Useful Notes / Poles with Poleaxes

"For my Poles, nothing is impossible." - Napoleon

For your freedom and ours.

—Joachim Lelewel, referring to Polish armies in exile.

Siły Zbrojne Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej, Armed Forces of the Republic of Poland.

Note: For the rest of this article, please play this song on loop while reading.

Historically, the geography and politics of Eastern Europe resulted in ways of warfare much different than in the West. In the earliest era of Polish history, the core of the military force consisted of the ruler's personal retainers, aided by footman levies, but over the course of several centuries this model was replaced by more typical feudal military. For some time, the Polish military didn't differ by much from their Western counterparts, but as Poland's attention turned eastward, so did change the ways of waging war. Most notable among Polish military quirks is the peculiar brand of Hussars, which traded being light cavalry for wings strapped to the back. From the late medieval to The Partitions Polish army was composed predominantly of cavalry that was usually formed of nobles and their retainers (and thus resembling medieval army model which became obsolete in Europe somewhere around mid-17th century). The noble cavalry wasn't the only tool of a Commonwealth general — due to the diversity of fighting styles preferred by its enemies, there was a need for variety, and his host could include commoner infantry, all manner of Western-style mercenaries, and Tatar or Cossack auxiliaries, and little known as it is, Poland had its artillery developed very well. Still, the general model resulted in very well-trained but unruly and poorly organized forces.

The end of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the loss of independence in the late 18th Century (between 1795 and 1918 Poland was divided between Russia, Prussia/Germany and Austria/Austro-Hungarian Empire) didn't exactly turn Poles into pacifists, either. This period saw the infatuation with Sinister Scythe in several uprisings, and Poles (and with them, once more, the Polish cavalry which shone on many battlefields of the time) were amongst the most loyal allies of Napoléon Bonaparte. Poles also served across the world as exiles; Casimir Pulaski and Tadeusz Kościuszko being two notable examples, serving in the Continental Army of the infant United States during The American Revolution. Pulaski is commemorated as "the father of American cavalry".

Of course, Polish officers also served in the armies of the partitioning powers — for obvious reasons, this is not as well-known, but that actually didn't carry as much stigma as you'd expect and some of them gained quite the name in their service.

After regaining independence in 1918, Polish Army faced the task to integrate organization, tactics and equipment from the three different armies. This proved quite a task, but after several years their army was well unified and organized, and it was more than capable of fighting the Soviet Union to a draw — the unit Stalin was attached to, as a commissar, was humiliated in a Curb-Stomp Battle outside Warsaw in 1921. Contrary to popular belief, Poland's pre-war army was actually fairly cutting-edge where it could afford it (making effective use of mechanised-cavalry units in a mobile defense). However, the country sorely lacked artillery and aeroplanes and more importantly had inadequate doctrine and high-level command experience of prosecuting a large-scale war (something common to many contemporary countries including Romania and Japan).

Interestingly, it was Poland's effective use of mechanised-cavalry forces for several successful counter-attacks upon German motorised units that served as the basis for Germany's "horses charging at tanks" propaganda. Given the German Army's near-total reliance on cavalry for their logistical apparatus this denigration of the horse in Nazi propaganda seems rather odd, but is understandable given the 'futurist'/'technocratic' aesthetic of the movement. German and Soviet forces went on to use horses in logistics and combat (particularly reconnaissance) capacities throughout the war, with German reliance upon them increasing over time due to losses.

The Polish military were "The First to Fight" in World War II^note On the Allied side; On the Axis', the first shots are traditionally said to have been fired by the German battleship Schleswig-Holstein, in Danzig (now Gdansk), playing a major role in the Battle of Britain and having their own version of La Résistance (counting as much as a million people, several hundred thousands at once at its peak and maintained a whole functioning government, complete with postal and tax services, in form of the Polish Underground State functioning in secrecy right under the noses of the occupying Germans). The Polish state maintained the overall largest partisan movement in history, in fact (Tito's Balkan resistance was larger in absolute numbers past ~1943, though it didn't have the state infrastructure as developed). They also gave a great deal of Intelligence support having some of the best field agents in Europe, and cryptographers who were Good with Numbers (they actually broke the merchant version of the Enigma code and thus greatly contributed to the joint effort of breaking the military one). It is worth noting that a large part of the Polish La Résistance consisted of soldiers and officers (many of them veterans of the First World War) who decided not to surrender and continued to fight as partisans. Polish troops that had successfully withdrawn from occupied territory were later formed into many units fighting along the Allies, usually British. Among the best known are the 1st Independent Parachute Brigade (Market-Garden), 303 Squadron (the highest-scoring squadron in the Battle of Britain), the Polish Independent Highland Brigade (Narvik Campaign), the Polish Independent Carpathian Brigade (Siege of Tobruk), the 1st Armored Division (Falaise pocket) and the Polish II Corps (Italian Campaign), which notably included a bear named Private Wojtek among their enlisted men (he didn't fight, but he did carry crates of artillery shells). During WWII Poland lost nearly 17% of its pre-war population during the war and subsequent occupations (the second-highest casualty rate of WWII), and held out against the simultaneous invasions of USSR and Germany longer than France would in 1940.

During the communism years, the Soviet way of doing things was imposed on Warsaw Pact member Poland. Since the end of communism, Poland abolished conscription and is moving to NATO standards. The modern Polish military is therefore a volunteer force consisting of five branches: apart from the Army, Navy, and Air Force, there are the separate branches of the Special Forces and the Territorial Defense.

Nowadays, the Polish military still uses a lot of Soviet-built equipment (like MiG-29 and Su-22 planes, Mi-24 helicopters, BWP-1 infantry fighting vehicles, 2S1 howitzers, Kilo class submarines and small arms) but is rapidly acquiring/already have American stuff (like F-16 fighters, Kobben class submarines, Oliver Hazard Perry class frigates, Leopard 2A4/5 tanks, C-130 Hercules/C-295 cargo planes, Spike ATGMs, AGM-154C JSOW cruise missiles), modernize its current equipment (for example PT-91 Twardy tanks and WR-40 Langusta MLRS which are upgrades of T-72 and BM-21) and have, builds and designs its own stuff (like W-3 Sokół and SW-4 Puszczyk helicopters, PZL-130 Orlik trainer planes, PL-01 Concept light tank, MSBS Grot assault rifle, light armored vehicles, trucks, artillery, firearms and many more).

In 2012, there were negotiations about building a part of the U.S. anti-missile shield (an idea proposed by theBush administration) in Poland, Poland having even made quite a fuss over it. The Polish reasoning was that having American forces on Polish soil would ensure that the Americans would be more likely to move in case anybody threatens Poland, similar to how American forces stationed in South Korea would be forced to respond to a North Korean attack. (Seeing what happened to Poland throughout the 20th century, it's at least understandable).

Although not much really came from it back then, there is some small chance of resumption of talks about this topic, due to the neighboring full scale war in Ukraine waged by Vladimir Putin's Russia since early 2022. Moreover, Poland's vehicle arsenals are looking more and more empty as their Soviet-era tanks, vehicles, and infantry weapons mysteriously found their way into the hands of Ukraine's army and territorial defense brigades. With all of this newly freed space in the garage, Poland has further increased its defense spending to 5% of GDP, the largest percentage of any NATO state (this includes the United States) and gone on a bit of a shopping spree. The Polish government has ordered 18 fully built HIMARS units and 468 HIMARS launchers (literally just the weapon without the transport truck) after seeing the results less than 20 of them have produced in Ukraine, 32 F-35A Lightning aircraft, and 400 M1 Abrams tanks remain on order from the United States.

But even America's armaments suppliers can't keep up with Poland's demands for modern weapons, so the Polish government went shopping abroad for further suppliers and, shocking most of the world, met the Republic of Korea. South Korea signed its largest arms export contract in the history of the nation with Poland for 288 K239 Chunmoo multiple rocket launchers, 672 K9 Thunder self-propelled artillery vehicles, 48 T-50 Golden Eagle light attack jets, several hundred Daewoo K4 belt-fed grenade launchers, and a sweetheart contract to produce 820 of the South Korean K2 Black Panther main battle tank locally in Poland- something unheard of in international arms deals. A further 180 will be built and shipped from Korea while the factory line gets set up. This spending and armament spree virtually guarantees a greater amount of exercises with allied nations and developing plans in the event of attack on Poland or on the Baltic countries. To crew all of these weapons, Poland has further planned to enlist 300,000 men and women into the Polish Armed Forces by 2035. In addition to all of this, there is active discussion of reorganizing the Territorial Defense Brigades with modern small arms and training for those who fall just outside optimal military service age but could still help in a crisis situation defend the homeland. Unless something gets in the way of its plans, then by the end of 2024 Poland may rightly be considered to have the largest modern army of Europe.

Since its entry to NATO in 1999, the Polish Army has participated and participates in numerous peacekeeping, humanitarian, police, training and observational missions in Europe, Africa and Asia (especially in Kosovo, Iraq, Chad and Afghanistan). It also sent a small contingent of soldiers (with British and Americans) to train Ukrainian officers.

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Current equipment of Polish Armed Forces consists:

• Land Forces:
  • 65000 active personnel
  • Over 158000 firearms (handguns, submachine guns, assault and sniper rifles, machine guns, including those mounted on vehicles), recoilless rifles and grenade launchers (plus much more stored)
  • Over 5000 man-portable/vehicle mounted anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles (Strzała-2, Grom/Piorun, Malyutka, Fagot, Metis, Spike)
  • About 675 operational tanks (Leopard 2, PT-91 Twardy, T-72) plus about 300 in storage; 1000 K2 Black Panthers on order from South Korea.
  • About 1425 infantry fighting vehicles and armoured personal carriers (BWP-1, KTO Rosomak, MT-LB)
  • About 645 light armored vehicles (HMMWV, many versions of BRDM-2, AMZ Dzik, Scorpion-3)
  • About 1200 artillery pieces - mortars (LM-60 Pluton, M-98, Wz. 38/43, 2B11), howizters (2S1 Godździk, Wz. 1977 Dana, Krab), MLRSs (BM-21 Grad, RM-70, WR-40 Langusta)
  • About 660 stationary and mobile anti-air artillery and anti-aircraft missile launchers (ZU-23-2, ZSU-23-4 Szyłka/Biała, Hibernyt, PZA Loara, Popard, Kub, Osa, Wega, Newa)
  • About 140 anti-tank vehicles
  • About 171 armoured recovery vehicles (WZT-2, WZT-3M, WPT Mors, Bergepanzer 2)
  • About 390 military engineering vehicles
  • About 11000 trucks, all-terrain utility vehicles and ambulances
  • About 500 command vehicles
  • About 50 radiolocation stations
  • 162 combat, multipurpose and transport helicopters (Mi-24, Mi-2, W-3 Sokół, Mi-8/17)
  • 33 Unmaned Aerial Vehicles

• Air Force:
  • 16400 active personnel
  • 111 combat aircrafts (F-16, MiG-29, Su-22, T-50)
  • 46 transport aircrafts (An-28, M28 Bryza, CASA C-295, C-130 Hercules)
  • 83 trainer aircraft (TS-11 Iskra, PZL-130 Orlik, Diamond DA20)
  • 127 transport, utility, rescue and trainer helicpoters (Mi-2, Mi-8/17, W-3 Sokół, SW-4 Puszczyk, Guimbal Cabri G2)

• Navy:
  • 18000 active personnel
  • 2 Oliver Hazard Perry class frigates
  • 1 Kaszub class corvette
  • 3 Orkan class fast attack missile craft
  • 1 Kilo class and 4 Kobben class submarines
  • 3 Projekt 206FM class, 12 Gardno class and 4 Mamry class minehunters/minesweepers
  • 5 Lublin class transport ships/mine layers
  • 2 Piast class and 2 Zbyszko class salvage ships
  • 1 Kontradmiral Xawery Czernicki class , 1 Bałtyk class, 2 Heweliusz class, 1 Moma class, 2 Nawigator class auxiliary ships
  • 2 Wodnik class, 3 Podchorązy class, 1 Iskra class training ships
  • Over 40 other small ships and yachts
  • 30 anti-submarine, tansport, utility and SAR helicopters (Kaman SH-2, Mi-2, Mi-14, Mi-17, W-3)
  • 14 patrol and utility aricraft (M28B Bryza)

• Special Forces:
  • About 2600 active personel divided into six unit (Agat, Formoza, Grom, Nil, Jednostka Wojskowa Komandosów, 7th Special Operations Squad) under Special Troops Command lead

Some minor facts:

• In case you're curious: Poles weren't exactly known for their use of poleaxes ("Poles with polearms" would be more appropriate title), but they had their share of them. They were used mostly by the commoner infantry, often Russian-style as support for their muskets.
• The "Charging Tanks on Horseback" thing has a true core; there actually was a little skirmish in which Polish Lancers charged German recon infantrymen before being dispersed by armoured cars (not tanks). Not only was this skirmish a "success" in a way (it achieved what it should - delaying the German advance), but also was the legend of tank-charging cavalry invented by Polish propagandists, of all people - to raise the own population's morale. Also, there were anti-tank cavalry units, usually used to ambush the armored vehicles in rough terrain, where horses provided better mobility (the cavalry men used anti-tank rifles while dismounted, of course).
• The winged hussars are commonly depicted with two huge wings on their backs, curving above their heads. In reality, the little actual evidence that survived all the wars suggests that they had a single straight wing, presumably mounted on the saddle. The common image most likely comes from the later times, when hussars were no longer used on the battlefield, and with the hamtastic culture of the time (and Nostalgia Filter), they devolved into a parade unit. Still, the leopard skins were a real thing, but surprisingly - they were typical for regular hussars; officers wore wolf pelts instead. What perhaps should be said at this point is that these guys were actually competent fighters - don't let the bling fool you, they were for the most part well-trained and commanded by officers who knew how to make best use of their strengths in battle.
• The Cub Scout salute originates from the Polish one.

Wojsko Polskie in fiction:

In General

• Whenever someone has to charge tanks on horseback.
  • Andrzej Wajda's 1959 film Lotna helped to reinforce this image, even though the scene was meant to be symbolic.
• Winged hussars tend to appear in period pieces and similar stories, perhaps at least in part due to their general badassitude and eye-candyness.

Anime & Manga

• Bonple High School of Girls und Panzer Ribbon Warrior manga spin-off, with their extensive operation of WWII Polish tanks such as 7TP and TKS are largely using the era's Wojsko Polskie as their main inspiration. In addition, many of their Tankathlon tactics, school traditions and imageries are also alludes to that both modern Polish military as well as the famed Winged Hussars, including the usage of the signature two-finger salute as greeting gesture between students though they does it without wearing headcovers like in Polish military proper.

Literature

• The hero of The Polish Officer by Alan Furst was a Polish military cartographer turned spy.
• A new war with Sweden (Gustavus Adolphus tried to invade Poland once before, in the 1620's) features them heavily in the 1635 volumes of the 1632 series. Notably the Polish army is the only major military power in the series able to effectively fight off the Swedish king and his American allies (albeit aided by the weather).
• Leo Frankowski's Conrad Stargard saga features a Polish Air Force officer from 1990 transported back through time to the 13th Century, where he decides that it's time for backwards Poland to conquer the world.
• Introduction to Gear Krieg game features Polish cavalry fighting invading Germans in September 1939 while playing with charging tanks with lances fallacy.
• The protagonist of Ernst von Salomon's semi-autobiographical novel The Outlaws (1930) fights against Polish insurgents in Upper Silesia during the uprising in early 1920s. Notably, it is one of rare examples in fiction where Polish military plays the role of villains.
• Second book of the Axis of Time trilogy features squadron 303 and real life badass and fighter ace Jan Zumbach, defending HMS Trident during the operation Sea Dragon a.k.a. Nazi Germany invasion of Britain.

Live-Action Film

• Polish airmen appear in Battle of Britain. Lots of them.
• UN IFOR peacekeepers with Polish distinctions is seen for a second or two in the movie The Peacemaker.
• They appear in A Bridge Too Far aiding the main protagonists. Watch to witness Gene Hackman speaking Polish. Hackman plays General Sosabowski, the commander of a Polish paratroop brigade, who is depicted as the Only Sane Man in Allied staff.
  • His whole text in Polish is "Ciągnij sznur!" - "Pull the rope". Very, very badly accented and pronounced, to the point where it's a running gag in Poland.
• The Polish lancers of Napoleon's Imperial Guard can be seen in Sergey Bondarchuk's movie Waterloo out of all proportion to their actual numbers and importance in the 1815 campaign (the countercharge against the British dragoons charge that broke the Scots Greys was actually done by French line lancers). Still, they were a badass elite unit, especially famous for their death-or-glory charge at Somosierra in 1808.

Music

• Sabaton have become rather popular in Poland after producing a few songs about their armed forces:
  • 40:1, which is about the heroic resistance put up by the Polish forces in Battle of Wizna against the German invasion in 1939.
  • Aces In Exile, which specifically mentions the 303rd Squadron, an exiled Polish squadron that fought in the Battle of Britain.
  • Uprising, which is about the Warsaw Uprising.
  • Winged Hussars about the relief on the besieged Vienna in 1683 by the largest cavalry charge in history.

Video Game

• The Contact expansion for ArmaA III adds the fictional country of "Livonia", a Polish-speaking baltic country. The Livonian Defense Forces are based on the Polish Armed Forces, even using the "Promet" rifle, based on the Polish "MSBS Grot B" model adopted as Poland's service rifle. This very gun is touted by Poland's top gun experts as notoriously unreliable. It doesn't help that it was ordered by the Polish Armed Forces even before passing rigorous tests, as is plagued by lots of development hell.
• They notably get a whole campaign in Call of Duty 3.
• Cossacks:
  • Cossacks: European Wars features 17th century Poland (Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth). The nation's most unique feature is, of course, the Winged Hussar, a cavalry unit that is both fast and armored (except against riflemen). The Ukrainian campaign of European Wars has Ukrainian Cossacks fight for independence against the Poles. The Polish campaign of the Art of War Expansion Pack, meanwhile, is mostly about crushing Ukrainian Cossacks uprisings.
  • Cossacks 3 recreates the famous battle of Vienna where Jan III Sobieski saved the day, with a charge of plenty of Winged Hussars.
• The LWP (Polish People Army) is a playable Warsaw Pact country in both Wargame: European Escalation and Air Land Battle expansion.
• The Polish are one of the factions in Mount & Blade's expansion Of Fire and Sword, with the winged hussars themselves being the best heavy cavalry in the entire game. We're talking about guys who can get shot in the face with a flintlock musket without stopping their charge.
• The Kislevite Winged Lancers of the Warhammer world are a fantasy counterpart to the Polish Winged Husars of the later Middle Ages, complete with the feathered wings on their saddles.
• Poland under Casimir III the Great is a playable civilization in Civilization V's expansion Brave New World, with the Winged Hussar as its special unit. Its special ability, Solidarity, gives it a free social policy every time the game advances an era. For these reasons, Poland is considered to be the game's best overall Civ.
• Medal of Honor: Warfighter has the GROM making appearances, both in Multiplayer as playable faction and in Single Player as a friendly faction who are assisting Task Force Mako in Sarajevo mission.
• Although there is no Polish campaign available in Panzer Commander tank sim, one of the single missions for the British forces features the 1st Polish Armoured Division fighting against German defenders of Calaise. Sadly, the player's tanks have no Polish markings and their crew speak English without clear Polish accent. Additionally, while playing the German campaign the player will face Polish tanks and bunkers in some early missions taking place during the invasion of Poland.
• Battle of Britain: 303 Squadron is a 2D flying shooter released by Channel4 centered around the titular Polish fighter squadron. The game is available online here.
• They can be selected in Call of Duty: WWII via uniform selection in multiplayer.
• Year Two of Rainbow Six Siege has two GROM operatives added to the roster, Zofia and Ela.

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