Talk:Andrzej Ciechanowiecki

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Ciechanowiecki and World War II

At last, a picture is emerging of Ciechanowiecki's nebulous role during the almost simultaneous German and Soviet invasions of Poland in 1939 and the subsequent Fourth Partition of Poland by the invaders for the duration of World War II. Although, like the rest of the country's population, he was exposed to the extreme horrors of war, his mother's social connections and his own guile enabled him to move in former diplomatic circles that, in the end, ensured he successfully avoided putting himself in the direct line of fire, unlike the vast majority of his contemporaries. There was, of course, a large dose of luck in this. The source for this is an interview he gave in 1993 to Stefania Kossowska from the influential Paris-based review, Kultura.

In relation to the two-fronted 1939 invasion when he, a 15 year old schoolboy, and his mother and grandmother were staying, ostensibly out of harm's way, on the estate of family friends in Eastern Poland, near Brzesc, now Belarus. He states he did "help out a bit" as General Franciszek Kleeberg's army were in flight in the neighbourhood. The likelihood is that he made himself useful "shifting boxes" for some of the Polish officers. For this he was awarded a medal for "participating in the 1939 campaign", as a volunteer.

In a similar vein, although sources record that he attended lectures for Home Army cadets while also engaged in other mainstream studies, there is no record of any formation he may have belonged to or any rank. In his interview he records his experience of the Warsaw Uprising in one sentence! It transpires that he was a 20 year old "bag carrier", i.e. secretary, for Adam Ronikier, a leading right-wing Polish politician and interlocutor with the German high command in Warsaw early in 1944, who was trying to negotiate a way out of the potential slaughter resulting from an uprising that was on the cards. After the bloody uprising, he left the ravaged city, not in the huge column of military captives, nor with the destitute civilian population, he came and went with the Red Cross. For this he collected another medal, maybe for just being there in the proximity of "important people".

Then in late 1944, although he found himself in Pruszków, a major holding area for prisoners of war, and was arrested by the Germans, this was of short duration and he was quickly released. Again, this is extraordinary in the circumstances, unless he had some form of Laissez-passer (e.g. from the Vatican), that the Germans had to honour. The question then arises was he a collaborator or some kind of double agent. Contrary to the impression created around him, this man does not appear to have done any "fighting" whatsoever. He was not known as a pacifist, nor did he make any such claims; at best one could say he was "accidentally" involved in intelligence gathering and in charitable works as his devout catholicism might have enjoined.

In summary, very little seems to have stood in the way of his single minded pursuit of his chosen career, until the road-block in 1950 of his arrest by the Polish security services. Despite a 10 year sentence in prison, he seems to have charmed his way out of that too, halving his stay in detention.--Po Mieczu (talk) 13:46, 1 December 2018 (UTC)