of "Krasnogwardiejski" unit it seems that 100 "White Poles" hide on roofs of houses of village of Turejsk - the same, which was burned 3 weeks earlier, according to report of Szupienia - shooting to Soviet partisans returning from economical operations. Szopen 13:58, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Economic operations? What a lovely euphemism... //Halibutt 15:26, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
Realy nice example of "bravery" in reports of Russian partisants, just please tell me what does it have to do with Legionas cited sources?--Lokyz 15:41, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
The reason I quoted it is quite simple. The AK in Belarus is also accused about killings of thousands of innocent Belarussian peasants. The main sources for that are soviet reports. The question is, what's the source for accusation of AK of killing of thousands of innocent Lithuanians? Also some reports, which are usually exxagerated at least threefolds, or some real, critical research? And if the numbers of killed in Belarus is inflated so highly, why shouldn't we suspect that the same thing is going with the data for AK victims in Lithuania? I am not saying the reports ARE exxagerated and the number of victims IS inflated - by please understand that I am naturally sceptic about any such accusations after reading about similar "AK crimes" in Belarus. Szopen 17:14, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
So you say, this one example is a proof that there was no killings by AK in Belarus? Or that for example Pranė Dundulienė is lying about kilings of Lithuanian civil population during Ostra Brama operation?--Lokyz 17:20, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
For the record: If you read Dundulienė's account you surely have noticed that she did not know if the murderers were from AK. What she saw is that they had white-red band on their arms and one of them was Lithuanian, Dzuk Sauliukas. I don't know about Lithuania, but in Ukraine it was a frequent practice of Soviet partisans to pretend that they were either AK or UPA. I'm not saying this happened here. It is likely, but not sure that the people she describes were indeed some unit of AK, but they could also be some Polish criminals that pretended to belong to the army. --Lysytalk 18:24, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
AFAIK criminals steal or kill on purpose. These men were deliberately looking for "Litwini są?" and executed them. Of course blame on Dundulienė for not asking those vilains for documents.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Lokyz (talk • contribs).
I think those that kill because of nationality are criminals as well. In fact she also noted that the murderers robbed one of the apartments, taking folk costumes, shoes etc. Anyway, there were many more organisation and individuals wearing white and red bands than AK alone. I have no reason to assume that these were or were not members of AK. Sadly, it seems they were Polish, and they hated Lithuanians. On the other hand the only single person that she recognized was Lithuanian (wearing a Polish sign ?) --Lysytalk 19:08, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
I'd assume that Szopen is refferign to Legionas argument from the medcab case, where he said that in addition to his book he also has (unspecified) "Soviet sources of the wartime". I think there is no doubt that Soviet sources have quite low reliablity and should be avoided if possible. The preffered sources are English academic ones.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  17:50, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
Yes! Exactly :-) In fact I searched for this info immedietely after seeing the mentioned "soviet sources of the wartime", but when I posted it here I forgot where I saw the sentence and even started to worry that there is something wrong with my memory and maybe I saw this sentence in some other forum :-D Thanks Piotrus. Szopen 11:04, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
I don't agree that Soviet sources have low reliabiality. There are plenty of Polish propaganda as well. It is work of historians to separate genuine information from the acts of propaganda. Sigitas 09:23, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
Here is one example of Polish propaganda: in Svencioniai area retaliating Germans killed around 100 people, Polish underground soon announced in the West that "thousands" Poles were killed (while people of different ethnicities were killed), and Lithuanians were blamed as the main executioners (from Rimantas Zizas. Armijos Krajovos veikla Lietuvoje 1942-1944 metais (Acitivies of Armia Krajowa in Lithuania in 1942-1944). Armija Krajova Lietuvoje, pp. 14-39. A. Bubnys, K. Garšva, E. Gečiauskas, J. Lebionka, J. Saudargienė, R. Zizas (editors). Vilnius – Kaunas, 1995.). This is obvious propaganda but it is not a reason to dismiss all Polish sources as "of low reliability". Sigitas 10:00, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
I think the problem is that while there are both genuine and fake information from the Polish side, the soviet sources are mostly only propaganda. That's what communism was built upon. --Lysytalk 10:29, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
Is it your opinion, or is it based on some research papers?--Lokyz 10:34, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
My opinion. --Lysytalk 11:12, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
Not really. While Soviet public information was almost always propaganda, secret information, not publically available, had no reason to have a propagandist nature. Sigitas 10:38, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
I beg to disagree. Much of the secret information was fabricated as well, for different reasons. --Lysytalk 11:31, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
Yes it is. A lot of "secret information" also was exxagerated, based on gossips or on wishful thinking. Szopen 11:04, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Soviet (and not only) 'twisting' of history is discussed in this very interesting book.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  15:34, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Problems with local sources

I have stated several times that in issues such as this we should avoid local sources (like Lithuanian AND Polish). I'd like to point out that the source Sigitas so heavily relies upon has been very negativly reviewed by Lysy at Talk:Glitiškės. It would be nice if Sigitas would reply to this review with an argument other then 'There is enough material published about how great AK was. This book about the dark side of AK helps to balance a view'.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  15:34, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

We don't need to avoid local sources as there is no such requirement in Wikipedia. Stop inventing new rules for Wikipedia. Most of the article is based on Polish sources, look what would happen if you'd strip it of references to Polish authors. Sigitas 12:58, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
Hi Sigitas, could you give your comments at Talk:Armia_Krajowa#Disputed_Paragraph. Thanks, Addhoc 13:10, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Vote

I would like to request a vote in order to end reverse war. Do wikipedians agree that a collection of articles, witness reports, and wartime documents Armija Krajova Lietuvoje (Armia Krajowa in Lithuania). A. Bubnys, K. Garšva, E. Gečiauskas, J. Lebionka, J. Saudargienė, R. Zizas (editors). Vilnius – Kaunas, 1995. is a valid source and facts provided in this book may be included in the article? Please provide the arguments if you don't agree. Sigitas 13:42, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Sigitas, I can't vote on validity of something I had not seen. Szopen 13:55, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
I second Szopen. Furthermore, if we are to have a poll which people will accept, we must do it properly. The guidelines are under Wikipedia:Straw polls. Most important point: Consensus must be reached about the nature of the survey before it starts. Allow about a week for this process. So, let us start discussing what the question for the survey should be. Balcer 14:00, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
Agreed, and let me point out to the review by Lysy at linked at #Problems with local sources.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  18:33, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
Scanned book [48]. Sigitas 09:52, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

My opinion, based on what I've seen so far is that they should be mentioned but since the authors seem to be controversial, their views should be attributed and the controversy should be explicitly stated when they are mentioned. As far as I know the point of view of Garšva and his findings are not confirmed by any independent research, which is a shame (but not surprise to me). Anyway, this should not be presented as an "ultimate truth". I would be also interested to see the opinion of other Lithuanian editors on this. --Lysytalk 10:38, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

This view is the only one existing in Lithuania. All Lithuanian historians confirm the AK crime facts and anti-Lithuanian position of AK. It is not controversial at all. Sigitas 10:02, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Garsva

Sigitas, I am reading the articles about Kazimieras Garsva. Well, the more I read about him, the less credible he seems. "Poland sent a desant of 300 priests" to Belarus, which are "ethnic Lithuanian territories", "Poland should apologise for occupation for Lithuania", "there were Red regime, Brown regime, and Polish regime", that planned meeting of Plechaviczius and AK men means that "Lithuanian soldiers sold themselves to Poles". POles living on Lithuania also reported that he consider all Poles in Lithuania in fact "polonised Lithuanians". One Pole reported that Garsva said to him in person "we will smoke you all out of Lithuania, like a rats". Hardly a man who I would consider an authority Szopen 07:21, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

I will not discuss the last anecdotal evidence, but everything else is generally truth. However, it is not a right place for discussing Lithuanian population polonisation trends, or Lithuanian ethnic lands abroad. Sigitas 10:12, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
Maybe it does not matter much if you, me or Sigitas consider Garšva to be an authority or not. Apparently some people do, as he's been member of an official Lithuanian investigation commission, as Sigitas explained. I think it's not appropriate to ignore his views if they seem to be shared by at least a group of Lithuanian historians. Their opinions should be mentioned and appropriately attributed. --Lysytalk 10:30, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
It would be nice if sb could write at least short bio stubs about those people, they certainly seem notable.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  13:24, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
No , Garsva wasn't a member of State commision. Members of state commision were: Zepkaite, Bubnys, Buchaveckas, Katuoka, Tamosiunas, Truska and Zizas. Sigitas 10:06, 28 September 2006 (UTC)