Inter-Community Racism

Unpublished letter to "i"

Dear Sir,
Your excellent columnist Patrick Cockburn is right to draw attention to the link between the Brexit campaign and the reappearance of overt racism in the community.("Brexit has unleashed the forces of racism" i 15-16/6/19). What has become a worrying phenomenon for me (and perhaps not so visible to the average white British commentator), is the growing racism in the last few years in everyday conversation between different religious and ethnic minorities that espouse Brexit thinking it makes them more British and criticize each other in their home language while remaining polite to each other when speaking English. Many of my friends from different ethnic communities complain about this and I can vouch for this happening with some East European minorities. Of course on the whole ethnic community leaders and ethnic online media continue to carry the torch for mutual tolerance and cultural cohesion but all the same it remains a worrying trend that is difficult to monitor.
Yours faithfully
Wiktor Moszczynski

No Deal Brexit 13/06/19

This is from the beginning of this week's @CommonsEUexit Select Committee. The message is clear, a no deal Brexit would devastate UK manufacturing. @hilarybennmp @NashSGC @TimRycroft_FDF @nvonwestenholz @NFUtweets pic.twitter.com/a7NpfpOBH2

— Martin Cooper (@mpc_1968) June 13, 2019

D-Day and Poland

Polish cruiser ORP Dragon shelling German positions on D-Day

Letter to the Editor of Daily Telegraph

Dear Sirs,

In reading your splendid text on D-Day {DT 06/06/19} which described the immense risks and the foreseen loss of life in the military strategic planning for Operation Overlord it is often easy to overlook the political planning behind that decision. It was made just as the Red Army was pushing the German army out of Russia and into Eastern Europe and there was concern that after the collapse of Germany a triumphant Soviet Union could dictate the peace in Europe.

The problem is that while D-Day saved Western Europe it was too late to save Eastern Europe. By refusing earlier to challenge the Third Reich through the Balkans and by delaying the Normandy landings until June 1944 the Western Allies gave the Soviet "liberators" the opportunity of destroying the independence of countries like Poland, the UK's longest most faithful ally against Germany. Despite the crucial input of Polish Armed Forces in the Battle of Britain, the Battle of the Atlantic and in the campaigns in Norway, North Africa and Italy and not omitting the 11 Polish airforce squadrons, the Polish cruiser ORP Dragon, 4 Polish destroyers and numerous Polish civilian troop ships who participated in D-Day itself, as well as the subsequent role of the Polish Armoured Brigade in Normandy and Polish paratroopers at Arnhem, Poland was abandoned to its Soviet fate and eventually her servicemen were not even allowed to participate in the London Victory Parade in 1946.

Yours faithfully
Wiktor Moszczynski
Chair
Friends of Polish Veterans Association (SPPW)
Published in DT 07/06/2019