Pacification operations in German-occupied Poland

The pacification operations in German-occupied Poland were the unlawful use of military force and punitive measures conducted during World War II by the German state with the goal of suppressing any Polish resistance. Pacification operations are one example of the extermination policies used against Poland and were of a massive scale, resulting in the murders of approximately 20,000 villagers. They were mainly conducted in the areas of General Government, Pomorze, and in the vicinities of Białystok and Wielkopolska. The number of villages which were an object of pacification in Poland is approximately 825. Collective punishment was used during such operations to discourage both the hiding of Jews or Soviet POWs, and the aiding of any guerilla forces. Pacifications included the extermination of entire villages including women and children, expulsions, the burning of homes, confiscation of private property, and arrests. In many instances these operations were characterized by extreme brutality. An example of such behaviour is the burning alive of 81 civilians and the shooting of 15 others in the village of Jabłoń-Dobki.

The first pacifications were conducted on the ground by Wehrmacht officers and soldiers, and took place in Złoczew on September 3rd and 4th 1939, in which the German soldiers murdered some 200 Poles. From the air, Luftwaffe planes bombed the villages of Momoty Dolne, Momoty Górne, Pawłów, Tokary, Sochy and Klew. Some places were subjected to multiple pacification operations. In the town of Aleksandrów in Biłgoraj County between 1939 and 1944, German authorities murdered 290 civilians (444 according to WIEM), wounded 43, deported 434 to forced labour camps, and burned at least 113 households.

At least 750 villages had at least 10 inhabitants murdered and at least 75 villages were destroyed completely (see: table for partial list of names of villages and the number of dead victims).

Modern international law considers these kinds of actions to be genocide, whether conducted within national boundaries or in occupied territories.

Notes

Villages and dead victims

Village name	Killed	Village name	Killed	Village name	Killed
Borów	232 (103 children)	Cyców	111	Jamy	147
Kaszyce	117	Kitów	174	Krasowo-Częstki	257 (83 children)
Krusze	148	Kulno	100	Lipniak-Majorat	over 370
Łążek	187	Michniów	203 (48 children)	Milejów	150
Mrozy	over 100	Olszanka	103	Rajsk	over 143
Różaniec	circa 200	Skłoby	265	Smoligów	circa 200
Sochy	183	Sumin	118	Szczecyn	368 (71 children)
Wanaty	109	Zamość	470	Szczebrzeszyn	208
Łabunie	210	Krasnogród	285	Mokre	304
Nielisz	301	Nowa Osada	195	Radecznica	212
Skierbieszow	335	Stary Zamość	287	Suchowola	324
Sułów	252	Tereszpol	344	Wysokie	203
Zwierzyniec	412	Kitowa	165	Królewiec / Szałas	over 100 each

See also

• Genocide
• Anti-Polonism
• Operation Tannenberg
• Generalplan Ost
• World War II atrocities in Poland
• Nazi crimes against ethnic Poles
• Valley of Death (Bydgoszcz)
• Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide

External links

• Poles: Victims of the Nazi Era
• Pacyfikacja Wanat description of pacification of the village of Wanaty - in Polish
• Pacyfikacje Polish Encyclopedia of PWN entry on pacifications on territory of Poland in Polish
• Pacifications in Białystok Voivodeship