"The destruction of Poland comes first"

In "Mein Kampf", his programme work, Adolf Hitler, the leader of the Third Reich stated that the external enemies of Germany were France and the Jews. He wrote that the Jews were also the internal enemy. From 1921 the Republic of Poland was in a military alliance with France and for this reason it was also a potential enemy of Germany.

From the autumn of 1938 Joachim von Ribbentrop, the German foreign minister, during talks with the representatives of the Polish authorities, suggested that the Free City of Gdańsk (Danzig) should be incorporated into the Reich and that an exterritorial highway should be built from mainland Germany, through Polish Pomerania, to East Prussia. Germany also made an offer to Poland to join the anti-Comintern (anti-Soviet) pact. The consequence of such an undertaking would have been the subordination of Polish foreign policy to Germany.

These suggestions were firmly rejected by the Polish government. On 5 of May 1939 Józef Beck, the Polish Foreign Minister, revealed them publicly in parliament and turned them down. He said then, amongst other things: "Peace is a precious thing and desirable (...), peace (...) has its high price, but is rational. We in Poland do not accept the idea of peace at any price. There is only one thing that is priceless in the lives of people, nations and states: this thing is honour".

At that time both sides were undertaking active preparations for war. On 11 April Hitler approved a directive, prepared in the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht, on to the conduct of war in the years 1939-1940. Eventually the operational part of the plan of war with Poland ("Fall Weiss") was drawn up on 15 June and passed to the higher commanders in the form of executive orders.

Marshall Edward Rydz-Śmigły, the Polish General Inspector of the Armed Forces (and the Supreme Commander from the moment of the outbreak of war), ordered a secret mobilization in two (out of ten) military districts. The commands of five armies and of one independent operational group were also set up. In the middle of May 1939 Franco-Polish staff talks took place, involving General Tadeusz Kasprzycki, Polish Minister of Military Affairs, and General Maurice Gamelin, the chief of the French General Staff. A protocol was signed (on 19 May) in which both sides declared that in the event of a German attack on Poland:

1. France will immediately commence air operations (...).



2. As soon as part of the French forces is ready (around the third day after initiating France's general mobilization), France will gradually develop offensive operations with limited aims.



3. As soon as the main German war-effort against Poland becomes clear, France will develop offensive operations against Germany with its key forces (starting from the 15th of day after declaration of general mobilization by France).

A declaration on military cooperation, in the event of a German attack on Poland, was also signed by the British (amongst others, by General William Ironside, chief of the Imperial Staff).

At this stage Hitler's aggression could still be tamed through political means. Joseph Stalin, the leader of the neighbouring Soviet Union, however, took an interest in the outbreak of war with Poland. He revealed his reasons at a council meeting of the Politbureau of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union(b) on 19th of August.

"If we sign a treaty on mutual aid with France and Great Britain, the Germans will give up Poland and will start to look for a modus vivendi with the western states. War is unavoidable anyway, but future events may take a turn that will be dangerous for the USSR. If we accept Germany's proposal and sign a pact of non-aggression with them, the Germans will of course invade Poland and then joining the war by France and Great Britain will be inevitable. Western Europe will be engulfed by serious unrest and riots. In such conditions we will have great chances of staying aside of the conflict and joining the war at a moment favourable for us. (...)
Comrades! What is in the interests of the USSR - The Motherland of the Working Masses - is that a war should break out between the Reich and the capitalist Anglo-French bloc. One has to do everything for this war to continue as long as possible; so that the two sides would annihilate each other. This is exactly why we should accept the pact proposed by Germany and once this war is declared, we should strive for it to last as long as possible".

Stalin was counting on Europe being conquested by the USSR in result of this War.



Consequently, on 23 August, a German-Soviet pact of non-aggression was signed in Moscow, being in fact a document of aggression. A secret protocol was attached to it, specifying the division of Poland, which was as yet independent. The border between the German and Soviet areas of interest was to run approximately along the rivers Narew, Wisła (Vistula) and San. Consequently, the right bank part of the Polish capital, Warsaw, was to be incorporated into the USSR.

Originally the German attack on Poland was to commence on 26 August. However, in light of the signing of the Polish-British alliance treaty (25 August) Hitler cancelled this order. However, the order did not reach all the troops of the Wehrmacht.

Under these circumstances the night of 25/26 of August a German sabotage group made an attack on the Jabłonkowski tunnel and the Mosty railway station in Silesia (Śląsk Cieszyński). As early as the morning of 26 of August this group was liquidated by Polish troops. Major General Eugen Ott, the commander of the 7 of Infantry Division concentrated in this area, sent an expression of regret and apology to General Józef Kustroń, the commander of the Polish 21st Infantry Division. It was described by the German side as an incident "caused by an insane individual".

At this time the Polish military authorities ordered an alert mobilization of the army (24 of August) and then a general mobilization (30 of August). It was, however, cancelled under pressure of the allies and then reinstated on 31 August.

By the end of August the number of German provocations was gradually increasing, with the number of dead and wounded rising on both sides. For example, German saboteurs planted a bomb at the railway station in Tarnów on 29th August, and killed 21 passengers, leaving 35 wounded. One of the best known actions was the Gliwice provocation. The truth behind it was to be unveiled later by Alfred Naujocks (ex-Waffen SS), during the Nuremberg trial. On 31 August, at 8 p.m. a group of Germans dressed in Polish uniforms, and under Naujocks' command, seized a German radio station (on German territory), in Gliwice (Gleiwitz). After broadcasting a speech in Polish, calling for war with Germany, the provocateurs withdrew, but in order to make the action appear more credible, a murdered inmate of a concentration camp, dressed in a Polish uniform, was left behind. The attack on the radio station in the eyes of international opinion was to be the pretext and justification for the German invasion of Poland.

It was not the only such action, but other ones - for example, the attack on the German guarding post near the town of Stodoły in Silesia - were not so broadly publicized.

During a meeting with Wehrmacht commanders at Obersalzberg (22nd August) Hitler presented the essence of war operations, which were soon to follow:
"The destruction of Poland comes first. (...) I will provide a propaganda motive for war, regardless of whether it is true or not. (...). The order is as follows: the aim of the war is not to reach a specific point, but to achieve the physical destruction of the enemy. That's why I - so far only in the east - have prepared my Totenkopf units with the aim of killing without mercy and pardon all men, women and children of Polish origin".

The invasion of Poland ended the period of Third Reich bloodless conquests (Austria, Czechoslovakia, Lithuanian Klajpeda), the war that started in 1939 eventually led to the downfall of the nazi Germany.