was not so. In the midst of battle or justnbefore it he can behold the mountains,nor the glowing slowness of light in thenearly dawn, with the eyes of the newborn.nIn one terrible moment he looksnupon a scene of unheard-of beauty andnknows in his head it is beautiful butncannot feel it in his breast and guts:nhe knows himself to have become thenman who will not see because he doesnnot feel. He sounds like a man reportingnhis own death.nBut after bringing his inner hardnessnout, the war softened him.n”Then, unobtrusively yet insistently,nvarious thoughts came to my mindnconcerning the Germans, the Partisans,nand ideology. Why were doctorsnfrom Berlin and professors from Heidelbergnkilling off Balkan peasantsnand students in these ravines.’ Hatrednfor Communism was not sufficient.nSome other terrible and implacablenforce was driving them to insanendeath and shame. And driving us,ntoo, to resist them and pay them backn. . . This passion, this endurancenwhich lost sight of suffering andndeath, this struggle for one’s manhoodnand nationality in the face ofnone’s own death . . . this had nothingnto do with ideology or with Marx andnLenin. When the sun rose, I suppressednthese abysmal thoughts, for Insensed how destructive they were fornthe ideas and organization to which Inhad given myself. But I never forgotnthose thoughts …”nThe war broke through his ideologicaln”assurance,” put him in touch withnthe profundity he yearned for but darednnot touch—for which ideology had donenas a substitute. And yet in the narrativenhe misses his earlier harshness, the daysnwhen he barked orders—and there werenno questions. The struggle of this booknis all between this harshness and thisnsoftness. He remarks of a vision ofnChrist he had at the worst moment ofnhis war:n”Thus I include it in this work,nthough my atheism and the dogmaticnpurity of the revolution suffer for it.”nL^ awodny’s book. Nothing but Honour,nis about the uprising of the PolishnHome Army against the Germans at thenmoment when the Red Army hadnreached the outskirts of Warsaw innAugust 1944—an event crucial to understandingnthe world that has comenafter. Like Djilas, Zawodny witnessednthe events he describes. But his relationnto these events and to his formernself is different. Djilas will not rid himselfnof his memories: they haunt himnlike the dreams of Chagall, allowing himnneither wakefulness nor sleep. Zawodny,nin contrast, writes almost as if henhad not fought in Warsaw. He keeps hisndistance—the distance of the AmericannUniversity Professor he has become—nbecause he desires to write history, notnmemoirs. And he succeeds in the beginningsnof historical understanding,nthat is in understanding the Warsawnuprising not only in terms of himself,nbut in terms of all sides who fought innit. Zawodny keeps his distance becausenhe has difficulty living with his formerncourage. Unlike Djilas he has no doubtsnabout its genuineness: he still breathesnliving anger at Home Army soldiersnwho shot at him in error. In fact, hisncourage troubles him, even embarrassesnhim:n”The soldiers’ (of the Home Army)nendurance seemed to be coming fromnpsychic energy, a resource that cannotnbe empirically verified and defiesnstatistical analysis.”nLike many of the Home Army soldiersnwho lived through the uprising, Zawodnynwonders whether their courage wasnmisplaced because it did not come tonvictory. In part his book springs fromnthese doubts—which tell more aboutnour present embarrassment with couragenthan the past.nIn Poland, unlike Yugoslavia, civilnwar did not come with resistance to thenGermans—but after the conquest ofnthe Red Army. The Home Army, whichnnumbered about three hundred eightynnnthousand in all Poland at the time ofnthe uprising and forty thousand withinnWarsaw, was anticommunist and largelyndemocratic. It fought for democracynclearly defined as the rule of law, suffrage,nfreedom of the press and religion,nan elected government with the possibilitynof an alternative, that is, with annopposition which could challenge it innParliament and elections. It wanted tonhave diplomatic relations with the SovietnUnion without submitting to its ideologies.nDuring the uprising the HomenArmy command in Warsaw cooperatednwith the about two thousand localncommunist fighters even though it wasnaware that the Red Army and the Polishncommunists from Moscow—which thenSoviets brought with them—arrestednthe Home Army soldiers they encountered.nThere are many questions, however,nabout the Warsaw uprising. It is notnclear who gave the order for it—thenLondon government or the command innWarsaw. Despite extensive preparations,nthe soldiers of the Home Army werenappallingly underarmed: there was approximatelynone gun to every twentynsoldiers—and not much ammunition.nAlthough Great Britain and the UnitednStates had made it clear they couldnnot help an uprising, the London governmentnof Poland did not communicatenthis to the Home Army command innWarsaw. Also, in the middle of Augustna crucial sentence allowing the commandernin Warsaw to surrender was leftnout in transmission from London.nThe commander of the Home Army,nBor-Komorowski, probably harbourednfew illusions about the odds against thenuprising, but he counted on swiftness.nAlthough he did not inform it officiallynof the uprising, he expected the interventionnof the Red Army which had arrivednon the Vistula towards the endnof July. The Soviet radio urged the Polesnto rise up—and implied that anythingnelse would amount to collaboration withnthe Nazis. Komorowski understood thatnthe Red Army had to be met by representativesnof the Polish people if theren9nChronicles of Culturen