President Karol Nawrocki, Defence Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz and senior commanders gathered at Warsaw’s Powązki Military Cemetery to lay wreaths at the Monument to the Fallen in the 1920 battle, in which Polish forces halted the westward advance of the Soviet Red Army.
Nawrocki hailed the soldiers’ defence of “a free, independent and sovereign Poland,” saying they resisted “Soviet barbarism and the anti-civilisation of cruelty and death.” He noted that many of those buried at Powązki also fought communist rule in later decades.
Kosiniak-Kamysz said the event served to remind current service members of those who came before them, warning that Russia “remains as aggressive today as in 1920.”
Friday’s Armed Forces Day will feature more than 4,000 troops, 300 vehicles and 50 aircraft parading in Warsaw, with military equipment on display including K2 and Abrams tanks, Borsuk infantry fighting vehicles and F-16 fighter jets.
For the first time, the celebrations will also include a naval parade, with about 20 warships taking part in manoeuvres off the Hel Peninsula on the Baltic Sea. The events coincide with the 105th anniversary of the Polish victory, known as the “Miracle on the Vistula.”
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Source: IAR