New Revelations from the Former Soviet Archives: The Kremlin, the Warsaw Uprising, and the Coming of the Cold War

Abstract

Using hitherto unavailable archival documents, this paper reveals the so-called ‘Soviet side’ of the Warsaw Uprising, 1944. These documents reveal that the Poles had repeatedly attempted to stage similar uprisings in other towns and cities when the Red Army was approaching. Polish rebels also actively resisted Soviet domination after the Red Army had liberated these cities. Moreover, Moscow knew well that Western Allied forces secretly participated in this ultimately anti-Soviet action. The British and the US governments trained the leaders of the Warsaw and other uprisings in military bases located in their own territories, although most of the training bases were located in the US. The British also parachuted these leaders into Warsaw shortly before the uprising. These and other facts presented in my work help us understand the perverted logic of the Kremlin's decision-making process with regard to the Warsaw Uprising, which functioned in more complex ways than is usually attributed to the power-thirsty Uncle Joe. These documents also reveal attitudes on the part of the Soviet and Western governments that eventually paved the way for the Cold War.