[8][9] The best-known Polish anti-communist resistance organisations operating in Stalinist-era Poland included Freedom and Independence (Wolność i Niezawisłość, WIN), the National Armed Forces (Narodowe Siły Zbrojne, NSZ), the National Military Union (Narodowe Zjednoczenie Wojskowe, NZW), the Underground Polish Army (Konspiracyjne Wojsko Polskie, KWP), the Home Army Resistance (Ruch Oporu Armii Krajowej, ROAK), the Citizens' Home Army (Armia Krajowa Obywatelska, AKO), NO (NIE, short for Niepodległość), the Armed Forces Delegation for Poland (Delegatura Sił Zbrojnych na Kraj), and Freedom and Justice (Wolność i Sprawiedliwość, WiS).

The "cursed soldiers" have prompted controversy over the degree to which individual fighters or their units were involved in war crimes against Jews or other ethnic minorities on Polish soil or against civilians generally.

[10][11] In the summer of 1944, as Soviet forces advanced into Poland, the USSR set up a provisional client state called the Polish Committee of National Liberation.

[12] Władysław Gomułka, future General Secretary of the Polish United Workers' Party, said that "Soldiers of the Armia Krajowa (AK) are a hostile element which must be removed without mercy".

[13] The Armia Krajowa officially disbanded on 19 January 1945 to prevent a slide into armed conflict with the Red Army and the increasing threat of civil war over Poland's sovereignty.

Soviet guerrillas torched and leveled Polish landed estates much more frequently than they blew up military transports and assaulted other hard targets.

during and directly after the launch of Operation Tempest, the Polish resistance's effort to seize control of cities and areas occupied by the Germans while the latter were preparing their defenses against the advancing Soviets.

[13] After the Delegatura Sił Zbrojnych na Kraj ("Armed Forces Delegation for Homeland") was disbanded, another post-AK resistance organisation was formed, called Wolność i Niezawisłość ("Freedom and Sovereignty").

Viewed as enemies of the state, starved of resources, and with a vocal faction advocating armed resistance against the Soviets and their Polish proxies, WiN was far from efficient.

A significant victory for the NKVD and the newly created Polish secret police, Urząd Bezpieczeństwa (UB), came in the second half of 1945 when they convinced several leaders of WiN that they truly wanted to offer amnesty to AK members.

[13] A further six million Polish citizens (i.e., one out of every three adult Poles) were classified as suspected members of a 'reactionary or criminal element' and subjected to investigation by state agencies.

In 1967, long after the abolition of Stalinist terror, Adam Boryczka, the last member of the elite British-trained Cichociemny ("The Silent and Hidden") intelligence and support group, was finally released from prison.

[13] The biggest battle in the history of the National Military Union (Narodowe Zjednoczenie Wojskowe, NZW) took place on 6–7 May 1945, in the village of Kuryłówka in southeastern Poland.

In the Battle of Kuryłówka, the partisans fought against the Soviet 2nd Border Regiment of the NKVD, gaining a victory for the underground forces commanded by Major Franciszek Przysiężniak ("Marek").

[30][31] On 21 May 1945, a heavily armed AK unit led by Colonel Edward Wasilewski, attacked and destroyed the NKVD camp in Rembertów on the eastern outskirts of Warsaw.

Prasowe, 1990); Part 10: "The Augustow Missing," compiled by the Citizen Committee for Search of Suwałki Region Inhabitants who Disappeared in July 1945 (Obywatelski Komitet Poszukiwań Mieszkańców Suwalszczyzny Zaginionych w Lipcu 1945 r., in Polish).

The "cursed soldiers" served as an inspiration for numerous films, documentaries, books, stage plays, and songs and, in Poland, they have become the ultimate symbol of patriotism and heroic fight for fatherland against all odds.