Letter to Mr. Mark Dekan, CEO, Ringier Axel Springer Polska
March 02, 2019
Dear Mr. Dekan,
We write to object to the legal action Axel Springer Poland has brought against the Polish journalist Mr. Witold Gadowski for stating the obvious: Germany committed heinous crimes in Poland during World War II and, after the war, members of the Nazi party and the SS worked for the German media giant. We believe these statements will hold up in a legal process and the scrutiny of a fair trial, reaffirming these historical facts. However, we feel generally concerned about German media’s repeated attempts to use financial power and influence to stifle Polish journalists’ rights to free speech, especially regarding German Nazi war crimes and related issues.
We find this legal action against the Polish journalist objectionable, particularly in view of the fact that occupied Poland was the location where all of the major German World War II crimes were committed. The brutal occupation that followed the September 1, 1939 German invasion of Poland became a perpetual war against the nation, six years of lawlessness and exploitation structured around policies of terror, brutality and extreme exploitation of the nation and its population. Poland’s national identity and culture were criminalized, its leaders jailed and murdered, its resources stolen, and the population subjected to brutal control of all aspects of daily existence. Poland’s citizens became the victims of racist German discrimination and economic exploitation through compulsory work for German corporations and as slave labor in the network of hundreds of forced labor camps established in the occupied territories for the benefit of the German military industrial complex.
The violence and exploitation of the occupation resulted in profound and lasting destruction to the Polish nation, its people and the country’s economy. By the time Germany was defeated, about 20% of Poland’s prewar population was murdered, and the losses and devastation of Poland’s economy has been estimated to be around $800 billion dollars. Yet, Germany has never made any kind of reparation payments for the devastation the occupation wrought on Poland, and it continues to hide behind statements offered by Poland’s Communist regime to falsely consider the matter settled. We see these judicial proceedings against Mr. Gadowski as a part of wider and deeply disturbing process, of Germany’s political institutions and the media’s attempts to re-write World War II history, to avoid responsibility for the “German Crimes against Humanity” committed during the war. Too often we see attempts to even go as far as to put the blame for the war crimes committed in occupied Poland on the nation itself. It seems grotesque that 73 years after the war, contrary to historical facts, Poland as the nation most exploited and devastated by Germany during the war is, instead, at times falsely portrayed as a perpetrator of the crimes. We see such falsification of history in the German media, in press articles making outrageous references to “Polish death camps” and in films wrongfully portraying Poland’s Home Army soldiers as some rabid anti-Semites, more evil than the German criminals themselves.
We also see Polish language media outlets, owned by German companies and operated in Poland, engage in such historical revisionism. We see these developments as attempts to silence Polish journalists, to dissuade them from discussing Germany’s troubled past, the brutal occupation of Poland and the lack of financial reparations.
Now, Axel Springer Poland, the powerful German media company located in Poland, is trying to punish a Polish journalist for statements of fact made about Germany’s war crimes and the genocidal World War II occupation of Poland. We stand with Mr. Witold Gadowski and demand that Axel Springer end it judicial proceedings against him, and apologize to Mr. Gadowski and to all Poles for the war crimes and the attempts to revise that history. We urge you demonstrate that good relations with Poland matter, that history matters, and to recognize the right of Poles right to grieve over their painful losses, and the right to defend the good name of their country.