Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union enemies and stressed the organization's determination to fight communist attempts to establish their rule in Poland. Creation The Soviet military successes on the Eastern Front caused the NSZ to adjust its program in mid-1943. Because of indirectly benefiting the Soviet Union, anti-German activities were to be discouraged. The main enemies were now considered to be the Soviet Union and its "communist agencies" in Poland: the Gwardia Ludowa (GL) and its successor Armia Ludowa (AL), the Polish Workers' Party (PPR) and the Soviet partisans, who were active also in Poland. Lacking a large military unit, the nationalists issued on 11 August 1944 an order establishing the Holy Cross Mountains Brigade. The brigade was created in August 1944 in the Kielce region out of the 204th infantry battalion and Special Action Groups of the NSZ-ZJ. It varied in number from 822 soldiers in December 1944 to 1418 soldiers in May 1945. The purpose of the brigade was the realization of the political and military program of the NSZ. The commander of the brigade was Colonel Antoni Szacki ("Bohun-Dabrowski"). Military engagements in Poland The formation fought against the Germans (among others at Brzeście, Zagnańsk, Caców, and Marcinkowice), the Soviet NKVD forces, the Polish communist partisans of the Armia Ludowa (at Fanisławice and Borów) and once against the peasant partisans of the Bataliony Chłopskie (BCh) when they cooperated with communist partisans. Although the brigade occasionally fought the Germans, it avoided confrontations with the occupier and stressed a "clearing of the Polish territories of red banditry". The brigade's major success was its defeat of a joint Armia Ludowa and Soviet partisans force in a battle fought on 8 September 1944 near Rząbiec. The battle took place after a patrol of the brigade was captured by the communist formations, and its members tortured and slated for summary execution. One of the captured prisoners managed to escape and alerted the brigade to the situation. The brigade attacked and defeated the AL and Soviet soldiers. The Soviet captives were executed and several Poles of the AL who were accused of banditry as well. Thirteen of the captured Polish communists joined the brigade. In individual actions units of the brigade killed several hundred members and sympathizers of the PPR and the AL, in what one historian, Rafał Wnuk, described as a bloody and brutal civil war fought between communists and nationalists in the