WI Poland-Germany Alliance 1939
- Thread starter MickeyM
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- germany phoney war poland wwii
Zachariah
Banned
Easy- have WW2 break out over the invasion of Czechoslovakia instead of having the Munch Agreement be reached, consolidating Poland's place as an aggressor, nominally allied with Nazi Germany in order to annex its claimed portion of Czechoslovakia for itself (as it did IOTL), on account of having the Wallies (and Soviet Russia) declare war on both the Axis Powers and Poland in response to their invasions.
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Deleted member 1487
They already had a non-aggression pact since 1934 that Hitler renounced in mid-1939 in the ramp up for war with Poland. They tried to ally with the Poles, but Poland realized that offer was only going to puppetize them, so they refused and opted to continue the non-aggression pact. Hitler then started beating the war drum against Poland after they rebuffed him. You'd have to radically change Poland to ever agree to ally with Hitler and remove British and French support to make that an option. Poland wanted peace and feared an alliance with Germany would mean Soviet invasion or at least later a Hitler led war against the USSR and they wanted none of it.
NapoleonCorinII
Banned
I would think not, poland had been ruled by russia and germany for many years and was quite paranoid
Admiral Beez
Banned
We're not removing British and French support, it never existing, but instead were having Poland recognize that such support was a canard.
Britain and France did nothing to defend Poland, did nothing when the USSR invaded, equally violating their security guarantees, and post-war Britain and France did nothing to protect Poland's independence, the entire point of Britain and France joining the war in the first place. Now, one could argue that Britain and France were in no position to do anything on the above, which supports my original point, Poland's guarantees from Britain and France are useless.
So, better to ally with Germany. Yes, Poland will have to give some of this territory back.
It's not a matter of giving some territory back--any more than Munich was a matter of Czechoslovakia conceding "some territory" to Hitler. Concessions on Danzig and the Corridor would only be the first step to a demand that Poland completely satellitize itself and eventually join Hitler in the Great War Against Bolshevism. If Germany and Poland lost that, Poland would be treated even worse by the victorious Soviets than it was in OTL. And if Germany and Poland won, Hitler would then ignore his promises to his Polish "allies" and proceed to install his "new order" on Poland (kill a great many Poles, deport others, Germanize the "salvageable" remaining ones, bring in German settlers, etc.).
True, the likelihood that the Western Allies would be able to prevail in the Second World War without Soviet aid and then restore Poland may seem slim now. But it did not by any means seem inconceivable at the time to many people. (Germany's economic weaknesses were often exaggerated, but they were real--of course in OTL she was able to make up for them in part by conquering and looting France, but the conquest of France was not widely foreseen and indeed was not IMO inevitable. Also it was widely expected--and not just in Poland--that Poland would hold out longer than it did.)
And in any event, Polish public opinion was solidly opposed to giving in to German demands, and even an authoritarian government could not ignore that.
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Deleted member 1487
We're not removing British and French support, it never existing, but instead were having Poland recognize that such support was a canard.
Britain and France did nothing to defend Poland, did nothing when the USSR invaded, equally violating their security guarantees, and post-war Britain and France did nothing to protect Poland's independence, the entire point of Britain and France joining the war in the first place. Now, one could argue that Britain and France were in no position to do anything on the above, which supports my original point, Poland's guarantees from Britain and France are useless.
So, better to ally with Germany. Yes, Poland will have to give some of this territory back.
IOTL Britain and France did declare war on Germany and fight Nazi Germany to the bitter end and crush them based on their guarantee to Poland. And Poland got a big cut of Germany, a very profitable slice too. Plus had Germany destroyed as a threat and the USSR, even as an overlord, neutralized as a major threat to their very existence. That wasn't exactly what Poland wanted pre-war, but it was better than being a Nazi puppet. Giving up any territory to Germany was politically impossible in Poland with or without the Allies and they would have fought even without Allied guarantees, even if they were doomed. They'd never agree to an alliance with Germany. Arguably though the Brits were on pace to actually talk Poland into giving up territory and becoming economic puppets of Germany IOTL when Hitler declared war, so perhaps if Hitler weren't so rash and willing to wait a couple of years Poland would have become 'Hungary-ized' within that period.
This, essentially. It's extremely debatable on the likelihood that Poland would actually join Germany in dismembering Czechoslovakia if war broke out over it in '38, but if they did they could wind up being regarded as a German ally and get attacked by the Soviets.
Zachariah
Banned
The thing is though, they did exactly this IOTL, invading and annexing Zaolzie literally on the day after the Munich agreement, believing that Warsaw had to act rapidly to forestall the German occupation of the region which they'd claimed as rightfully theirs ever since the Polish-Czechslovak War in 1919. And when they did, the Germans were delighted, all too happy to give up the small provincial rail centre to Poland in exchange for the ensuing propaganda benefits- it spread the blame of the partition of the Republic of Czechoslovakia, made Poland a participant in the process and confused political expectations. Poland was accused of being an accomplice of Nazi Germany, and the Polish government argued that Poles in Zaolzie deserved the same ethnic rights and freedom as the Sudeten Germans under the Munich Agreement. And when they got Zaolzie, they went about their business there in exactly the same manner that the Nazis did over in the Sudetenland.
The vast majority of the local Polish population enthusiastically welcomed the change, seeing it as a liberation and a form of historical justice, but they quickly changed their mood when rapid Polonization policies were implemented in all parts of public and private life. Czech organizations were dismantled and their activity was prohibited, Czechoslovak education in the Czech and German languages ceased to exist, and these languages were forbidden from being spoken in public. The behaviour of the new Polish authorities was different but similar in nature to that of the Czechoslovak ones before 1938. Two political factions appeared: socialists (the opposition) and rightists (loyal to the new Polish national authorities). Leftist politicians and sympathizers were discriminated against and often fired from work. The Polish political system was artificially implemented in Zaolzie; the local Poles continued to feel like second-class citizens and a majority of them were dissatisfied with the situation after October 1938.
Daladier, the French Prime Minister, told the US ambassador to France that "he hoped to live long enough to pay Poland for her cormorant attitude in the present crisis by proposing a new partition." The Soviet Union was so hostile to Poland over the affair that there was a real prospect that war between the two states might break out, with the Soviet Prime Minister Molotov denouncing the Poles as "Hitler's jackals". And in his postwar memoirs, Winston Churchill compared Germany and Poland to vultures landing on the dying carcass of Czechoslovakia, stating that "over a question so minor as Teschen, they [the Poles] sundered themselves from all those friends in France, Britain and the United States who had lifted them once again to a national, coherent life, and whom they were soon to need sorely... It is a mystery and tragedy of European history that a people capable of every heroic virtue... as individuals, should repeatedly show such inveterate faults in almost every aspect of their governmental life."
So, the likelihood isn't really in doubt- they did go ahead and join Germany in dismembering Czechoslovakia IOTL, literally within 24 hours of the Germans doing so, with Poland’s annexation of Teschen and the Zaolzie region cited as one of the primary factors which contributed to the reluctance of the British and French to attack the Germans with greater force in September 1939. If the British, French and Soviets had put their foot down then, and declared war over it, then they'd have declared war against Poland as well, because Józef Beck had been stupid and arrogant enough in his revanchism to commit Poland to invading and annexing the region already. Poland would have been stuck in a military alliance with Nazi Germany and the Axis Powers, stuck being "Hitler's jackals", whether they liked it or not. Being partitioned between the Nazis and Soviets in a markedly different, far more destructive manner than IOTL would have undoubtedly beckoned...
Almost everything is basically true. Plus in November small parts of Slovak territory were annexed by Poland which destroyed pro Polish wing of Hlinka Slovak People party and made war against Poland in September 1939 if not popular at least sold as liberation war. However in September 1938 Czechoslovaks offered at least parts of Tesin area in exchange for Polish neutrality in conflict with Germany.
Zachariah
Banned
Indeed they did- but Józef Beck refused their offers point blank and presented an ultimatum for Czechoslovakia to either hand the area over, withdrawing their troops from the region, or face war. That offer wasn't deemed to be good enough IOTL; unless it was improved upon, Beck wouldn't have taken it.
Well it was proposed to late. One of blunders of Benes's foreign policy. Prague should try to improve relations wit Poland much sooner while it had some good cards in hand.
Admiral Beez
Banned
I've read this sentence multiple times and can't figure it out. Is Germany and the USSR destroyed? Who is the overlord? WTH?
Deleted member 1487
I meant, plus they had Germany destroyed as a threat. The USSR though became their overlord post-WW2 IOTL, but they ceased to be an existential threat as they were to Poland pre-WW2.
General Ripper
Banned
Trouble is, Poland is first course for German Lebensraum, so how can you be an ally with them? It's an alliance of lamb and a wolf ( pun intended ) against a deer ( USSR ) and two shepard dogs ( UK and France ).
Soviets wouldn't be invading anyone would they? not with their worst fear of Germany-Poland-Japan alliance actually forming?
What about the annexatin of the Baltic States? It seems that Stalin would still want some strategic depth, or at least to grab them before hitler does
do not think they would want to add occupation duties to their lists of problems, Baltics do not add much to their strategic depth, probably scares Finland into Axis, AND they look like the aggressive party (well ... they would BE the aggressive party.)