Bogdan Musiał

Bogdan Musiał
Cover of Sowjetische Partisanen. Mythos und Wirklichkeit by Bogdan Musiał Cover of Sowjetische Partisanen. Mythos und Wirklichkeit by Bogdan Musiał
Born	1960
Occupation	Historian, author
Notable works	Sowjetische Partisanen. Mythos und Wirklichkeit (2009)

Professor Bogdan Musiał (born 1960) is a Polish-German historian with Polish background and dual citizenship. Born in Poland, Musiał arrived to Germany as a political refugee in 1985 where he became a naturalized citizen, and returned to Poland in 2010. He specializes in the history of World War II.

Career

Bogdan Musiał was born in 1960 in Wielopole, Dąbrowa County, Poland. He worked in Silesian mines and collaborated with the Polish Solidarność movement. On account of the latter involvement, he was persecuted by state security and in 1985 sought and received political asylum in the Federal Republic of Germany; in 1992 he was naturalized. He worked as a mechanic, and from 1990 to 1998 studied history, political science and sociology at the Leibniz University of Hannover and the University of Manchester. In 1998 he graduated with a thesis on the treatment of Jews in occupied Poland.

From 1991 to 1998, Musiał received a scholarship from Friedrich Ebert Foundation. During that time he was one of the main critics of the Wehrmachtsausstellung exhibition compiled by the Hamburg Institute for Social Research, which eventually had to be seriously revised before reopening to conform with his findings.

Since 1998 he served as scientific researcher at the German Historical Institute in Warsaw where he has studied previously inaccessible sources about crimes of the Soviet NKVD during the Soviet retreat in 1941 which escalated violence.

In 2008 he published the book Kampfplatz Deutschland. Since 2010 he lives in Poland and works at the Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw.

Criticism

Musiał's research of Soviet partisans in Sowjetische Partisanen 1941-1944, was reviewed by Karel Berkhoff who noted that the book seems to have not printing errors, read easily, and will likely remain a comprehensive description of partisan warfare in Belarus due to its large source base. However the book has two key weaknesses. The first is not making the protagonists, never pictured, come alive as individuals with the book remaining too close to the sources. The second being Berkhoff questioning Musiał's use of labeling "Belarusian question', a 'Polish question", and a 'Jewish question" as well as ascribing independent partisans groups to "Soviet", questioning the use of "movement" to describe the partisans, the rejection of anti-Semitism with regard to the Polish Home Army units in Belarus which attack Jews, not exploring the degree of loyalty to Stalin's state, the propoganda issued by the groups, and lack of a comparison between the partisans described and other partisans in Belarus, Ukraine, or western Europe.

According to Joanna Michlic, Musiał belongs to an ethno-nationalist school of thought in Poland that also includes Marek Jan Chodakiewicz and Tomasz Strzembosz.

Per Anders Rudling, reviewing “Konterrevolutionäre Elemente sind zu erschießen”: Die Brutalisieung des deutsch-sowjetischen Krieges im Sommer 1941. (“Counter-revolutionary Elements are to be Shot”: The Brutalization of the German-Soviet War in the Summer of 1941), wrote that book was not very well received by German Holocaust historians, receiving sharp criticism. Rudling notes that Musiał predicted in his introduction that "German liberal intellectuals are not going to like his book for political reasons. In his eyes, the sensitiveness surrounding the subject of the Holocaust and the National Socialist past has often worked as a block to a scholarly approach to the subject". Musiał places responsiblity for the outbreak of World War II both on Germany and on the Soviet Union, with Poland and Poles being the primary victims. Rudling criticizes Musiał for not describing how and why Poland ended up possession of Western Ukraine and Western Belorussia (east of the Curzon Line) as a result of the use of force in the Polish–Soviet War in violation of the principles of national self-determination set up by Wilson. Musiał fails to comment on possible reasons some members of the minorities in the east may have had to take revenge of their former Polish masters following the Soviet invasion of Poland in 1939. According to Rudling Musiał makes use of " controversial statistics, aimed at pointing out that Poles were singled out and subjected to uniquely harsh terror under Stalin, often at the hands of Jews. However, the statistics Musial relies on to back his claim seem somewhat exaggerated". Rudling concludes by saying that "By focusing on these tragic events, the book has stirred up a debate. It is a debate with unpleasant undertones of nationalism and ethnic hatred, and perhaps not at the level at which we may want to see academic debates conducted, but it is still a debate". Noting that the book in no way measures up to Jan T. Gross's Revolution from abroad, which stands unrivaled as the most complete study of the tragic events in 1939-41 in Western Ukraine and Western Belarus. However despite its limitations, Musiał's book does add knowledge to the subject area.

Views

In August 2012, Musiał criticized the Polish Foreign Ministry for recommending the book Inferno of Choices: Poles and the Holocaust, as a advancing a ""pedagogy of shame", that may have an irreparable effect on the Polish image abroad.

In November 2012, Musiał sharply criticized the Aftermath film based on the events in the Jedwabne pogrom and its director Władysław Pasikowski, saying that countries outside of Poland would not put up with similar disdain.

In 2017, Musiał supported demanding war reparations from Germany via "centrally coordinated action", involving |both a legal and a political way as well as discussion at an international forum". Musiał further said that German officials have been aware that Germany owes Poland reparations, but that they have been unwilling to pay.

In 2018, responding to the international outcry over 2018 amendment to Act on the Institute of National Remembrance, Musiał said that those who recognize Polish collaboration with Nazi Germany or accept responsibility for events such as the Jedwabne pogrom are "recognizing the memory of the Holocaust as a form of religion where emotions play the crucial role at the expense of facts", further saying that "The Holocaust is a supplementary religion for Judaism".

Bibliography

• "Aktion Reinhardt". Der Völkermord an den Juden im Generalgouvernement 1941-1944 (The Origins of “Operation Reinhard”: The Decision-Making Process for the Mass Murder of the Jews in the General Government) Osnabrück 2004
• Sowjetische Partisanen in Weißrußland. Innenansichten aus dem Gebiet Baranovici 1941-1944. Eine Dokumentation (Soviets partisans in Belarus). Oldenbourg Verlag, München 2004, ISBN 3-486-64588-9.
• “The Origins of ‘Operation Reinhard’: The Decision-Making Process for the Mass Murder of the Jews in the Generalgouvernment.” Yad Vashem Studies 28 (2000): 113-153.
• Deutsche Zivilverwaltung und Judenverfolgung im Generalgouvernement. Eine Fallstudie zum Distrikt Lublin 1939-1944. Harrassowitz Verlag, Wiesbaden 1999, ISBN 3-447-04208-7.
• Kampfplatz Deutschland, Stalins Kriegspläne gegen den Westen (Battle-ground Germany, Stalin's plans of war against the West). Propyläen, Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-549-07335-3.
• Sowjetische Partisanen 1941–1944: Mythos und Wirklichkeit (Soviet partisans. Myth and Reality), Paderborn: Ferdinand Schöningh Verlag, 2009; 592 pages. ISBN 978-3-506-76687-8.
• "Stalins Beutezug. Die Plünderung Deutschlands und der Aufstieg der Sowjetunion zur Weltmacht" (Stalin's plundering raid. The plundering of Germany and the rise of the Soviet Union to a Superpower),Propyläen, Berlin 2010. ISBN 978-3-549-07370-4.

References

• Paweł Paliwoda (February 2, 2001), Bogdan Musiał interviewed by Paweł Paliwoda. Życie, Internet Archive.