Miła 18

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A monument of Anielewicz standing where the bunker was

This article is about the bunker. For the novel named after the bunker, see Mila 18.

Ulica Miła 18 (or 18 Mila Street in English) was the headquarters bunker (actually shelter) of the Żydowska Organizacja Bojowa (ŻOB) (Jewish Fighting Organisation), a Jewish resistance group in the Warsaw Ghetto in Poland during World War II. Nowadays a monument to Mordechaj Anielewicz stands here.

The bunker at 18 Mila Street was constructed by a group of underworld smugglers in 1943. The ŻOB arrived there by coincidence, and it became the tactical headquarters for the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. The smugglers who had built it helped the ŻOB as guides. On May 8, 1943, three weeks after the start of the Uprising, when the bunker was attacked by the Nazis, there were 300 people inside. The smugglers surrendered, but the ŻOB command, including Mordechaj Anielewicz, the leader of the Uprising, stood firm. German and Ukrainian troops threw tear gas into the bunker to force the occupants out. Anielewicz, his wife and many of his staff committed suicide rather than surrender, though a few fighters managed to get out of a rear exit.

A monument at the site of number 18 Mila street

Although it is often claimed that Miła 18 was the last shelter in the Ghetto to fall, this was not the case. Schutzstaffel General Jürgen Stroop's men took 30 shelters on May 12 alone.

It should be noted that the current street numbering in Mila Street does not correspond to the wartime numbering. The current Mila 18 is occupied by an apartment block but is not in the same location.