Located between the former Soviet Union and Germany Poland has the potential to become a political and economic bridge between the East and the West. It is crucial to European security and stabilization. Yet, the list of reference books on recent Polish history is very short. This book, a companion to the Historical Dictionary of Poland, 966-1945, provides information on Polish political, economic, and cultural history since 1945 Written for English-speaking readers, the book includes entries on the most important events and personalities in the past 51 years of Polish history. It covers the entire history of communist Poland, the great changes of 1989, and the main developments during the first seven years of the post-communist era.

Located between Germany and the former Soviet Union, Poland has the potential to become a crucial political bridge between East and West. Poland may be central to the security and stability of Europe, yet little data is readily available. This reference work seeks to fill that gap, and provides information on Polish political, economic and cultural history since 1945.

Jan Karski's Story of a Secret State stands as one of the most poignant and inspiring memoirs of World War II and the Holocaust. With elements of a spy thriller, documenting his experiences in the Polish Underground, and as one of the first accounts of the systematic slaughter of the Jews by the German Nazis, this volume is a remarkable testimony of one man's courage and a nation's struggle for resistance against overwhelming oppression. Karski was a brilliant young diplomat when war broke out in 1939 with Hitler's invasion of Poland. Taken prisoner by the Soviet Red Army, which had simultaneously invaded from the East, Karski narrowly escaped the subsequent Katyn Forest Massacre. He became a member of the Polish Underground, the most significant resistance movement in occupied Europe, acting as a liaison and courier between the Underground and the Polish government-in-exile. He was twice smuggled into the Warsaw Ghetto, and entered the Nazi's Izbica transit camp disguised as a guard, witnessing first-hand the horrors of the Holocaust. Karski's courage and testimony, conveyed in a breathtaking manner in Story of a Secret State, offer the narrative of one of the world's greatest eyewitnesses and an inspiration for all of humanity, emboldening each of us to rise to the challenge of standing up against evil and for human rights. This definitive edition-which includes a foreword by Madeleine Albright, a biographical essay by Yale historian Timothy Snyder, an afterword by Zbigniew Brzezinski, previously unpublished photos, notes, further reading, and a glossary-is an apt legacy for this hero of conscience during the most fraught and fragile moment in modern history.