Tragedy of WWII should never reoccur - president

The ceremony marking the 80th anniversary of the outbreak of World War II (Sept. 1, 1939) took place on Warsaw's central Pilsudskiego Square. In attendance were 40 foreign delegations, including presidents, prime ministers, parliament heads, foreign ministers, defence ministers and representatives of Europe's royal houses. Besides Duda, the speakers included German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and US Vice-President Mike Pence.

In his address, Duda said the international community had the duty to prevent the reoccurrence of tragic armed conflicts like World War II and stressed that such counter-measures needed to be pursued with determination. He added that the Poles belonged to the nations that the war had permanently stigmatised.

"It is our responsibility and we must be determined to prevent armed aggression and the tragedy of World War II from repeating itself. (The war's stigma on the Poles - PAP) is still embedded in many souls, it is visible in many places, in still war-scarred architecture, in the many cities that lost their beauty due to wartime destruction and which couldn't be rebuilt to their original form through lack of funding," Duda said.

Duda recounted that the war began with an attack on a military depot on the northern-Polish Westerplatte Peninsula near Gdansk, and the bombing of the then western-Polish town of Wielun, which was defenceless against the air raid as it possessed no defence facilities.

"World War II began here in Poland on September 1, 1939, with Nazi Germany's attack on a Polish military depot on Westerplatte and a simultaneous attack on a sleeping town, a town completely unprepared to defend itself, which had no military force nor defence installations, which was simply full of peacefully sleeping people - the small Polish town of Wielun," Duda said.

He stated that throughout the war the Poles never surrendered although their country had been wiped off the map. In this context he also spoke about the September 17, 1939, attack on Poland by Soviet Russia, which placed Poland in a clinch between the Germans and Soviets, and remarked that Poland's allies, on whose help Poland counted on in the situation, formally declared war on Nazi Germany but in fact never came to Poland's aid.

"First we were invaded by Nazi Germany, which pushed the Polish forces eastward, then, on September 17, the Soviet Union attacked us treacherously as (...) an ally of the Germans. And the Polish army found itself in a clinch. We all knew then that we would not be able to manage this alone. We counted on help from our allies, who did declare war on Germany, but whose help, in fact, never came," the president said, adding that if Poland had received allied aid history may have taken a different course.

Duda also recalled Poland's wartime history, especially the terror to which the Germans subjected the Poles, and said that death camps, including the notorious Auschwitz camp which served as the main Holocaust site, were erected by the Germans on Polish soil.

"The country disappeared, along came the German occupation, the General Government was established and the whole nation was put under absolute terror, with practically no one sure of their next minute or hour. Ordinary, innocent people were rounded up on the streets, hoarded into lorries and deported to concentration camps, prisons and forced labour in Germany. They were tortured and tormented, families were separated, children were taken away. (Polish Jews - PAP) were confined in ghettos (...) and were treated like sub-humans. They were killed, starved, and finally subjected to total annihilation in the concentration camps," Duda said.

He also stated that Nazi persecution also embraced Roma, Soviet POWs and people of other nationalities brought to Nazi death camps in Poland.

In his address, Duda also mentioned the 1940 Katyn Forest Massacre of 22,000 Polish POWs by the Soviet NKVD security service, calling it a "terrible hecatomb for the Polish nation".

The Polish president also said that Polish forces fought alongside the Allies on all World War II fronts, and in this connection recalled the much-admired Polish squadrons that fought in RAF ranks during the Battle of Britain. He also mentioned the Poles' role in the Allies' victorious Battle of Monte Cassino and the liberation of cities in France, Holland and Belgium.

Duda also mentioned the 1944 Warsaw Uprising in which the city's population rose against the Germans despite having no chance of victory. Duda stressed that the insurgents were so intent on freeing themselves from the Germans that they were ready to go into battle unarmed and die.

Duda thanked the wartime Allies for their aid to Poland and stressed that their support also helped in the later development of the Solidarity Union which ultimately overthrew Poland's post-war-imposed communist regime.

According to Duda humanity has not drawn a sufficient lesson from the war as there were still instances of ethnic purging and genocide worldwide. He added that remembrance of World War II served to prevent similar suffering in the future, and in this connection warned against rising imperialist tendencies in Europe. As examples of the latter he named the 2008 Russian-Georgian conflict and the 2014 annexation of Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula by Russia.

During the ceremonies, a ceremonial "Remembrance and Warning" bell was rung on Pilsudskiego Square. The bell will be installed later in Wielun, the first town targeted by Nazi German planes during WWII.

All delegations laid flowers at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Pilsudskiego Square.

German diplomatic posts flew their flags at half-mast on Sunday as a sign of "shame and pain", German Ambassador to Poland Rolf Nikel said on Twitter.

An ecumenical Polish-German service was held at Warsaw's Holy Trinity Evangelical Church under the motto "responsible for reconciliation and future." (PAP)
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