Jakub Berman

Berman's doctoral dissertation, written under the direction of Krzywicki and entitled O strukturze miast polskich na podstawie spisu ludności w 1791 r. ('On the structure of Polish cities based on the population census of 1791'), was brought to Białystok by his friend and colleague Irena Sawicka, but burned in Minsk when a dormitory where Berman and other journalists were housed was bombed by the Germans.

Jakub Berman (23 December 1901 – 10 April 1984) was a Polish communist politician.

An activist during the Second Polish Republic, in post-war communist Poland he was a member of the Politburo of the Polish Workers' Party (PPR) and then of the Polish United Workers' Party (PZPR).

Jakub Berman was born into a middle-class Jewish family in Warsaw on 23 December 1901.

His younger brother was Adolf Berman.

He received a law degree in 1925 from the University of Warsaw.

Jakub became a member of the Communist Youth Union and in 1928 joined the Communist Party of Poland (KPP).

He was arrested a few times, but unlike many other activists, had not been imprisoned for a prolonged period.

In 1935–36, he worked with Aleksander Wat (as his tutor on behalf of the KPP) in an attempt to establish a leftist periodical, intended to result from cooperation of the communists with other leftist forces in Poland (mostly the Polish Socialist Party (PPS)) within the Popular Front.

On 6 September 1939, after the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany, Berman followed government directions for "able-bodied men" and took a train going in the eastern direction.

He went to Białystok, occupied by the Soviet Union after the Soviet invasion of Poland.

With his friend Alfred Lampe, Berman was active in Polish-communist circles there and became a Soviet citizen.

In March 1941 he moved to Minsk, where he worked as an editor at Sztandar Wolności ('The Banner of Freedom'), a Polish-language bulletin published by the Communist Party of Byelorussia.

After the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, Berman escaped to Moscow.

Later he became an instructor at the International Lenin School, the Comintern school, where he trained displaced Polish communists, activists for the new Soviet-sponsored Polish Workers' Party (PPR).

With the help from Georgi Dimitrov and Jerzy Borejsza, Berman was able to bring there his wife and daughter Lucyna.

In December 1943, Berman met Joseph Stalin at a Kremlin reception for activists of the Union of Polish Patriots (ZPP).

Berman became a prominent figure among the Polish communists in the Soviet Union (according to Berman, however, Stalin hated him).

In the summer of 1944, Berman joined the Politburo of the Polish Workers' Party (PPR) and returned to Poland.

In Lublin, at the Polish Committee of National Liberation (PKWN), Berman practically led the foreign affairs department; it was concerned primarily with securing international recognition for the new communist-led governing entity.

In 1945, after a survey suggested that 4.8 million Polish citizens including 3 million Jews had died in the war, Berman stated "if we accept that 3 million Jews were murdered, we must significantly increase the number of Polish victims".

He declared that 3 million non-Jewish Poles had died, in order to equalize the numbers, to make them acceptable to Polish public opinion.

According to Jan Grabowski, this policy of "equalizing" the respective numbers of Jewish and Polish victims has since been propagated in Poland and that is how the issue is presently taught to students in public schools.

In January 1945, as soon as Warsaw was occupied by the Red Army, the Provisional Government of the Republic of Poland (formerly the PKWN) moved from Lublin to Praga district of Warsaw.

Berman, as a member of the Politburo of the PPR, was charged with oversight of the state security apparatus (the Ministry of Public Security).

In post-war Poland Berman organized state censorship, supervised the development of and permissions for political parties and organizations, and was the main liaison between the PPR and the PKWN.

From 1948, he was considered the second most powerful politician in Poland after President Bolesław Bierut, until he was removed from power in 1956, following Bierut's death.

Alongside Bierut, Berman was responsible for party oversight of the Stalinist Ministry of Public Security, commonly known as the "UB".

Under Berman's leadership, 200,000 people were imprisoned for alleged political crimes, and 6000 were executed.

Berman also oversaw Poland's cultural affairs.

From 1948, together with Bolesław Bierut, general secretary of the Polish United Workers' Party (PZPR), a successor of the PPR, and economist Hilary Minc, Berman formed a triumvirate of Stalinist leaders of Poland.

According to Lucyna Tych, Berman's daughter, all three "Stalinist" leaders sought to implement communism in Poland in ways different from the manner in which it was done earlier in the Soviet Union (while remaining entirely loyal to the Soviet leadership).

Berman and Minc were close friends and partners.

They successfully cooperated in protecting Poland's economic interests.

Berman's decisions had to be consulted with and could be vetoed by two resident Soviet advisers, who remained in Poland until 1953 and 1954.

He wrote a magister thesis entitled Służba domowa w Warszawie w końcu w. XVIII oraz próby jej zrzeszenia się zawodowego ('Domestic servantry in Warsaw at the end of the 18th century and its attempts to establish a trade association').

Berman's academic adviser, Marxist sociologist Prof. Ludwik Krzywicki, wanted to hire Berman at the university as his assistant, but it was not allowed because of Berman's Jewish origin.

Krzywicki's efforts to find Berman a mainstream non-university job also failed and Berman ended up working for a Jewish agency, in a poorly paid position.

The family was supported largely by Berman's wife, Gustawa née Grynberg, who was a well-regarded physician and dentist.

Berman's social contacts in Warsaw included many communism-sympathizing members of Polish intelligentsia; Janina and Władysław Broniewski, as well as Wanda Wasilewska, were among his associates.