The Secret State Series #7
Story of a Secret State stands as one of the most poignant and inspiring memoirs of World War II and the Holocaust. With elements of a spy thriller, documenting his experiences in the Polish Underground, and as one of the first accounts of the systematic slaughter of the Jews by the German Nazis, this volume is a remarkable testimony of one man's courage and a nation's struggle for resistance against overwhelming oppression.
Karski was a brilliant young diplomat when war broke out in 1939 with Hitler's invasion of Poland. Taken prisoner by the Soviet Red Army, which had simultaneously invaded from the East, Karski narrowly escaped the subsequent Katyn Forest Massacre. He became a member of the Polish Underground, the most significant resistance movement in occupied Europe, acting as a liaison and courier between the Underground and the Polish government-in-exile. He was twice smuggled into the Warsaw Ghetto, and entered the Nazi's Izbica transit camp disguised as a guard, witnessing first-hand the horrors of the Holocaust.
Karski's courage and testimony, conveyed in a breathtaking manner in Story of a Secret State, offer the narrative of one of the world's greatest eyewitnesses and an inspiration for all of humanity, emboldening each of us to rise to the challenge of standing up against evil and for human rights. This definitive edition—which includes a foreword by Madeleine Albright, a biographical essay by Yale historian Timothy Snyder, an afterword by Zbigniew Brzezinski, previously unpublished photos, notes, further reading, and a glossary—is an apt legacy for this hero of conscience during the most fraught and fragile moment in modern history.
Karski was a brilliant young diplomat when war broke out in 1939 with Hitler's invasion of Poland. Taken prisoner by the Soviet Red Army, which had simultaneously invaded from the East, Karski narrowly escaped the subsequent Katyn Forest Massacre. He became a member of the Polish Underground, the most significant resistance movement in occupied Europe, acting as a liaison and courier between the Underground and the Polish government-in-exile. He was twice smuggled into the Warsaw Ghetto, and entered the Nazi's Izbica transit camp disguised as a guard, witnessing first-hand the horrors of the Holocaust.
Karski's courage and testimony, conveyed in a breathtaking manner in Story of a Secret State, offer the narrative of one of the world's greatest eyewitnesses and an inspiration for all of humanity, emboldening each of us to rise to the challenge of standing up against evil and for human rights. This definitive edition—which includes a foreword by Madeleine Albright, a biographical essay by Yale historian Timothy Snyder, an afterword by Zbigniew Brzezinski, previously unpublished photos, notes, further reading, and a glossary—is an apt legacy for this hero of conscience during the most fraught and fragile moment in modern history.
Jan Karski was born in ód , Poland, in 1914.
He received a degree in Law and Diplomatic Science in 1935 and served as a liaison officer of the Polish Underground during World War II. He carried the first eyewitness report of the Holocaust to a mostly unbelieving West, meeting with President Roosevelt in 1943 to plead for Allied intervention. Story of a Secret State was originally published in 1944, becoming a bestseller and Book of the Month Club selection. After the war, Karski earned his PhD at Georgetown University, where he served as a distinguished professor in the School of Foreign Service for forty years. He died in Washington, DC, in 2000. Karski has been recognized as Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem. In 2012, he was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by our President.
"His wartime saga as officer, as Soviet prisoner, as escapee, in the hands of the Gestapo, and as a Polish Underground activist and courier, is beyond remarkable. In a world today where words such as 'courage' and 'heroism' have been so overused—applied freely from sports to entertainment to politics as to be rendered practically meaningless—Jan Karski was the rare human being who embodied both."
He received a degree in Law and Diplomatic Science in 1935 and served as a liaison officer of the Polish Underground during World War II. He carried the first eyewitness report of the Holocaust to a mostly unbelieving West, meeting with President Roosevelt in 1943 to plead for Allied intervention. Story of a Secret State was originally published in 1944, becoming a bestseller and Book of the Month Club selection. After the war, Karski earned his PhD at Georgetown University, where he served as a distinguished professor in the School of Foreign Service for forty years. He died in Washington, DC, in 2000. Karski has been recognized as Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem. In 2012, he was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by our President.
"His wartime saga as officer, as Soviet prisoner, as escapee, in the hands of the Gestapo, and as a Polish Underground activist and courier, is beyond remarkable. In a world today where words such as 'courage' and 'heroism' have been so overused—applied freely from sports to entertainment to politics as to be rendered practically meaningless—Jan Karski was the rare human being who embodied both."
"In the words of James Russell Lowell's rousing hymn:
'Once to every man and nation, comes the moment to decide, in the strife of truth with falsehood, for the good or evil side.' Perhaps more than most of us, Jan Karski faced such a choice in the starkest of possible terms, and made his decision as courageously as one could. . . . Jan Karski was a patriot and a truth teller; may his words always be read and his legacy never forgotten.
"Secret State is an indispensable and compelling historical document of World War II and the Holocaust, written by a supremely courageous humanitarian."
"Secret State is an indispensable and compelling historical document of World War II and the Holocaust, written by a supremely courageous humanitarian."
The Secret State Series #7:
The Secret State #7 “Retribution”
Top Officer in WW2 to German Slave
by Jan Karski: Highlights and excerpts by PL Sturgis:
Top Officer in WW2 to German Slave
by Jan Karski: Highlights and excerpts by PL Sturgis:
The Secret state Series 1: “The Underground” by Jan Karski:
Introduction: During my four and a half months absence while captured by the Russians and the the Germans, Conditions in Poland had changed considerably. The first few conversations made me conscious of the fact that the consolidation of the underground had practically been achieved. The movement had crystallized into the major organization: The coalition of the four largest political parties;
1) The Peasants
2) The Socialist
3) The Christian Labor
4) The Nationalist.
This was the official military organization which had been recognized by the government as a military unit enjoying equal rights with the Polish Army in France. The most important need for that third party was to unite and agree on a chief delegate. The government was not interested in the personality of the candidate, nor his political affiliation, nor was he to become involved in party representation. The government would confirm the appointment of any individual who possessed authority and had the confidence of the population.
(hmmmm? 1940 sounds familiar in 2017)
The Polish underground State to which Karski belonged was under the authority of the Polish government in London. He admitted that besides this organization there were other organizations carrying on their activities under the direct influence of Moscow. Being the first active member of the Polish Underground and in the fortunate position to publish some aspect of its story, he hoped that it would encourage others to relate their experiences and that out of such narratives the free people all over the world would be able to form an objective opinion as to how the Polish people reacted during the years of German conquest.
Daily Bites of The Secret State Series #7:
Top Officer in WW2 to German Slave
“Retribution”
Bites #26-30,The Liaison Woman:
#27) Unforgettable Tragedies:
#28) Hidden Archives:
#29) All’s Fair in Love and War:
#30) Losing to Win:
by Jan Karski :
#26) The Liaison Woman:
During the course of my work in liaison I came to sympathize deeply with the liaison women. Their chief function was to facilitate contacts between underground workers. They were a vital link in our operation and in many ways more exposed than those they helped bring together. One general principle that worked for myself and others was to keep our private dwellings free from secret work as much as possible. No one was to know my private address except the closest members of my family and my personal liaison girl. When I slept no political action was prepared; no interviews were held; no compromising papers were kept. This gave us a minimum amount of security. If I wanted to contact a political leader whose assumed name I did not know, my liaison girl would search for him. If arrested she was unable to report us. Even if she were tortured she could not because her information was limited. She was therefore in constant danger. All the details of her life was known to many people. The average life of a liaison woman lasted only a few months. They were caught and put in Nazi jails and treated cruelly. It can be said: Of all the workers in the underground, the liaison women’s lot was the most severe; their sacrifices the greatest; and their underground work the least rewarded. They were over worked and doomed. They neither held high rank nor received honor for their heroism. Most of the liaison women, with whom I had the honor to work, endured the same fate as their sisters.
#27) Unforgettable Tragedies:
One unforgettable case is the one of this liaison girl, only 22 years old. I saw her frequently but knew very little about her. She was with us about 3 months and was a marvelous worker. She was caught by the Gestapo in a trolley car and had no chance to get rid of the documents she was carrying. A message smuggled out of the jail, after her first and only examination with the Nazis, described her condition. The Gestapo beasts stripped her to the skin and placed her on the floor. They tied her hands and legs to hooks and struck at her sex organs with rubber black jacks. This message from the prison read: “When they carried her away the lower half of her body was in shreds. There was another woman about 50 years old who had been with us for a long period. Before the war she taught French in one of the Warsaw High Schools. She associated herself with the underground almost at its inception. She was poor and lived with her husband in a modest apartment. Her husband, nearly 70, was unhealthy and unable to work. She had placed her home at the disposal of the Democratic Organization and acted as a liaison woman. My contacts with that organization were arranged by her. The Gestapo caught her red handed in her own apartment and arrested her husband also. They were both subjected to unspeakable torture. Her husband died at the first examination. On her third examination they had to carry her to a cell with 4 other women. The next morning they found her hanging from a beam in the ceiling. She had used her own shirt waist for a rope.
#28) When to Die is Gain:
The liaison woman’s desire to die, following the murder of her husband by the Gestapo, and the torture they caused her, was so important that it surpassed the pain. She hung herself in the cell while 4 other women slept and heard not a single groan from her lips. Later I asked a physician if this were possible. He replied in the negative. He informed me that one who commits suicide always loses consciousness and self preservation begins to function. But in this case I know, without a doubt, the instinct must have been counteracted by a strange force. The liaison women suffered more than the majority of other women but the war has worked its hardship on all the women of Poland. For the mothers, daughters, wives of men in the underground, misery was their daily lot. If they did not actively participate themselves, then their torment was all the greater. They had no way of gauging danger nor sensing the approach of tragedy. they expected it constantly and never knew a moment’s peace. If the wife of an underground man lived with her husband and he was arrested she was arrested too. Even though she had taken no part in the work she was tortured and the attempt was made to pry loose from her secrets which they were unable to get from her husband. They died unvoluntary martyrs; unfortunate women who knew nothing but happened to be the wives of good courageous men.
#29) All’s Fair in Love and War:
It became a generally accepted rule, at least for the wives of the Leaders in the underground, to live under assumed names. They lived in concealment as the men did; constantly moving about and away from their friends and family, harrassed by fear and uncertainty. the worst part of it for the women was that they were unsuited for the underground work and would never have been chosen as a member for underground work but were forced to share the lives of their husbands. The innocent landladies who harbored cells of the underground workers, often without even knowing it were frequently dragged off like thin wailing shadows with the men they harbored who were caught by the Gestapos. Pitiful too, were the girls who served as distributors of the underground press and rushed about with the material they hid on their persons or in their hand bags. The distribution was single mechanical work and women were frequently used. I remember a thin attractive girl who used to come into my office punctually two times a week. Always arriving breathlessly. She was quiet and shy and looked frightfully tired and overworked. I asked her how many people she delivered the papers to and she said 12o two times a week for the past three years. “You must be tired of it?” I asked. “No!” she said, “But I do wish the war would be over and I could stay in one place with the papers while the people come to me to buy them.” I hardly knew what to say to her. She considered herself fortunate compared to this woman she knew well who had to stay with the Germans. There are women who are to blame for siding with the Germans but there are those who have no choice.
#30) Losing to Win:
There was a woman who lived in a moderately well furnished two room apartment. Her husband had been in the army and at that time was in a German prison camp. she was an average middle class woman, neither more nor less patriotic than the average Polish woman. She subscribed to the secret underground press but also did everything demanded of her by the Gestapo. A few months ago the Germans had inflicted a tenant on her. He was a middle aged magistrate worker. This, in itself, was disgraceful but since she had no place to go she was compelled to remain. Besides she clung to her few worldly possessions and hoped if she stayed to watch them she could help her country in some way. The German was only too pleased to allow her to stay. Germans liked to be comfortable and he wanted to have the neat tireless woman to keep house. After he had gotten acquainted with her he invited her to a cafe where he listened to music. She refused five times. On the sixth time when she refused he had gotten very angry. He informed her that if she did not go to the cafe with him that he would have her put out of her house and put in a concentration camp. The woman had no choice whatsoever! What would you expect her to do? She is an unfortunate, average woman who wants to live through the war and wait for her husband. The German would have had her arrested. She had no one to whom she could turn. She was not a member of the underground. As she went and sat there in the cafe, men called her ugly names, never once thinking of her bitter humiliation. There she sits ....frightened of them and of the Germans...Still she risks buying the secret underground press and hides it in a secret compartment of her purse...hoping for good news...waiting for her husband’s return and once more...a Free Poland. Yes, women suffer in this war as much as the men.
(end of Series 7)
Preview of Secret State: Series 8:
Jan Karski: It had been necessary for me to secure the services of a liaison boy. (one who delivers messages in the underground) I turned up with a boy named Tad Lisowski. In a strange way, I knew his family before the war. They were then very wealthy people who owned an estate and received rent from two apartment houses in Warsaw. Mrs. Lisowski was a small dark haired lady who had the energy of a dynamo.
Preview of Secret State: Series 8:
Listen to this! Just like here today except this was written in 1944 just after the war ended: Daily Bites of The secret State: Series 8: “Underground Schools” By Jan Karski:
#1) Demoralizing the Polish Youth:
Jan Karski: It had been necessary for me to secure the services of a liaison boy. (one who delivers messages in the underground) I turned up with a boy named Tad Lisowski. In a strange way, I knew his family before the war. They were then very wealthy people who owned an estate and received rent from two apartment houses in Warsaw. Mrs. Lisowski was a small dark haired lady who had the energy of a dynamo.
She kept perfect order in her home that was always filled with visitors. She managed affairs of her family, attended church faithfully, and found time for charity and social work. Mr. Lisowski though would go on a spree and disappear for weeks. After the war the Lisowski’s finances rapidly deteriorated and their estate was confiscated. The children were rapidly succumbing to the influence of shiftless companions and the invidious German propaganda which aimed at the utter demoralization of Polish youth by encouraging their interest in pornagraphic books.
Tad was only one of the many youths of Poland which constituted a tragic problem to the underground authorities in education. Since our educational facilities were extremely limited, moral and material assistance was extended only to those whose character and patriotism most deserved that advantage. We had to educate, first of all, that section of Polish youth which would provide us with suitable candidates for underground work, We were compelled to ignore those which stood in the greatest need for attention. Once boys and girls had compromised themselves by yielding to the Nazi blandishment, or if they showed evidence to irregular habits
To be continued...Series 8 of the Secret State: “Underground Schools” By Jan Karski:
(to be continued) ....
(To be continued )
Daily Bites of The Secret State Series #8
“Underground Schools”
Top Officer in WW2 to German Slave
#2) A Mother’s Concern:
#3) A Family Tradition:
#4) Tad’s First Lesson:
#5) Tough Love:
by Jan Karski 1944 :
“From The Secret State”
#1) The Spirit of Resistance:
#2) Never Forgotten: Never Forgiven:
#3) Confiscating Children:
#4) Ten Commandments of Resistance:
#5) Ferocious Retaliation:
#6) Germicide the Germans:
#7) Testing True Patriots:
#8) Labor Camps:
#9) The ends Justifying the Means:
#10) War Bonds:
#11) The Secret Press:
#12) The Hidden Printing Machines:
#13) The Hidden Printing Machines:
#14) Secret Codes:
#15) From the Closest to the Roof tops:
#16) The Printing Press Invasion:
#17) The Printing Press Invasions:
#18) The Three System of Selling:
#19) The Lord’s Prayer of the Polish Underground:
#20) Our Daily Bread:
#21) Forbidden Books:
#22) In Bold Print:
#23) Trees Hidden in the Forest:
#24) Hidden Archives:
#25) Tension at the Top:
#26) The Liaison Woman:
#27) Unforgettable Tragedies:
#28) Hidden Archives:
#29) All’s Fair in Love and War:
#30) Losing to Win:
LibertygroupFreedom
https://redd.it/6y400k
“Retribution”
Top Officer in WW2 to German Slave
Top Officer in WW2 to German Slave
"FIGHTING FOR FREEDOM AND LIBERTY"
Stand Up To Government Corruption and Hypocrisy
NEVER FORGET THE SACRIFICES
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