Germany & USSR jointly carved up Poland, but Britain (and France?) only declared war on Germany, not the Soviet Union. Why is this?
Any aficionados and/or arm-chair theorists here?
Is the answer as simple as they didn't want to drive Germany and USSR closer together, and/or that they were scared of the USSR? I thought the latter was still viewed as pretty backward and a potential pushover in a fight by not just Germany but everyone in the West at the time.
Could it be as simple as the Brits agreement with Poland was to protect Poland against Germany, and not the SU? In other words, Britain honored it's agreement when Germany attacked. There was no such agreement regarding attack from SU.
To the Western leftists, communist leftists were less scary than the fascist leftists. Plus, Hitler disturbed their Jewish central banking system, whereas Stalin did not.
@AntV Same with Poland's agreement towards the Soviet Union. Romania was prepared to co-operate with Poland regarding the 17th September invasion. Just that Poland's leadership at the decided for Romania to not step in, so that the evacuation to France would be faster/easier.
Poland's leadership simply overestimated France's political&militaric capabilities cause of France's prestige since France was seen as the one holding off the German advance.
The unfortunate lack of knowledge about the French society's pessimism towards war which was a result of the amount of losses from ww1, wasn't understood from a Polish point of view. Until it was too late, it wasn't until later that after 1940 that the main ally switched from France to the U.K.
Which stinged really bad and again cause of the Yalta agreement, then also the Potsdam conference. Cause U.K's influence, economy and power was waning due to the attrition of ww1, then also ww2. (It's not without reason that Churchill was desperate to get U.S.A onboard in to the European conflict)
U.S.A&Soviet Union having no formal obligations towards pre-ww2-Poland. Was doing how they liked and how they saw it fit.
The power shift was heavily on Stalin during the negotiations, while Churchill's influence was waning as Roosevelt was determined to end European Imperialism (colonial rule in Africa&Asia)
Which is why he wasn't interested in strengthening U.K international position in any way. Poland was simply unfortunate with her prospects of potential allies as the Soviet Union had an axe to grind (with Stalin it was even on a personal level cause of the 1920 war near Lwów) while the U.S.A simply had no ambitions to have any influence in slavic countries that would create tension and was fairly naive with it too. (Czechoslovakia is a particularly good example of naivety from the west)
I wouldn't blame U.K as much in this as Stalin simply hoped for the Germans to bleed on the French front (just like during ww1) while instead it happened in the east. With enormous casualties for the Soviet Union as well. The sad thing is that if the red army had come to the aid of Poland in 1939, the Nazi Germans might have been defeated earlier. But, that's of course just speculations now about top level discussions and possibility of outcomes. If Stalin wasn't paranoid and revengeful.
Alas Polish-Russian relations continue to be difficult to this day
I'd say that the agreement became enforceable in Sept 1939, hence Britain declaring war on Germany. I guess you could argue the "protecting" part of the agreement ended in October; but, that's academic. When Britain declared war-it was on!
It was indeed on, and fascism obviously needed defeating, though the agreement was, according to some, voided by the Polish government some time before.
The issue has been much discussed here, and as history turned out, the UK respected the guarantee regardless of whether or not it had been broken..
Could it be as simple as the Brits agreement with Poland was to protect Poland against Germany
Wrong, Britain signed a mutual defence pact with Poland, which it never intended to honour. This is evidenced by the shameful betrayal at Yalta when Poland was sold to the Communists after the war. Europe was not liberated after WWII it was occupied and divided in two halves.
Seems an odd claim since Britain did declare war on Germany on Sept 3, 1939 even though it wasn't prepared for war at that time. Seems to me whether they intended to honor the agreement when made or not is moot. They did honor it-maybe not with the hoped for outcome, but it did honor it.
Then explain why Britain and France didn't honour the defense agreement & declare war against the Soviets who at the same time invaded & occupied Eastern Poland?
dailymotion.com/video/x30y3cn Adolf Hitler, The Man who Fought the Bank
Plus, Hitler disturbed their Jewish central banking system,
dailymotion.com/video/x65ayz4 The German War Against Globalism
archive.org/details/hitler-vs-rothschild
The English are "a slave race governed by the House of Rothschild since Waterloo". (Ezra Pound - American poet & critic) en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ezra_Pound
...like Madoff? I wasn't there, but have no doubt that Hitler had real problem with the international Jews in the banking business. Would you like to see the names of the authors of the Federal Reserve who kidnapped the US banking system in 1913 and made it private? Yes, the so-called "Fed" is as private as Federal Express.
And yet people are shocked when Poland resists their restitution extortions or a poll that shows 1/5 Poles are glad WW2 resulted in less jews (a majority agreed jews have too much power)
Coz the Polish-Western alliance was designed only against Germany. Simple.
As evasive as ever...The question is why only against Germany? How about the NATO way...against any aggressor. Here is the answer: because the Western swamp had a love affair with the Soviet Union. Long after the evil empire dropped the iron curtain, American publications would still show Stalin as a jovial sweet uncle - good enough to be Santa at Sears. In a 1954 edition of Encyclopedia, Katyn was still a German atrocity. Soviets? No way!
My reading suggests that the Baldwin, later the Churchill, government acutely realized the geopolitical significance of Stalin as a bulwark against the Nazis. HE wasn't history's supreme dolt; Neville Chamberlain won that booby prize hands down.
Stalin was on the American leftist academia most admired list long after the iron curtain went down. So much for the intelligence and morality of "professors".
Almost forgot the lovely couple aka the Rosenbergs. I wonder who smoked more on that Sing Sing chair.
