After the Polish uprising in Warsaw broke out on August 1, 1944, Hitler issued orders to reduce the city to rubble and establish a fortress in its place. Once the uprising was quelled, some of the cityΓÇÖs Polish inhabitants were deported. In October-December 1944, the Germans methodically destroyed many of WarsawΓÇÖs antiquities and collections of cultural artifacts. The Soviet and Polish armies began an offensive in early January 1945, and liberated the city on January 17. In the course of the German occupation, 685,000 residents of Warsaw were murdered, most of them Jews.
