So, after encouraging Poland with promises of British salvation should Hitler take the bait, Churchill used Poland as the excuse to start WW2 and destroy Germany which was his stated aim since 1933.
And just as Britain proved itself a double crosser to the Arabs when it gave Palestine to the Zionists, it likewise did to Poland after the second world war when it delivered Poland to Stalin.
My question is, was life for Poles who chose to live in Prussia when it was a Germanic Nation, better or worst for Poles than when they where suffered with Communism?
How can they not be relevant to the question? Britain made promises to Poland which it failed to keep. Was Poland as a result better or worst off for having trusted Churchill?
I think rule under Nazi Germany would have been a worse fate as Hitler considered Poles subhuman.Not that rule under the Soviet Union was a walk in the park.
Actually, aren't we forgetting that Churchill wasn't the Prime Minister at the time when Germany attacked Poland? Chamberlain was, the same man who sold Czechoslovakia to appease Hitler.
My question is, was life for Poles who chose to live in Prussia when it was a Germanic Nation, better or worst for Poles than when they where suffered with Communism?
When it was occupied during the war there were starvation rations, the closure of educational establishments, ghettoes, death camps and mass executions. Even during the period of partition there was a brutal suppression of dissent and a failed German attempt to eliminate Polish culture. During the communist period it was, once it had all settled down a society of which many people have fond memories.
Rather than a comparison of Life under Communism with life under Nazi occupation, which would obviously be unfair comparison in times of war, Iam looking at a comparison of life between communist rulership, which was the end result of the Allies interference, and life for Poles under the previous Prussian rule, Pre WW2 for East Prussia, and pre WW1 for West Prussia, and indeed, their own rule in actual Poland, basically how Poland might have been come 1945 and after if the West had let things alone.
Of course there are two courses history might have taken, Hitler might have invaded anyway, or, without the implied backing of the strength of the British Empire, Poland might have been more accommodating of Hitlers demands of a corridor to East Prussia and war might have been avoided.
Doubtless the Soviet Union would have, I wonder if Poland would have successfully repelled the Communists if they were not having to fight the Nazis at the same time, whats more, if the Communists had attacked Poland, East Prussia would have considered that to be a threat towards themselves and so possibly have fought on Poland's side if the likes of Marshall Rydz=Smigly hadn't followed Churchill's encouragement to antagonize Hitler.
"Poland wants war with Germany and Germany will not be able to avoid it even if she wants to." (Polish Marshal Rydz-Smigly as reported in the Daily Mail, August 6th, 1939)
Churchill was not in power when the war started. To defeat Germany, he took advantage of Germany's violation of its treaty with Russia by letting Russia sacrifice millions of soldiers to kill off the Nazis. But this strategy backfired because by the time the war ended the Russian armies had occupied all of Poland and Germany up to Berlin. Britain, whose resources were exhausted, France who had few resources and the U.S. who was not politically able to continue a war they had been fighting for years, were in no position to start another war with Russia to beat them back from Berlin all the way past Poland to Russia proper. As they say, possession is nine tenths of ownership. Political reality forced the allies to concede Poland to Russia. They were able to convince Russia to cede a portion of eastern Germany in return for the eastern border between Russia and Poland being moved westward from what existed before the war. They also tried their best to get Russia to promise a democratic form of government in Poland, which Russia paid lip service to in the beginning but eventually totally disregarded. Those Poles who lived in Prussian Poland were subsumed into post-war Poland under Russia, as were all the Germans who lived in Eastern Germany. They did not have a choice so there is no question of whether they where better off in Prussia or in Russia.
As I've read, life for Poles in German Prussia was somewhat better than under Russian rule. Under the Russian regime, people, even children had to learn the Russian language and had to speak and write it. Otherwise they lost many of the small comforts they had in their lives. Under both regimes though, people suffered from many of the day to day things one might consider normal in life. The Germans were considered to have been somewhat kinder, however.
Life in Prussia was different from life in Germany. They voted less to nazi party than the rest of the country in 1933. Before 1933 life in Germany was better than life in USSR. Life in Austria was good too. In 1914 polish people decided to fight for austrians under Józef Piłsudski. But Polish agreed only to fight russians and not the french/english. Therefore when the war stop against Russia in 1917 Polish people refuse to fight the french. Józef Piłsudski was sent to a jail until the end of world war 1.
Furthermore polish people had some deputies in austian parliament before 1914. They created the birth of polish governement of post was 1917 there.
However with Hitler's rule life for poles would have been a nightmare pretty soon. For the nazis slavic nations were sub humans. For example nazis left for dead 3 millions of russians POW in camps.
Archives - 2010-2019 / History / Poland worst off as a result? (life in German Prussia vs. Russian communism)
