Polish People's Army

This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these template messages) This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Polish People's Army" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (August 2021) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in Polish. (August 2021) Click for important translation instructions. View a machine-translated version of the Polish article. Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia. Consider adding a topic to this template: there are already 1,456 articles in the main category, and specifying|topic= will aid in categorization. Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article. You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is Content in this edit is translated from the existing Polish Wikipedia article at ]; see its history for attribution. You may also add the template {{Translated|pl|Ludowe Wojsko Polskie}} to the talk page. For more guidance, see Wikipedia:Translation. (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

Polish People's Army
Ludowe Wojsko Polskie
Emblem worn by LWP soldiers
Active	May 1943 - December 1989
Country	Polish People's Republic (1947–1989)
Allegiance	Polish People's Republic
Branch	Air Force of the Polish Army (1943–1947) Polish Air Force (1947-1989) Polish Air Defence Force (1962-1989) Polish Land Forces Polish Navy
Size	200,000 (1945)
Headquarters	Seltsy, RSFSR, Soviet Union (1943-1945) Warsaw, Polish People's Republic (1945-1989)
Patron	Tadeusz Kościuszko
Engagements	World War II - Eastern Front Battle of Lenino Operation Bagration Lublin-Brest Offensive Warsaw Uprising Battle of Studzianki Vistula–Oder Offensive Battle of Poznań East Pomeranian Offensive Battle of Kolberg Battle of Berlin Battle of the Seelow Heights Battle of Bautzen Prague Offensive Aftermath of World War II Anti-Communist Insurgency Polish-Ukrainian ethnic conflict (1945-1947) Czechoslovak Border Conflicts Invasion of Czechoslovakia
Battle honours	For Warsaw For Battle of Berlin
Commanders
First Secretary	Mieczysław Rakowski (last)
Prime Minister	Tadeusz Mazowiecki (last)
Minister of National Defence	Florian Siwicki (last)
Chief of the General Staff	Józef Użycki (last)

The Polish People's Army (Polish: Ludowe Wojsko Polskie, pronounced [luˈdɔvɛ ˈvɔjskɔ ˈpɔlskʲɛ]; LWP) constituted the second formation of the Polish Armed Forces in the East in 1943–1945, and in 1945–1989 the armed forces of the Polish communist state (from 1952, the Polish People's Republic), ruled by the Polish Workers' Party and then the Polish United Workers' Party. The communist-led Polish armed forces, allowed and facilitated by Joseph Stalin, were the result of efforts made in the early 1940s in the Soviet Union by Wanda Wasilewska and Zygmunt Berling.

The official name of those formations were: Armia Polska w ZSRR (Polish Army in the USSR) from 1943 to 1944, Wojsko Polskie (Polish Troops) and Siły Zbrojne Rzeczpospolitej Polskiej (Armed Forces of the Republic of Poland) from 1944 to 1952 and from 1952 Siły Zbrojne Polskiej Rzeczypospolitej Ludowej (Armed Forces of the Polish People's Republic). On 7 October 1950, the anniversary of the Battle of Lenino was declared the official "Day of the Polish People's Army" by the authorities of the People's Republic.

History

World War II

What became the LWP was formed during World War II, in May 1943, as the 1st Tadeusz Kościuszko Infantry Division, which developed into the First Polish Army, unofficially known as Berling's Army. Because of the shortage of Polish officers and the policies of the Soviet Union, in March 1945 Soviet Red Army officers accounted for nearly 52% of the officer corps (15,492 out of 29,372). Around 4,600 of them remained in the LWP by July 1946.

It was not the only Polish formation that fought on the Allied side, nor the first one formed in the East. The earlier Polish force formed in the Soviet Union, known as Anders' Army, was loyal to the Polish government-in-exile and by that time had moved to Iran. The communist-led Polish forces soon grew beyond the 1st Division into two major commands – the First Polish Army (initially under Zygmunt Berling) and the Second Polish Army (commanded by Karol Świerczewski). The First Polish Army participated in the Vistula–Oder Offensive, the Battle of Kolberg and the final Battle of Berlin.

Immediate post-war years

After the war the Polish Army was reorganized into six (later seven) military districts. These were the Warsaw Military District, headquartered (HQ) in Warsaw, the Lublin Military District, HQ in Lublin, the Kraków Military District, HQ in Kraków, the Łódź Military District, HQ in Łódź, the Poznań Military District, HQ in Poznań, the Pomeranian Military District, HQ in Toruń, and the Silesian Military District, HQ in Katowice.^{[citation needed]}

In the late 1940s and early 1950s, the Polish Army was under the command of Marshal of the Soviet Union, Marshal of Poland and Minister of Defense of Poland Konstantin Rokossovsky. It was increasingly integrated into Soviet military structure and organization. This process was mitigated in the aftermath of the Polish October of 1956, when Władysław Gomułka formalized aspects of Poland's military relationship with the Soviet Union. The Sovietization of the armed forces structure was phased out altogether and thus the combat and service support structures were integrated once more into regular combat formations following the old Polish model.

Cold War

An anti-Zionist purge in the Polish Army took place in 1968 to systematically remove soldiers of Jewish origin, following the Six-Day War between Israel and Arab countries.

Characteristics

Uniform

In 1949, the first fundamental uniform reform after the war was made. The "Dress Rules for the Soldiers of the Polish Army" were introduced and were to apply from January 1, 1951.

In the Polish People's Army, a soft field cap modeled on the pre-war one was introduced. After the war, the pre-war garrison caps were used again. Stiffened caps were only worn until around 1950 when they were completely replaced by round caps. In 1982, the Polish Rogatywka, modeled on the pattern from 1935, were restored in the Polish Army's Representative Company.

Chaplaincy

Throughout the entire period of the existence of the Polish People's Army, its officers and soldiers were provided with pastoral care. Such a service was provided by the General Dean's Office of the Polish Army.

Training

In the 1980s, the Polish People's Republic had 4 military academies and 11 higher officers' schools, which trained auxiliary corpsmen and corresponded in rank to higher educational institutions. In 1954, judo instructors from the Warsaw and Kraków institutes of physical culture, participated in the training program for border guards and military personnel of the airborne units of the Polish army.

Engagements

• Battle of Lenino - 1943
• Battle of Studzianki - 1944
• Vistula-Oder offensive - 1945
• Battle of Kolberg - 1945
• Battle of Bautzen - 1945
• Battle of Berlin - 1945
• Anti-communist resistance in Poland (1944–1946)
• Battles for Bircza - 1945-1946
• Operation Vistula - 1947
• Poznań protests of 1956
• Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia - 1968
• Polish protests of 1970
• Pacification of Wujek - 1981
• Martial law in Poland (13 December 1981 – 22 July 1983)

See also

• Air Force of the Polish Army
• Polish Armed Forces
• Polish Armed Forces (Second Polish Republic)
• Main Directorate of Information of the Polish Army (GZI WP)
• Internal Military Service (WSW)
• Border Protection Troops (WOP)
• Polish Legions (Napoleonic period)
• Polish Military Organisation
• Armia Ludowa
• Gwardia Ludowa
• Polish forces in the West
• Polish forces in the East
  • Anders' Army
• First Polish Army (1944–1945)

References

External links

• Maps showing the LWP positioning
• Personnel policy of the LWP in the post-war period