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Witold Leder (December 8, 1913 - April 16, 2007) was a Polish military intelligence officer, activist, translator, and author. He shared in the ups and downs of the anti-Stalinist current of Polish communism, in which he was a lifelong participant.
Witold Leder a adăugat o fotografie
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Witold Leder (December 8, 1913 - April 16, 2007) was a Polish military intelligence officer, activist, translator, and author. He shared in the ups and downs of the anti-Stalinist current of Polish communism, in which he was a lifelong participant.
Witold Leder a adăugat o fotografie
acum 10 zile
Youth (1913-1933) He was born in Paris as the son of Władysław Feinstein, known among various pseudonyms as Zdzisław Leder (1880–1938), and Lili Hirszfeld (1885–1962), two Polish émigrés and activists of the Marxist SDKPiL Party, after 1918 Communist Party of Poland. As a child, he moved wherever Feinstein/Leder's Communist assignments would take the family, from 1920 on behalf of the Soviet Union: he thus lived in Paris (1913–15), Geneva (1915–18), Warsaw (1919–20), Moscow (1920–21), Sopot (1921), Berlin (1921–24), Moscow again (1924–26), Naples (1926-28), and Rome (1928). While the rest of the family moved back to Moscow in 1928, he attended high school in Lahr where he joined the Young Communist League of Germany (under a false name, since he could not do so legally as a Soviet citizen) and received German Abitur in 1931. He then joined his father who was on a diplomatic mission in London on behalf of the Soviet Union, and worked there at the TASS bureau for half a year, then moved together with his father to Paris, and undertook studies there in electrical engineering.
Witold Leder a lăsat un gând
acum 10 zile
Military career (1933-38, 1943-52) In 1933, back in Moscow, he joined the Zhukovsky Air Force Engineering Academy, through which he would become a commanding officer of the Red Army. However, following his father's arrest (September 1937) and death in captivity (February 1938) as part of the Great Purge, he was removed from the Academy and Red Army in mid-1938. For several years he worked odd jobs, including as a translator and teacher of English. In October 1941, as Axis forces were approaching Moscow, he moved together with his mother and brother to Orenburg (then named Chkalov after Valery Chkalov), where they experienced hardship together with thousands of other refugees. In the spring of 1943, he was informed by Zygmunt Modzelewski, who was a friend of the family and had remained in Moscow, about the effort to organize a Polish Division as part of the Soviet war effort. He volunteered and in autumn 1943 became a captain in the 1st Tadeusz Kościuszko Infantry Division, then served in the 1st Corps of the Polish Armed Forces (pl) and the 1st ("Warsaw") and 2nd Air Force Regiments (pl) of the Polish People's Army, participating in military operations all the way to Berlin in…
Witold Leder a lăsat un gând
acum 10 zile
Imprisonment and rehabilitation (1952-54) In March 1952, in the late days of Stalinism, he was arrested while vacationing with his wife in Zakopane, as part of a broader wave of political persecution. Komar was arrested in November 1952; so was Stanisław Flato in February 1953, who together with Leder had been one of Komar's two deputies in the Second Department; Stanisław Bielski committed suicide in February 1953. Leder was incarcerated in Warsaw, tortured, and held in solitary confinement. He was released and rehabilitated on December 6, 1954.
Witold Leder a lăsat un gând
acum 10 zile
Later life and writing (1954-2007) Witold Leder then worked as deputy director of the Institute of Aviation. He became the institute's Party Secretary in 1956 at the time of the Polish October, in which he was an active participant. In 1958 he became head of the international department of Nowe Drogi, a monthly publication of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party. In the ensuing years, he became increasingly active as a translator and conference interpreter in matters of socio-political, historical and economic analysis, and remained involved in those areas well into his retirement. He spoke fluent English, French, German, and Russian. Among numerous published translations, he translated several key works of Polish Marxist philosopher Adam Schaff into German. In 1981 he was a co-founder of the Association of Polish Translators and Interpreters (Stowarzyszenie Tłumaczy Polskich). He also wrote essays and articles of his own on international politics, mostly in Polish and German. Late in his life, together with his brother Stefan Leder who in the meantime had become a noted psychiatrist, he coauthored a book on their family members' history and lifelong commitment to Communism, first published in German as Unbeirrbar Rot: Zeugen und Zeugnisse einer Familie…
Witold Leder a lăsat un gând
acum 10 zile
Honors He was awarded the Order of Polonia Restituta in 1946.