Freedom and Independence

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Zrzeszenie Wolność i Niezawisłość WiN (Freedom and Independence) was Polish underground anticommunist organisation founded September 2, 1945 and active to 1952.

The main goal of its activity was to avoid Soviet domination over Poland and to defend civilians from communism. Its primary method was not military action against the state but rather to provide protection (false documents, money) for former soldiers of Armia Krajowa and other resistance organizations not allied to Soviets and thus treated by them as enemies of the state.

WiN announced the falsification of the Polish people's referendum, 1946 to UN Security Council.

It was prosecuted by Russians and Polish communists. NKVD soldiers and Ministerstwo Bezpieczeństwa Publicznego agents carried out a bloody war with its 30,000 men in Mazowsze and Lubelskie region. WiN's soldiers liberated many Russian jails in Poland, killed collaborators and communist agents as well. The organization was however penetrated by UB agents, with major deconspiration as early as late 1945.

[edit] WiN's presidents

since September 2, 1945 to November 5, 1945 colonel Jan Rzepecki

since November 1945 to October 18, 1946 colonel Franciszek Niepokólczycki

since October 1946 to January 5, 1947 lieutenant colonel Wincenty Kwieciński

since January 1947 November 1947 lieutenant colonel Łukasz Ciepliński

[edit] References

(Polish) Wnuk, Rafał (2002). ""Polska konspiracja antysowiecka na Kresach Wschodnich II RP w latach 1939-1941 i 1944-1952" (Polish Anti-Soviet Conspiracy in the Eastern Borderlands of the Second Polish Republic, 1939-1941 and 1944-1952)", "Tygiel narodów" (Melting Pot of Nations) (in Polish). Warszawa / London: ISP PAN / RYTM, pp. 157-251. ISBN 8388794728.