Polish paratroopers in Warsaw

I was wondering what would happen if Polish 1st Independent Parachute Brigade aided the Warsaw Uprising. Of course this means no Market Garden or that this unit won't participate. According to polish Wikipedia: At the end of 1943 colonel Sosabowski travelled to USA. He concluded that C-47 Dakota planes can carry polish brigade to Warsaw. So if polish paratroopers landed in Warsaw, and took over the airport to secure any other allied aid, would it help Home Army win the Uprising? If so, what would Soviets and Wehrmacht do with free Warsaw? Could nationwide operation Tempest succeed? Would Poland be independent or there would be rigged elections as in 1947?
 
The big challenge would be logistic. Was RCAF Bomber Command willing to divert all their bombers to supply Warsaw for a few weeks?
How many aircraft were the Americans willing to divert to supply Warsaw?
Re-supply by air would be frightfully expensive ..... while struggling to supply WALLIED troops in France and the Low Countries.

OTL During August 1944, WALLIES were extremely busy in Normandy. At the start of the month they were stagnant near Caen, but after Falaise Gap (mid month) they raced towards Paris and the Belgian border, capturing Antwerp during the first week of September. Then the WALLIED advance stalled for lack of supplies.
No way would Eisenhower or Montgomery or Bradley have allowed any diversion of resources towards Poland.

Elections would depend upon whether Soviets occupied Warsaw with sufficient troops.
 
Last edited:
Any plan to drop a couple thousand paratroops who can't be reliably supplied isn't going to get given the go-ahead, especially when preparations for Market Garden are underway.
 
Basically, the best way to make this happen would be having the wallies be very lucky.
I'd imagine that having Norway successfully fend off the germans, Crete be held by the Commonwealth, and Dakar surrender to Free France could lead to a much better situation for them. I expect these conditions to also change up the Tehran and Yalta conferences by a bit. Once Vienna and Bornholm are occupied by the wallies, then we can talk about paratroopers being deployed at Warsaw.
 
The only way this happens is if STalin arranges for refueling and that's not happening, he wants the Home Army destroyed, not reinforced.
 
Perhaps, WAllies call Stalin's bluff, go ahead don't refuel our planes, show the the world your true Katyn colors.

SO lets say the Poles do go in for whatever reason, Maybe Churchill wants to try to blunt the Soviets advance into Europe.

Maybe the Soviets see that the West is serious and decide they better liberate the city before the WAllies arrive in force.

They release General Berling and the Polish People's Army with the Red Army on it's heels and liberate Warsaw

If its only Polish parattroopers in the Capitol they are in for a bit of trouble as they at the very least are detained by the Soviets

If the Allies managed to get English or American troops into the city they all shake hands with their Russian counterparts and have their photos taken while the men in charge in London, Moscow, and Washington all glare at each other behind false smiles.
 

Deleted member 1487

Wonder if the Red Army could have organized this given the will?
Of course, they chose not to make a serious effort to help:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warsaw_Uprising#Limited_outside_support
The Polish government-in-exile carried out frantic diplomatic efforts to gain support from the Western Allies prior to the start of battle but the allies would not act without Soviet approval. The Polish government in London asked the British several times to send an allied mission to Poland.[16] However, the British mission did not arrive until December 1944.[95] Shortly after their arrival, they met up with Soviet authorities, who arrested and imprisoned them.[96] In the words of the mission's deputy commander, it was "a complete failure".[97] Nevertheless, from August 1943 to July 1944, over 200 British Royal Air Force (RAF) flights dropped an estimated 146 Polish personnel trained in Great Britain, over 4000 containers of supplies, and $16 million in banknotes and gold to the Home Army.[98]

The Soviet Union did not allow the Western Allies to use its airports for the airdrops[7] for several weeks,[103] so the planes had to use bases in the United Kingdom and Italy which reduced their carrying weight and number of sorties. The Allies' specific request for the use of landing strips made on 20 August was denied by Stalin on 22 August.[99] Stalin referred to the Polish resistance as "a handful of criminals"[104] and stated that the Uprising was inspired by "enemies of the Soviet Union".[105] Thus, by denying landing rights to Allied aircraft on Soviet-controlled territory the Soviets vastly limited effectiveness of Allied assistance to the Uprising, and even fired at Allied airplanes which carried supplies from Italy and strayed into Soviet-controlled airspace.[99]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lack_of_outside_support_during_the_Warsaw_Uprising

I know you don't like me doing block quotes, but there was so many areas of the very limited support rendered from the Polish 1st Army under Soviet command that should have been massively increased, which the Polish Paras under British command could have easily participated in (plus of course a major airlift of volunteers from Polish units in the west if the Soviets provided air bases and supply routes):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warsaw_airlift

I was wondering what would happen if Polish 1st Independent Parachute Brigade aided the Warsaw Uprising. Of course this means no Market Garden or that this unit won't participate. According to polish Wikipedia: At the end of 1943 colonel Sosabowski travelled to USA. He concluded that C-47 Dakota planes can carry polish brigade to Warsaw. So if polish paratroopers landed in Warsaw, and took over the airport to secure any other allied aid, would it help Home Army win the Uprising? If so, what would Soviets and Wehrmacht do with free Warsaw? Could nationwide operation Tempest succeed? Would Poland be independent or there would be rigged elections as in 1947?
The problem is the Soviets. Without their help the paras would be on a suicide mission and might even get shot down by the Soviets, who were against most of the aid that the Allies tried to give as it was. Parachuting a bunch of non-(really anti) communist paratroopers into Poland from the government in exile was the last thing Stalin wanted to enable.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Top