Soviet partisans in Poland

Lacking support from the local population, the Soviet partisan groups retreated to various large forest complexes in the area, where they hid from the German rear and anti-partisan units.

[5] Until early 1943, the Soviet partisans focused primarily on survival deep behind enemy lines, with their activity limited mostly to sabotage and diversion rather than armed struggle against German forces and collaborationist police units.

During this early period various Soviet partisan groups also collaborated with the local Polish resistance of ZWZ, later renamed the AK.

[10] The Poles' main motivation was to gain intelligence on German morale and preparedness, and to acquire some badly needed weapons.

[11] There are no known joint Polish-German military actions, and the Germans were unsuccessful in their attempts to turn the Poles toward fighting exclusively against Soviet partisans.

[15] Bogdan Musial argued that the Soviet partisans preferred to assault the less challenging Belarusian and Polish self-defense units rather than German military and police targets.