The Polish decision to reject Germany's demands in 1939

[ThomasG]

Why did Poland make the decision to reject the German demand to allow a plebiscite determine the ownership of the Polish corridor? The loss of Sudetenland prevented Czechoslovakia from effectively defending itself in March 1939 but accepting the German demands about the corridor wouldn't really impact Poland's military ability. I don't find the Polish fears that accepting the German demands would lead Poland to the status of a satellite nation as reasonable. If Poland had given back Danzig Hitler would have no means to threaten Poland's sovereignty because without a good casus belli a victorious war would be impossible for the Germans.

What did the Polish strategists really expect to happen in the war against Germany? Did they seriously consider the risk that Poland would be occupied? Did they think that it would be worth it to fight the war even if the country became occupied but would be ultimately liberated?

[Rumsfeld]

Here is a narrative:

...Germany opened its negotiations with Poland in a fairly friendly way on October 24, 1938.

It asked for Danzig and a strip a kilometer wide across the Polish Corridor to provide a highway and four-track railroad under German sovereignty. Poland's economic and harbor rights in Danzig were to be guaranteed and the "corridor across the Corridor" was to be isolated from Polish communication facilities by bridging or tunneling.

Germany also wanted Poland to join an anti-Russian bloc. If these three things were granted, Germany was prepared to make certain concessions to Poland, to guarantee the country's existing frontiers, to extend the Nonaggression Pact of 1934 for twenty-five years, to guarantee the independence of Slovakia, and to dispose of Ruthenia as Poland wished.

These suggestions were generally rejected by Poland.

They were repeated by Germany with increased emphasis on March 21st. About the same time, the Germans were using pressure on Romania to obtain an economic agreement, which was signed on March 23rd...

...If the chief purpose of the unilateral guarantee to Poland was to frighten Germany, it had precisely the opposite effect. On hearing of it, Hitler made his decision: to attack Poland by September 1. Orders to this effect were issued to the German Army on April 3, and the plans for Operation White, as it was called, were ready on April 11.

On April 28, in a public speech to the Reichstag, Hitler denounced the Anglo-German Naval Agreement of 1935 and the German-Polish Nonaggression Pact of 1934. He also announced the terms he had offered Poland which had been rejected. As a result, negotiations broke off between the two Powers and were never really resumed. Instead, the crisis was intensified by provocative acts on both sides...

... In the face of this misunderstanding and hatred on the part of Hitler, and in the full knowledge that he had every intention of attacking Poland, Britain made no real effort to build up a peace front, and continued to try to make concessions to Hitler. Although the British unilateral guarantee to Poland was made into a mutual guarantee on April 6, Poland guaranteed Britain's "independence" in exactly the same terms as Britain had guaranteed that of Poland on March 31st. No British-Polish alliance was signed until August 2sth, the same day on which Hitler ordered the attack on Poland to begin on August 26th. Worse than this, no military agreements were made as to how Britain and Poland would cooperate in war. A British military mission did manage to get to Warsaw on July 19th, but it did nothing. Furthermore, economic support to rearm Poland was given late, in inadequate amounts, and in an unworkable form. There was talk of a British loan to Poland of ฃ100 million in May; on August 1st Poland finally got a credit for $8,163,300 at a time when all London was buzzing about a secret loan of ฃ1,000,000,000 from Britain to Germany.

The effects of such actions on Germany can be seen in the minutes of a secret conference between Hitler and his generals held on August 22nd. The Fuhrer said: "The following is characteristic of England. Poland wanted a loan from England for rearmament. England, however, gave only a credit to make sure that Poland buys in England, although England cannot deliver. This means that England does not really want to support Poland."

Perhaps even more surprising is the fact that France, which had had an alliance with Poland since 1921, had no military conversations with Poland after 1925, except that in August 1936 Poland was given 2,000,000,000 francs as a rearmament loan (Rambouillet Agreement), and on May 19, 1939, the Polish minister of war signed an agreement in Paris by which France promised full air support to Poland on the first day of war, local skirmishing by the third day, and a full-scale offensive on the sixteenth day. On August 23rd General Gamelin informed his government that no military support could be given to Poland in the event of war until the spring of 1940 and that a full-scale offensive could not be made by France before 1941-1942. Poland was never informed of this change, and seems to have entered the war on September 1st in the belief that a full-scale offensive would be made against Germany in the west during September..

The failure to support Poland by binding political, economic, and military obligations in the period before August 23rd was probably deliberate, in the hope that this would force Poland to negotiate with Hitler. If so, it was a complete failure. Poland was so encouraged by the British guarantee that it not only refused to make concessions but also prevented the reopening of negotiations by one excuse after another until the last day of peace. This was quite agreeable to Hitler and Ribbentrop. When Count Ciano, the Italian foreign minister, who had been kept completely in the dark by the Germans, visited Ribbentrop on August 11th he asked his host: "What do you want? The Corridor or Danzig? . . . 'Not any longer.' And he fixed on me those cold . . . eyes of his. 'We want war.' " Ciano was shocked, and spent two days trying, quite vainly, to persuade Ribbentrop and Hitler that war was impossible for several years...

... Danzig was no issue on which to fight a world war, but it was an issue on which negotiation was almost mandatory. This may have been why Britain insisted that it was the chief issue. But because it was not the chief issue, Poland refused to negotiate because it feared that if negotiation began it would lead to another Munich in which all the Powers would join together to partition Poland. Danzig was a poor issue for a war because it was a free city under the supervision of the League of Nations, and, while it was within the Polish customs and under Polish economic control, it was already controlled politically by the local Nazi Party under a German Gauleiter, and would at any moment vote to join Germany if Hitler consented...

http://real-world-news.org/bk-quigley/13.html#46

[Michael Emrys]

Why did Poland make the decision to reject the German demand to allow a plebiscite determine the ownership of the Polish corridor?

Possibly because without the Corridor, Poland had no access to the sea? That's why they were given the Corridor in the first place.

Michael

[ThomasG]

Possibly because without the Corridor, Poland had no access to the sea? That's why they were given the Corridor in the first place.

Hitler's proposal to solve the conflict would have ensured Poland's access to the sea so I don't think that is a satisfactory explanation.

After myriad rumors of putsches, Adolf Hitler's speech to the Reichstag on April 28 injected a more definite note into the situation. The Fuehrer admitted Poland's need for free access to the sea, but insisted that Danzig was a German city. Yet it had 'contracts with Poland which were admittedly forced upon her by the dictators of the peace of Versailles.' In his negotiations with Poland, he had proposed the return of Danzig as a Free State into the Reich. In return Germany had been prepared to recognize all Polish economic rights in Danzig, and to ensure a free harbor for Poland with unimpeded access to the sea.

This plan, so reasonable on the surface, was received with utter distrust in Warsaw. Addressing the Polish Sejm on May 5, Colonel Beck stressed the fact that Danzig's economic life depended on Poland; recalled that he had suggested a common guarantee of the existence and rights of the Free City on March 26 but had had no reply from Berlin; and intimated that, although Poland had not menaced the political and cultural development of the German majority in the Free City, Germany might nevertheless be striving to bar Poland from the Baltic. Thus the question of Danzig had become merely one segment of the general struggle for supremacy between Germany and the Anglo-French-Polish bloc. It could no longer be settled on its merits.

http://encarta.msn.com/sidebar_46150116 ... anzig.html

Poland made two errors which led to the breakout of World War II:
1) It trusted the French promises that France would make a "bold relief offensive" within three weeks of German's attack.
2) It assumed that the USSR would be neutral despite the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentropp Pact.

If Poland had judged the intentions of France and the USSR correctly it would have chosen to accept the German demands because it was not possible to avoid the occupation of Poland if the war started on September 1 1939.

[henryk]

http://encarta.msn.com/sidebar_46150148 ... nd.html#s3

Problem of Danzig and the Polish Corridor.

Immediately after the occupation of Czechoslovakia, the Nazis began to press for a speedy solution of the Danzig and the so-called Corridor problems. At the time it was reported that Germany demanded: (1) the return of Danzig as a 'free city in the framework of the German Reich'; (2) the right to build a highway 25 kilometers in width across Pomorze; (3) German control of the important railway-junction of Bohemia; (4) a special status for the German minority in Poland.

The acceptance of these demands by Poland would have meant the loss of an independent access to the sea. Naturally Poland, remembering the fate of Czechoslovakia, refused to abandon sovereignty over any portion of its territory. No Polish Government could have accepted the Nazi terms. Poland replied that it was willing to negotiate and establish a common Polish-German guarantee of the autonomy of Danzig. It was also ready to grant to Germany all possible transportation facilities through Pomorze. This meant that the Polish Government was willing to help in abolishing the League of Nations control over Danzig, and to agree to a virtual political Anschluss between Danzig and the Reich while reserving the vital economic interests of Poland in the Baltic. Short of sovereignty, Poland was ready to make the most liberal concessions to facilitate transit through the Corridor. When no reply was received to these Polish proposals, the whole country awakened to the fact that independence was in danger. A national defense loan was announced by the Government and important troop movements took place on the Western frontier.

[ThomasG]

I don't see how the example of Czechoslovakia justifies not giving Danzig back to Germany. Hitler's possibilities to threaten Poland's sovereignty would be very limited if Poland accepted the demands. Without Danzig as casus belli the German people would not have motivation to fight a world war. Poland, France and Britain were also gaining strength militarily vis-à-vis Germany.

[alf]

Thomas please give an example of Hitler honouring a Treaty that would have inspired Poland to consider such terms. Link with Mein Kampf and the German "right" for lands in the east and the concept of the "undermenchsen".

I don't see how the example of Czechoslovakia justifies not giving Danzig back to Germany. Hitler's possibilities to threaten Poland's sovereignty would be very limited if Poland accepted the demands. Without Danzig as casus belli the German people would not have motivation to fight a world war. Poland, France and Britain were also gaining strength militarily vis-à-vis Germany.

http://164.11.131.30/genocide/poland3.htm. No mention of Danzig is mentioned in the Hitler's reason to attack Poland. The propaganda was already in place to condition the German people for war. Again the onus is on you to show proof that Hitler would have kept his word.

TRANSLATION OF DOCUMENT TC-54
Source:Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression. Volume VIII. USGPO, Washington, 1946/pp.408-409
PROCLAMATION OF THE FUEHRER TO THE GERMAN
ARMED, FORCES, 1st SEPTEMBER, 1939

To the Armed Forces-

The Polish Government unwilling to establish good neighbourly relations as aimed at by me wants to force the issue by way of arms. The Germans in Poland are being persecuted with bloody terror and driven from their homes. Several acts of frontier violation which cannot be tolerated by a great power show that Poland is no longer prepared to respect the Reich 's frontiers. To put an end to these mad acts I can see no other way but from now onwards to meet force with force.

The German Armed Forces will with firm determination take up the struggle for the honour and the vital rights of the German people.

I expect every soldier to be conscious of the high tradition of the eternal German soldierly qualities and to do his duty to the last.

Remember always and in any circumstances that you are the representatives of National Socialist Greater Germany.

Long live our people and Reich!

Berlin, 1st September 1939.

(signed) ADOLF HITLER

A little bit on Nazi Germany intentions in Poland.

http://164.11.131.30/genocide/poland1.htm

The conquest of Poland by the Third Reich afforded Nazi racial ideologues their first real opportunity of restructuring a sizeable population and geographic area outside the boundaries of the Reich on racial grounds. The expansion eastward, although compromised by the need to come to an agreement with the USSR on the division of Poland, as set forth in the Nazi-Soviet Pact (24 August, 1939), revised on September 28, 1939, provided Germany with an extra 188,000 square kilometres of territory within which to experiment with demographic reorganization. The conquered territory included approximately 20 million people, of whom 650,000 were ethnic Germans and 2.6 million were Jews. A portion of the conquered territories had previously been under German control, but ceded to Poland under the terms of the Versailles Treaty, June 1919. These, along with territory that had not previously been German were incorporated into the Reich either by attachment to existing provinces (Eastern Prussia) or the creation of new administrative areas (Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia and Reichsgau Posen, which after January 1940 was named Warthegau). The eastern part of German occupied Poland was not incorporated in the Reich. From August 1940 it was known as the General Government, its seat of government being the old Polish capital, Krakow. Hitler appointed Dr Hans Frank as Governor General of the occupied Polish territories, that is, those territories not incorporated directly in the Reich.

The initial aspiration of the racial planners, especially the Reichsführer of the SS, Heinrich Himmler, and Alfred Rosenberg, one of the foremost Nazi race theoreticians, was to move Poles and Jews out of the incorporated territories and into the General Government area. The ethnic Germans residing in occupied Poland, and the Baltic states, would be resettled in these areas.

Rumsfield's obsession with finding any reason to excuse Germany going to war, needs to start visiting some serious scholarly sites. http://www.ess.uwe.ac.uk/genocide/ is a good start on Nazi Germany, it presents a lot of source documents.

http://164.11.131.30/genocide/chronology1.htm gives a timeline of events. Hitler did not simply ask for Danzig corridor

April 28
German note notified Great Britain of denunciation of the Naval
Agreement of June 18, 1935.
New York Times, April 29, 1939, p. 6.

German note to Poland denounced the 10-year non-aggression
treaty of January 26, 1934 between the two countries and
requested the return of Danzig as well as an extraterritorial
railway and highway connection to East Prussia.
New York Times, April 29, 1939, p. 7.

Finally from the Kietel Trial at Nuremburg http://164.11.131.30/genocide/keitel1.htm

(3) Aggression against Poland.

On 25 March 1939-four days after Ribbentrop pressed new demands for Danzig on the Polish Ambassador-Hitler told von Brauchitsch, Commander-in-chief of the Army, that he did not intend to solve the Polish question by force for the time being but requested that plans for that operation be developed. (R-l00)

On 3 April 1939 Keitel, as Chief of the High Command of the Armed Forces, reissued over his signature the directive for the Uniform Preparation for War by the Armed Forces for 1939/ 40. The directive; noting that the basic principles for the sections on "Frontier Defense" and "Danzig" remained unaltered, stated that Hitler had added the following directives to "Fall Weiss":

"1. Preparations must be made in such a way that the operation can be carried out at any time from 1.9.39 onwards.
"2. The High Command of the Armed Forces has been directed to draw up a precise timetable for "Fall Weiss" and to arrange by conferences the synchronized timings between the three branches of the Armed Forces.
"3. The plans of the branches of the Armed Forces and the details for the timetable must be submitted to the OKW by 1.5.39." (C-120)

It i s noteworthy that, even in April of 1939, the tentative timetable called for the invasion of Poland to be carried out at any time from 1 September 1939 onwards.

About a week later, an order signed by Hitler was circulated. to the highest commands of the Army, Navy and Air Force. This confirmed Keitel's directive to prepare for three eventualities: "Frontier Defense"," Fall Weiss", and the Annexation of Danzig. Annex II contained further instructions for "Fall Weiss". In the first paragraph, headed "Political Hypotheses and Aims", it was stated that should Poland adopt a threatening attitude toward Germany, a "final settlement" would be necessary nowithstanding he pact with Poland. "The aim is then to destroy Polish military strength . . ."

It was further stated that the Free State of Danzig would be incorporated into Germany at the outbreak of the conflict, at the latest. The directive continued :" Policy aims at limiting the war to Poland, and this is considered possible in view of the internal crisis in France and British restraint as a result of this."

The general political background against which the Armed Forces were to work having thus been set down, the later paragraphs outlined the tasks and operational objectives of the three branches of the Armed Forces. It was also decreed that a "camouflaged or open (' general' added in ink) mobilization will not be ordered before D-Day 1 at the latest possible moment", and further that the "preparations for the opening of operations are to be made in such a way that-without waiting for the planned assembly of mobilized units-positions can be taken up immediately by the first available troops." (C-120)

On 10 May an order signed by Hitler promulgated his instructions for the seizure of economic installations in Poland and directed the commanders-in-chief of the three branches of the armed forces to report by 1 August 1939 on the measures taken in consequence of these instructions. (C-120)

On 23 May 1939 Hitler called a meeting of his military leaders at the Reich Chancellery. Keitel was at the meeting; Jodl was not, but Warlimont (also from the Planning Department of OKW) was. Hitler announced the necessity of a war against Poland, not over Danzig, but in order to acquire living. space in the East. He recognized the possibility that this would provoke a war against France and England, but the Wehrmacht was instructed to prepare detailed plans. (L-79)

A directive dated 22 June 1939, signed by Keitel as Chief of the OKW, indicates an advanced stage of preparation. On the basis of particulars already available from the Navy, Army, and Air-Force, he stated, he had submitted to Hitler a "preliminary timetable" for "Fall Weiss." The Fuehrer was reported to be in substantial agreement with the intentions submitted by the three branches; he had also made suggestions with regard to the need to camouflage the scheduled maneuvers "in order not to disquiet the population," and had commented on the disposition of an SS Artillery Regiment. (C-126)

Two days later, Keitel issued instructions for further study on two specific problems: the capture, in undamaged condition, of bridges over the Vistula; and the possible adverse effect of Navy mining in Danzig Bay on the element of surprise in the Army's attack against the bridge at Dirschau, southeast of Danzig. (C-120)

On 22 August 1939, Hitler called together at Obersalzberg the Supreme Commanders of the three branches of the armed forces; as well as the lower ranking Commanding Generals (Oberbefehlshaber), and announced his decision to attack Poland near dawn on 26 August. Keitel was at this meeting. (L-8; 798-PS; l0l4-PS)

Three documents reporting this meeting have been uncovered: the text of one, L-3, overlaps the contents of the other two, 798-PS and 1014-PS ; the latter two appear to be complementary, 798-PS being a record of a morning speech, and 1014-PS of an afternoon speech. Violent and abusive lanuguage appears in both L-3 and 798-PS. That Hitler made, at a minimum, the following points, appears from all of them:

1. The decision to attack Poland was made last spring. (L-3; 798-PS)
2. The aim of the war in Poland is to destroy the Polish armed forces, rather than to reach a fixed line. (L-3; 1014-PS)
3. The attack will start early Saturday morning, 26 August (L-3; 1014-PS)
4.A spurious cause for starting the war will be devised by German propaganda. It is a matter of indifference whether it is plausible or not. The world will not question the victor (L-3; 1014-PS). The text in L-3 further describes the pretext to be used to start the war: "I'll let a couple of companies, dressed in Polish uniforms, make an assault in Upper Silesia or in the Protectorate."
A handwritten entry in the diary of Jodl, at that time Chief of the Operations Department of the OKW, confirms that the time for the attack on Poland had been fixed for 0430 on 26 August 1939. (1780-PS)

An addition added L-3; 1014-PS Document can be found at http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/people/h/hit ... oland.html. The whole document makes fascinating reading and to quote Hitler's thoughts on Danzig.

"Danzig is not the subject of the dispute at all. It is a question of expanding our living space in the East and of securing our food supplies, of the settlement of the Baltic problem. Food supplies can be expected only from thinly populated areas. Over and above the natural fertility, thorough- going German exploitation will enormously increase the surplus.

[Rumsfeld]

Rumsfield's obsession with finding any reason to excuse Germany going to war,

???

I don't excuse Germany for aggressing against Poland.

It's clear to anyone that Germany was the aggressor here, like USA was the aggressor to invade Iraq.

Simple.

[Tim Smith]

ThomasG,

You are forgetting the historical Nazi propaganda stunt to make the German people believe that Poland had attacked Germany on August 31st 1939.

The SS staged a fake 'border incident' near Gleiwitz in Silesia. They dressed a dead concentration camp victim in a Polish uniform as 'evidence' of Polish aggression against Germany.

So Hitler didn't need a genuine 'cassus belli' to go to war with Poland - he could manufacture a fake 'cassus belli' whenever it suited him.

Hitler was sly and treacherous in the extreme - as shown by his completely unjustified occupation of Bohemia (rump Czechoslaviakia) in March 1939. Poland saw this and knew that Hitler was totally untrustworthy. So their refusal to make any concessions to Hitler was quite understandable, especially once they had the British guarantee.

As previously mentioned, the Poles did not anticipate the Nazi-Soviet Pact and hence only considered a German attack when planning their defence.

Finally, the Poles underestimated German military strength - especially in airpower. The Poles knew that Germany had modern combat aircraft like the Bf 109, Ju 87 and He 111, but didn't expect the Luftwaffe to have over 2,000 such planes available for Fall Weiss, outnumbering the Polish Air Force 5 to 1.

[Rumsfeld]

... Danzig was no issue on which to fight a world war, but it was an issue on which negotiation was almost mandatory.

This may have been why Britain insisted that it was the chief issue.

But because it was not the chief issue, Poland refused to negotiate because it feared that if negotiation began it would lead to another Munich in which all the Powers would join together to partition Poland.

Danzig was a poor issue for a war because it was a free city under the supervision of the League of Nations, and, while it was within the Polish customs and under Polish economic control, it was already controlled politically by the local Nazi Party under a German Gauleiter, and would at any moment vote to join Germany if Hitler consented...

http://real-world-news.org/bk-quigley/13.html#46

Interesting 1939 TIME article:

If last week's news had no other effect, it certainly pepped up diplomatic gossip. Around the embassies went the story about Yang Chieh, Chinese Ambassador to Moscow: The day before the German-Russian pact was announced, Yang Chieh called on Russian Premier Viacheslav Molotov and asked what was up. Said he with Oriental suavity, he had heard rumors of a German-Russian plan to dismember Poland. . . . Thunderstruck, Premier Molotov gasped, drew back, while the veins of his forehead stood out in his apoplectic fury: this, he reminded his visitor, was the Soviet of Socialist Republics, the fatherland of the toiling masses, the vanguard of the antifascist struggle; that any ambassador could believe such a slander of the Socialist State made him, Molotov, wonder if he was the proper ambassador to be accredited to it. The Chinese Ambassador left, to read in Pravda the next day the laconic notice that the agreement had been made. Molotov hadn't been told.

Premier Molotov, whose name in Russian means Hammer (Stalin means Steel), whose pretty wife Paulina is Commissar of Fisheries and is very close to Stalin, may well have been taken by surprise. If so, his astonishment last week must have mounted hourly. No sooner had the German-Russian pact been hailed as thwarting the foul design of British Tories to direct German expansion to the East than the German Army did what (in the Russian view) Tories had failed to accomplish—i.e., directed German expansion to the East...

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/artic ... -1,00.html

At least TIME was more honest in the old days.

[ThomasG]

Thomas please give an example of Hitler honouring a Treaty that would have inspired Poland to consider such terms. Link with Mein Kampf and the German "right" for lands in the east and the concept of the "undermenchsen".

This isn't about Hitler's trustworthiness. It would indeed be more than likely that Hitler would betray the treaty with Poland if that benefited Germany. If Poland allowed the Corridor to become a part of the Reich in August 1939 Hitler would however have to wait at least until Spring 1940 before he could make more demands and perhaps invade Poland. Despite Hitler's dictatorial powers he would not declare war against Poland in September 1939 if Poland accepted all German demands about the Corridor. The majority of the German people had to believe that the war was justified to have the necessary morale to fight effectively and even National Socialist propaganda had to have some basis in existing grievances such as the situation of ethnic Germans in former German territory.

Britain, France and Poland had large rearmament programs and were gaining strength vis-a-vis Germany which had serious economic problems in 1939.
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic. ... 6&t=127603

In the light of these economic and military realities it is unlikely that Germany could succesfully conquer Poland in 1940 or later and therefore also unlikely that Hitler would even declare war. Returning Danzig and the Corridor to Germany would in that way allow Poland to preserve their sovereignty and avoid German or Soviet occupation.

[Rumsfeld]

I believe this explains Poland's refusal:

Poland refused to negotiate because it feared that if negotiation began it would lead to another Munich in which all the Powers would join together to partition Poland.

http://real-world-news.org/bk-quigley/13.html#46

Poland feared a "polish munich" where it would be cut up by Germany, Soviet and others.

That was their fear.

Who cut up Czechoslovakia?

Germany, Poland and Hungary.

Poland worried that if talks began to concede Danzing to Germany, others like Soviet, Lithuania, would start to make demands on Poland's eastern frontiers.

For this reason, Poland refused to talk with Germany over Danzig.

[ThomasG]

You are forgetting the historical Nazi propaganda stunt to make the German people believe that Poland had attacked Germany on August 31st 1939.

The SS staged a fake 'border incident' near Gleiwitz in Silesia. They dressed a dead concentration camp victim in a Polish uniform as 'evidence' of Polish aggression against Germany.

So Hitler didn't need a genuine 'cassus belli' to go to war with Poland - he could manufacture a fake 'cassus belli' whenever it suited him.

Germany would certainly not fabricate the border incident and start the war anyway in September 1939 if Poland accepted the German demands about Danzig and the Corridor.

As previously mentioned, the Poles did not anticipate the Nazi-Soviet Pact and hence only considered a German attack when planning their defence.

The Molotov-Ribbentrop pact was signed on August 24, 1939. There was still time to avoid the war. Hitler could cancel the invasion. The Poles were aware of the Pact but did not realize the that a secret protocol was included to the pact and assumed that the USSR would be neutral during the possible German-Polish war. Correct assessment about the Pact would give Poland a reason to avoid war at all costs in 1939 because the participation of the USSR to the invasion made it inevitable that Poland would be occupied. Appeasement in 1939 would give Poland time to rearmament and a possibility to avoid the occupation and stay independent.

[Rumsfeld]

Appeasement in 1939 would give Poland time to rearmament and a possibility to avoid the occupation and stay independent.

More likely Germany, Soviet and Lithuania would cut up Poland in a fashion similar to Czechoslovakia.

Poland won't take that risk after seeing the destruction of Czechoslovakia.

Would you?

[Michael Emrys]

Interesting 1939 TIME article:

Given that it was Molotov himself who negotiated and signed the pact, the entire article is clearly a fabrication on somebody's part. BTW, another thing that the article got wrong is that Molotov was not premier but Commissar of Foreign Affairs. In light of all that, the useful information content of the article is zero.

Michael