what was World War Two all about?

Fuinseog

The whole thing started because Hitler invaded Poland, as indeed did Stalin, but why did Britain and France not also declare war on the USSR?

if WW2 was fought to liberate Europe why did Britain and France agree to Eastern Europe becoming enslaved. Thousands of Poles and Czechs died fighting for the liberation of their country. instead of five years of Nazi oppression they got forty years of communist oppression.

so, what was it all about?

jonniebgood1

The previous annexations, etc by Germany had created a situation that led to France and Britain pledging support for Poland. You are correct to highlight the irony of going to war to protect Poland yet at the end the Polish were left to Stalin. By the time that the Soviet army invaded east Poland war was already declared on Germany by several weeks. This meant it could be seen as a defensive action (i.e. creating a buffer zone). It was also a lower key action than the Blitzkreig. It would have been a massive blunder for Britain and France to get on the wrong side of the red army at this stage and I doubt it was ever realistically considered, I would be interested to research if it was discussed. In any case the public face of it seems fully in line with what churchill said at the time

"That the Russian armies should stand on this line was clearly necessary for the safety of Russia against the Nazi menace. At any rate, the line is there and an Eastern front has been created which Nazi Germany does not dare assail. When Herr von Ribbentrop was summoned to Moscow last week, it was to learn the fact and to accept the fact that the Nazi designs upon the. Baltic States and upon the Ukraine must come to a dead stop."

http://www.revolutionarydemocracy.org/archive/false4.htm
This page also makes the point that Britain and USA also occupied areas of countries against the will of those countries as it benefited their position later in the war (in North Africa).

Fratton Fred

The world changed beyond all recognition between 1938 and 1945.

There were two main reasons why Poland was left to Stalin. The first being that the UK and France were completely incapable of getting involved in another conflict. Both countries had expended all their resources compared to the USSR who were effectively on the ascendancy.

Secondly, Roosevelt was determined to create the UN and the Soviet Unions membership was vital. In return for signing up to the UN, Russia were given the opportunity to "Oversee" the elections in Poland through their puppet government.

The future of Europe was decided at the Yalta conference in February 1945, it is worth checking the Wikipedia page as that gives a good overview of what happened. You have to appreciate that Stalin went into the conference in by far the strongest negotiating position.

Morlar

Fuinseog wrote: »

The whole thing started because Hitler invaded Poland, as indeed did Stalin, but why did Britain and France not also declare war on the USSR?

if WW2 was fought to liberate Europe why did Britain and France agree to Eastern Europe becoming enslaved. Thousands of Poles and Czechs died fighting for the liberation of their country. instead of five years of Nazi oppression they got forty years of communist oppression.

so, what was it all about?

I think the primary underlying cause of WW2 was Versailles, the terms of which are largely the responsibility of the French. Along with the 'sole war guilt' German reparations, carving up of German colonies and ongoing industrial constraints were specifically designed to cripple German economic growth. Germany also of course lost territory to Poland, and their requests for rail and road access to the isolated Danzig were not granted by the Poles. There is also the issue which is rarely covered, and often downplayed of violence against ethnic Germans in (former Germany) Poland. British and French hollow assurances of coming to Poland's defence are also a factor. Without those false assurances Poland and Germany may well have been forced onto better terms. In any event in the long run Poland was betrayed, along with half of Eastern Europe. Stalin had long wanted revenge on the Poles following the Polish-soviet war of 1920 and this is evident in his immediate invasion, liquidation of the Officer/intellectual class. Also in his eventual abandonment of Poles who fought in the Warsaw uprising to prepare the way for a permanent occupation.

Here are a few links which make interesting (if sometimes disagreeable) reading :

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/06/04/Russian-historian-blames-Poland-for-WWII/UPI-13251244137018/

This one is particularly odd, haven't been able to find much more on this story, so it may well be out of proportion or have a sensationalist element ;

http://www.thephora.net/forum/showthread.php?t=41754

marcsignal

Morlar wrote: »

I think the primary underlying cause of WW2 was Versailles

fully agree with this.

Morlar wrote: »

There is also the issue which is rarely covered, and often downplayed of violence against ethnic Germans in (former Germany) Poland.

Fully agree with this too. This was mentioned in another thread a while ago. However you don't have to rely on exclusively German reports about this kind of thing, the Russians and French also had a thing or two to say with regard to the persecution of ethnic minorities in Poland. Whether British politicians had any view on the matter is hard to ascertain, oficially, but the British public certainly knew.

French Protest against Polish Police Terrors.

"A wave of terror is sweeping Poland at this very moment. The Press can hardly breathe a word because it is gagged. A police regime with all its horrors and its wild measures of oppression strangles the country. The prisons of the Republic to-day hold more than 3000 political criminals who are maltreated by their jailers, humiliated and beaten up with belts and sticks. The life they have to stand is such that in many prisons the inmates prefer death to the slow torture inflicted upon them."

Paul Painlevé, Edouard Herriot, Léon Blum, Paul Boncour, Séverine,
Romain Rolland, Victor Basch, Georges Pioch, Pierre Caron, Charles
Richet, Aulard, Hadamard, Bouglé, F. Herold, Mathias Mornardt, Jean-
Richard Bloch, Pierre Hamp, Charles Vildrac, Lucien Descaves, Henri
Béraud, Michel Corday, Léon Bazalgette, Paul Colin, Albert Crémieux,
Henri Marx, Paul Reboux, Noel Garnier.

From: Protest against the terrorisation of minorities in Poland submitted by French politicians and men of letters, 1924.

"The minorities in Poland are to disappear, and it is Polish policy that they shall not disappear only on paper. This policy is being pushed forward ruthlessly and without the slightest regard for public opinion abroad, for international treaties, and for the League of Nations. The Ukraine under Polish rule is an inferno -- White Russia is an even more hellish inferno. The purpose of Polish policy is the disappearance of the national minorities, both on paper and in reality."

From: "Manchester Guardian", December 14, 1931 (special report from Warsaw).

"The oppression of the Ukrainian minority in Poland is growing worse every day. It would perhaps be wearisome to record the oppressive acts, . . . such a record would be of almost impossible length. But there are certain things that cannot be left unrecorded, that must be heard by the civilised world -- namely, the horrible and inhuman barbarities that are inflicted on Ukrainian political prisoners in Polish gaols, and which are part of the war waged by the Polish dictatorship against the Ukrainian minority."

From: "Manchester Guardian" of December 12, 1931: "Oppression of Ukrainians. Methods of Middle Ages revived by Poles." Special Report from Lemberg (East Galicia).

The Germans protested to the Leage of Nations a dozen times about this. They left the League in 1933.

Morlar wrote: »

British and French hollow assurances of coming to Poland's defence are also a factor.

I believe this was a huge factor, when you consider the general Anti-German sentiment in poland at the time. For example (previously posted in another thread) In the Polish Campaign, the Germans lost 25% of the aircraft committed, and approx a Divisions worth of Tanks.

It's also quite clear, in hindsight, that Poland was sold down the toilet by the French and the British.

The French promised the Poles in May 1939, that in the event of a German attack, France would launch an offensive against the Germans in the West “no later than fifteen days after mobilization”. A promise made in a treaty signed between Poland and France.
However, when Germany attacked, Poland was totally and completely betrayed. Britain and France did declare war, and French troops made a brief advance toward the Siegfried Line, but stopped upon meeting German resistance. Had France attacked the Germans in a more aggressive way as promised, the results would have been disastrous for the Germans.
Contrary to their assurances to Poland, Britain and France later agreed to allow Russia keep the parts of Poland seized as part of the non aggression pact with Hitler in 1939.

In terms of Britain, Neville Chamberlain stated in the House of Commons on March 31, 1939:

As the House is aware, certain consultations are now proceeding with other Governments. In order to make perfectly clear the position of His Majesty's Government in the meantime before those consultations are concluded, I now have to inform the House that during that period, in the event of any action which clearly threatened Polish independence, and which the Polish Government accordingly considered it vital to resist with their national forces, His Majesty's Government would feel themselves bound at once to lend the Polish Government all support in their power. They have given the Polish Government an assurance to this effect. I may add that the French Government have authorized me to make it plain that they stand in the same position in this matter as do His Majesty's Government

Source

By April 1939 a formal agreement was signed between Poland and Britain. It stated quite clearly:

"If Germany attacks Poland His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom will at once come to the help of Poland."

Source: Anita Prazmowska, Britain, Poland and the Eastern Front, 1939 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), p. 193.

Britain’s support for Poland was a relatively new development, but France’s alliance initially went back as far as 1921. That year, France signed a mutual assistance pact with Poland on February 21, and Raymond Poincaré, the fufure president of the French Republic, stated:

"Everything orders us to support Poland: The Versailles Treaty, the plebiscite, loyalty, the present and the future interest of France, and the permanence of peace."

Source: Richard Watt, Bitter Glory: Poland and its Fate, 1919-1939 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1979), p. 176.

On September 15, 1922 a formal military alliance signed by Marshal Foch and General Sokoski, stated explicitly:

"In case of German aggression against either Poland or France, or both, the two nations would aid each other to the fullest extent.”

Source: Bauer, "Franco-Polish Relations," p. 32.

By mid May 1939 the Franco-Polish Military Convention stated that:

"on the outbreak of war between Germany and Poland, the French would immediately undertake air action against Germany.

It was also agreed that:

on the third day of French mobilization its army would launch a diversionary offensive into German territory, which would be followed by a major military offensive of the full French army to take place no later than fifteen days after mobilisation

Source: Richard Watt : Watt, Bitter Glory, p. 402.

Despite promising to help Poland fight a war against Nazi Germany, behind the scenes the British and French seriously doubted their ability to effectively aid the Poles. Discussions were held by the British and French Chiefs of Staff between March 31 and April 4, 1939. A report entitled "The Military Implications of an Anglo-French Guarantee of Poland and Rumania" stated:

"If Germany undertook a major offensive in the East there is little doubt that she could occupy Rumania, Polish Silesia and the Polish Corridor. If she were to continue the offensive against Poland it would only be a matter of time before Poland was eliminated from the war. Though lack of adequate communications and difficult country would reduce the chances of an early decision, No spectacular success against the Siegfried Line can be anticipated, but having regard to the internal situation in Germany, the dispersal of her effort and the strain of her rearmament programme, we should be able to reduce the period of Germany's resistance and we could regard the ultimate issue with confidence."

Source: Prazmowska, Britain, Poland and the Eastern Front, p. 81.

What actually happened is certainly no secret. The RAF, for example, did not even attempt to bomb German military installations because, as the Air Staff concluded on September 20:

"Since the immutable aim of the Allies is the ultimate defeat of Germany, without which the fate of Poland is permanently sealed, it would obviously be militarily unsound and to the disadvantage of all, including Poland, to undertake at any given moment operations ... unlikely to achieve effective results, merely for the sake of maintaining a gesture."

The Chiefs of Staff then informed Chamberlain that:

"nothing we can do in the air in the Western Theatre would have any effect of relieving pressure on Poland."

Source: Prazmowska, Britain, Poland and the Eastern Front, pp. 183-184.

Consequently, instead of Bombing Germany, as promised, the RAF chose to drop Propaganda Leaflets instead.

Now when you consider all of the above assurances given to the poles, it's hardly a surprise that Polish Marshal Rydz-Smigly is quoted as saying (as reported in the Daily Mail*, August 6th, 1939):

"Poland wants war with Germany and Germany will not be able to avoid it even if she wants to."

IMO that's a powerful comment for anyone in authority to make in August 1939. Consider what would be said today, if Hitler had said that about the Poles. IMO there's more to the start of the war than the standard run of the mill stuff.



* The Daily Mail was, and still is, often cited as a rag that supported Fascism then, and intolerance and sensationalism today by many on boards........... until they publish articles like this.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1303804/Adolf-Hitler-loner-rear-area-pig-according-WWI-regiment.html

The point I'm making with that, is that you must remain cognisant of the fact that people, and Governments, are not fussy who they quote, if it fits their agenda.

edit: I don't read the Daily Mail myself, but wont dismiss it for the purposes of research.