How ordinary Poles prepare for a Russian invasion

At a military training ground near Urolaw, ordinary pillars are arranged, waiting to be handed weapons and learned how to shoot. “After the circle is loaded, the weapon is ready to shoot,” the instructor, a Polish soldier, his face, his face smeared with camouflage paint.

Young and old, men and women, parents and children, they all come here for one reason: to learn how to survive an armed attack.

In addition to the shooting range, this Saturday morning program, called “Train with the Army,” also studies civilian combat, first aid and how to put a gas mask.

“Times are dangerous now, we must be ready,” says the project coordinator, Captain Adam Sielitsky. “We have a military threat from Russia and we are preparing for it.”

Capt Sielicki says the program has been signed and the Polish government already has plans to expand it so that every adult man in the country receives training. Poland, who shares the boundaries with both Russia and Ukraine, says he will spend almost 5% of GDP for defense this year, the highest in NATO.

Last week, Prime Minister Donald Tusk said Poland aims to build the “strongest army in the region”. Warsaw is expensive by buying planes, ships, artillery systems and missiles from the US, Sweden and South Korea, among others.

Dariusz is one of the attendees of the course on Saturday in Vroclaw and says he would be the “first” who voluntarily participates if Poland was attacked. “History has taught us that we must be ready to defend ourselves. We cannot rely on anyone else. Today there are alliances and tomorrow they are violated.”

As he removes his gas mask, Bartek says he thinks most pillars “will take a weapon,” if they are attacked, “and will be ready to protect the country.”

Agatha is present with a friend. She says the choice of Donald Trump has made people more worried. “He wants to withdraw (in Europe). That is why we feel even less safe. If we are not prepared and Russia attacked us, we will just become their prisoners.”

The statements of Donald Trump and the members of his administration have caused deep concern among the employees in Warsaw. During a visit to the Polish capital in February, US Secretary of Defense Pete Heget said Europe should not accept that the presence of US troops on the continent “will continue forever.”

Currently, the United States has 10,000 troops located in Poland, but Washington has announced last month that it is withdrawing from a key military base in Ruzau in eastern Poland. Officials claim that the troops will be redistributed in Poland, but this move has caused even more disturbance in the country.

Donald Trump’s apparent hostility to Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelenski and warm words for Russian Vladimir Putin only added to the anxiety.

Poland has to sign a defense agreement with France in the coming days, and another pact with the United Kingdom is under development – additional movements from Warsaw to rotate away from their historically strong military ties with Washington. It is also said that Poland was brought under the “nuclear umbrella of the French military”.

“I think (Trump) is certainly pressing us to think more creatively about our security,” says Tomash Shatkovski, Poland’s Permanent Representative to NATO and Presidential Defense Advisor. “I think the US cannot afford to lose Poland because it would be a sign … that you cannot rely on the United States. However, we have to think about other opportunities and develop our own capabilities.”

“If the Russians continue their aggressive intentions for Europe, we will be the first – the goalkeeper,” says G -n Shtkovski. He attributes Poland’s rapid military accumulation to “first-geopolitical situation, but also the experience of history.”

The painful heritage of Russian occupation can be felt everywhere here.

The 98-year-old Vanda Trachik-Zuska, the last time the Russian forces, under 1939, came to the State House of Care in Warsaw, when a pact between Stalin and Hitler led to Poland that was carved between the USSR and Nazi Germany.

“In 1939, I was twelve years old. I remember my father was very concerned (Russians),” Vanda remembers, “We knew that Russia had attacked us, they took advantage of the fact that the Germans exposed us.”

On the shelf is a photo of Vanda as a fighter who smeared the machine gun during the Warsaw uprising since 1944, when the Polish underground struggled with the German army among the ruins of the city. After repelling the Germans in the dying days of World War II, the Soviet Union installed a promotion regime in Poland, which ruled the country until 1989.

Currently, about 216,000 troops and women are compiling the Polish armed forces. The government says they intend to increase this to half a million, including reservists, which would give it to NATO’s second largest military military after the United States.

I ask Vanda if he thinks it is nice that Poland is building its military. “Of course, yes. Russia has this aggression in its history. I am not talking about people, but the authorities are always so,” she sighs. “It is better to be a well-armed country than to wait for something to happen. Because I am a soldier who remembers that weapons are the most important thing.”

Eighty years since the end of World War II, the Poles again look at their neighbors nervously. In a warehouse in southern Poland, in popular demand, a company has built a model of a bomb shelter.

“These shelters are designed mainly to protect against a nuclear bomb, but also against armed attacks,” says Janusz Janzi, Shelterpro boss, who shows me around the steel hopper, complete with two -storey beds and a ventilation system. “People build these shelters simply because they don’t know what to expect tomorrow.”

Janusz says the search for his shelters has increased since Donald Trump took office. “It was just a few phone calls a month. Now there are dozens of a week,” he says, “My clients are afraid of Russia most. And they worry that NATO will not come to defend Poland.”

But are Poles ready to protect the country if these fears become reality? A recent poll found that only 10.7% of adults said they would join the army as volunteers in the event of a war, and a third said they would escape.

On a sunny afternoon at Vroclaw, I ask Polish students if they would be ready to protect their country if they were attacked. Most say they would not. “The war is very close, but he feels quite far,” says medicine student Marcel, “but if Russia attacks, I think I would rule.”

“I would probably be the first to try to escape from the country,” says another student, Shimon. “I just don’t see something worth dying here.”

Aleksandra Stefanowicz Additional Report