Not quite true, this from Wiki. Little bit of film licence me thinks.
"After the war, in a changed political situation, their equipment was returned to the British. Due to the fact that Poland ended the war, under Soviet occupation, only a small proportion of the pilots returned to Poland where they suffered from harassment, while the rest remained exiled from their native country."
Anyone who thinks independent poles lived a good life after wwii should spend a vacation in nazi germany or stalin's russia. I say this without knowing the details of the specific incident but i have spent many years studying this issue and whatever it says in the wiki it seems highly improbable to me. There were many people repatriated against their will to suffer an ignoble fate. As i say I have not studied this specific issue but I wouldn't take a wiki as a my first source.
"In 1949 the PRC RAF was officially disbanded but the PAF Liquidation Commission operated for another two years. Finally, from about 11,000 members of the Corps fewer than 3,000 returned to the homeland, 2,800 emigrated from the UK to other countries of residence, and 500 persons, mostly flying personnel, joined the RAF. Many airmen who returned to Poland fell victim to repression and persecution by the communist government. Show trials of airmen accused of “espionage” proliferated, ending with death sentences, six of which were carried out. "
I don't think there was forced repatriation of Polish military personal fighting alongside British forces. I went school with many of the offspring of the Polish exiles in Clapham, London who had stayed behind after the Russian postwar takeover of Poland.
More generally there was forced repatriation of many refugees and POWs in Europe at the end of the war by the allied forces, many of who suffered terribly because of this.
Q/ Where is Guthrum, now that we need him?
Red Army POWs repatriated from Germany to the USSR spent ten years in Siberia for the crime of surrendering to the Nazis, so the idea that the Poles who lived & fought with the Brits (read "were exposed to Western liberal values") would be imprisoned (with all the attendant risks to life & limb) upon their return only requires that the Puppet Commie government in Poland follow Stalin's lead; this is not a huge leap for 1946.
As to deWiki versus deMovie, the NTSB folks say that the movie Sully was unfair to them, and that the chief dramatic constructs of the film never took place ... while Tom Hanks says that, well, that's how America's Best Known Airliner Captain felt at the time.
Cheers,
/s/ ikeyPikey
Ros and I visited Hodgemoor woods near Chalfont St Giles, in Bucks, last week. There was a plaque recording the fact that there was an encampment of about 150 Polish families who couldn't return to Poland living there in temporary wooden houses - we called them prefabs - from about 1948 to 1962. Amersham, a few miles away, has a Polish ex-servicemens club which serves the best and cheapest beer in town. And Bison spirit - very strong!
Another Polish connection - in the 1970 I had a Scottish girlfriend, whose father was a Polish airman in the war. After the war he settled in Edinburgh, but his Polish paediatrician qualification wasn't recognised here and so he had to work as a GP (general practitioner) here in a Scottish town till he retired and eventually died.
Saw this film on Netflix about the Polish aviators who fought for the RAF. Their 303 squadron racked up the highest number of kills and the newspapers and the people loved them. In 1946 they were given 3 days to leave the country...some were repatriated to Poland and were imprisoned or murdered. Seems like the Poles could never catch a break.
re: Mission of Honor
Not quite true, this from Wiki. Little bit of film licence me thinks.
"After the war, in a changed political situation, their equipment was returned to the British. Due to the fact that Poland ended the war, under Soviet occupation, only a small proportion of the pilots returned to Poland where they suffered from harassment, while the rest remained exiled from their native country."
re: Mission of Honor
Anyone who thinks independent poles lived a good life after wwii should spend a vacation in nazi germany or stalin's russia. I say this without knowing the details of the specific incident but i have spent many years studying this issue and whatever it says in the wiki it seems highly improbable to me. There were many people repatriated against their will to suffer an ignoble fate. As i say I have not studied this specific issue but I wouldn't take a wiki as a my first source.
re: Mission of Honor
"In 1949 the PRC RAF was officially disbanded but the PAF Liquidation Commission operated for another two years. Finally, from about 11,000 members of the Corps fewer than 3,000 returned to the homeland, 2,800 emigrated from the UK to other countries of residence, and 500 persons, mostly flying personnel, joined the RAF. Many airmen who returned to Poland fell victim to repression and persecution by the communist government. Show trials of airmen accused of “espionage” proliferated, ending with death sentences, six of which were carried out. "
re: Mission of Honor
I don't think there was forced repatriation of Polish military personal fighting alongside British forces. I went school with many of the offspring of the Polish exiles in Clapham, London who had stayed behind after the Russian postwar takeover of Poland.
More generally there was forced repatriation of many refugees and POWs in Europe at the end of the war by the allied forces, many of who suffered terribly because of this.
re: Mission of Honor
Q/ Where is Guthrum, now that we need him?
Red Army POWs repatriated from Germany to the USSR spent ten years in Siberia for the crime of surrendering to the Nazis, so the idea that the Poles who lived & fought with the Brits (read "were exposed to Western liberal values") would be imprisoned (with all the attendant risks to life & limb) upon their return only requires that the Puppet Commie government in Poland follow Stalin's lead; this is not a huge leap for 1946.
As to deWiki versus deMovie, the NTSB folks say that the movie Sully was unfair to them, and that the chief dramatic constructs of the film never took place ... while Tom Hanks says that, well, that's how America's Best Known Airliner Captain felt at the time.
Cheers,
/s/ ikeyPikey
re: Mission of Honor
Ros and I visited Hodgemoor woods near Chalfont St Giles, in Bucks, last week. There was a plaque recording the fact that there was an encampment of about 150 Polish families who couldn't return to Poland living there in temporary wooden houses - we called them prefabs - from about 1948 to 1962. Amersham, a few miles away, has a Polish ex-servicemens club which serves the best and cheapest beer in town. And Bison spirit - very strong!
Another Polish connection - in the 1970 I had a Scottish girlfriend, whose father was a Polish airman in the war. After the war he settled in Edinburgh, but his Polish paediatrician qualification wasn't recognised here and so he had to work as a GP (general practitioner) here in a Scottish town till he retired and eventually died.