February 1, marks the 76th anniversary of the assassination of Frantz Kutschera – dubbed the butcher of Warsaw. Kutschera, a German Nazi SS commander, ordered his units to spell terror on the streets of the occupied capital of Poland. The inhabitants of Warsaw saw hostages being taken in broad daylight, as well as mass shootings of hostages in order to subdue resistance.
Finally, the Polish Underground issued a death sentence and a Home Army unit carried it out successfully.
Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki wrote a letter to the surviving participants of the attack.
The head of government wrote on Twitter: “76 years ago, the Home Army once again, by the execution of Franz Kutschera, the „Warsaw executioner”, proved to the Germans that Polishness has not only a symbolic dimension, and that anyone who stands in the way of Polish freedom and dignity will sooner or later be punished with merit.”
The celebrations in the capital on the anniversary of the assassination of the “executioner of Warsaw” took place on Saturday at the memorial stone. This is the place where the Polish underground justice system executed the sentence on Kutschera. The ceremony was attended by the head of the Office for Veterans and Repressed Persons, Jan Józef Kasprzyk, who pointed out that the participants of the assassination attempt on Kutschera belonged to the generation that grew up in the love of independence, as well as in love of what is called the spirit of freedom. He also stressed that the action proved that it is worth being invincible on the way to victory.
Due to Kutschera’s crimes against Poles – including Polish Jews – the Polish resistance Home Army, in agreement with the Polish government in exile, targeted him for assassination. He was gunned down by the Poles in front of the SS headquarters in Warsaw. In reprisal, the Nazis murdered 300 Polish civilians.