Operation Tempest

Operation Tempest
Part of Eastern Front and World War II

Polish soldiers during the Warsaw Uprising.
DateJanuary 4, 1944 – January 1, 1945
Location
Territorial
changes
Most of Poland occupied by the Red Army and their Polish Allies
Belligerents
 Germany

 Polish Underground State

Commanders and leaders
Hans Frank
Erich von dem Bach-Zelewski
Tadeusz Bór-Komorowski
Leopold Okulicki

Operation Tempest (Polish: akcja „Burza”, sometimes referred to in English as "Operation Storm") was a series of uprisings conducted during World War II against occupying German forces by the Polish Home Army (Armia Krajowa, abbreviated AK), the dominant force in the Polish resistance.

Operation Tempest's objective was to seize control of German-occupied cities and areas while the Germans were preparing their defenses against the advancing Soviet Red Army. The Polish Underground State hoped to take power before the Soviets arrived.

A goal of the Polish government-in-exile in London was to restore Poland's 1939 borders with the USSR, rejecting the Curzon Line border. According to Jan Ciechanowski,

"The [exiled] Polish Cabinet believed that by refusing to accept the Curzon Line they were defending their country's right to exist as a national entity. They were determined that Russo-Polish relations should be restored on the basis of the pre-1939 territorial arrangements."[1]

  1. ^ Jan. M. Ciechanowski. The Warsaw Rising of 1944. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge. London. 1974. p.9