🇵🇱 Too backward to fight a modern war? The Poles had already broken Germany’s military Enigma before Hitler invaded their country. Yet the enduring image is of foolish cavalrymen charging tanks. That story deserves correcting. On September 1, 1939, at Krojanty, Polish cavalry charged German infantry and scattered it. German armored vehicles then opened fire, forcing the horsemen to withdraw. This was not a suicidal attack on tanks with lances. Polish cavalry generally fought dismounted and possessed antitank guns and rifles. Nazi propaganda helped turn the encounter into a story of Polish stupidity. Communist-era narratives also used the myth to discredit Poland’s prewar leadership. Now consider what that supposedly backward nation contributed to victory. ENIGMA. Marian Rejewski, Jerzy Różycki and Henryk Zygalski pioneered the breaking of Germany’s military cipher. In July 1939, Poland shared its methods and reconstructed machines with Britain and France, providing vital foundations for Bletchley Park. THE BATTLE OF BRITAIN. Polish pilots helped defend the country that would become their wartime base. The predominantly Polish No. 303 Squadron claimed 126 victories during the Battle of Britain, the highest total of any RAF fighter squadron. Its pilots also included British and Canadian airmen, and its leading ace was a Czech, Josef František. MINE CLEARANCE. Józef Kosacki developed the Polish mine detector, used at El Alamein to help Allied troops clear paths through Axis minefields. TANK TECHNOLOGY. Rudolf Gundlach’s reversible periscope allowed tank crews to observe behind them without turning around. His design was adopted abroad and influenced equipment used in Allied armored vehicles. INTELLIGENCE. The Polish underground recovered components of a German V-2 rocket and helped send them, with technical intelligence, to Britain in Operation Most III in July 1944. MONTE CASSINO. In May 1944, soldiers of the Polish II Corps captured the ruined abbey after bitter fighting during the final Allied offensive. Many had previously endured Soviet imprisonment or deportation. NORMANDY. General Stanisław Maczek’s 1st Armoured Division helped seal the Falaise pocket. On Hill 262, Polish troops held against repeated German attacks, helping prevent trapped forces from escaping. THE NETHERLANDS. Maczek’s men went on to liberate Breda. Polish paratroopers fought at Driel during Operation Market Garden, helping support the beleaguered British airborne troops across the Rhine. THE WAR AT SEA. Polish ships escorted convoys, fought submarines and supported Allied landings. The destroyer Piorun helped maintain contact with Bismarck before the German battleship’s final action. RESISTANCE. Occupied Poland sustained an underground state, clandestine schools, intelligence networks and the Home Army. Witold Pilecki organized resistance inside Auschwitz. Jan Karski carried eyewitness testimony of the Holocaust to the Western Allies. THE EASTERN FRONT. Polish formations fighting alongside the Red Army also contributed to Germany’s defeat, reaching Berlin in 1945. By 1944, the Polish Armed Forces in the West alone numbered approximately 195,000. Hitler’s regime treated Poles as racially inferior. Stalin’s regime murdered officers and intellectuals it regarded as enemies. Both occupiers attacked the people capable of sustaining an independent Poland. Poland nevertheless supplied the Allied cause with mathematicians, inventors, intelligence officers, sailors, airmen and soldiers. Victory came. Full independence did not. Soviet domination followed German occupation, and many Polish veterans remained in exile. Remember the codebreakers, the pilots and the men on Hill 262! They deserve to be better known than a propaganda story about horses and tanks. Follow @Vanguard_WW2 for more stories that deserve to be remembered.