Reborn as a police officer in South Africa

While the French were hurriedly fleeing France, 1,300 kilometers away in Poland, the German army and the Russians met at the Bug River.

The partition of Poland was part of the Soviet-German Non-Aggression Pact.

In addition to the five public clauses of the Soviet-German Non-Aggression Pact, there is also a secret subsidiary protocol.

In the secret subsidiary protocol, Germany and Russia delimited their spheres of influence, roughly taking the northern border of Lithuania in the Baltic Sea coastal area and the Nalev, Vistula and San rivers in Poland as the dividing line.

At the same time, Germany also acquiesced in Soviet interests in Bessarabia.

Bessarabia refers to the triangle formed by the Dniester River, the Prut River-Danube River and the Black Sea. It once belonged to Russia in history. In January 1918, Bessarabia merged with Romania based on the principle of national self-determination.

Russia did not attack Poland at the same time as Germany.

Germany launched an attack on Poland on September 1st, while Russia launched an attack on September 17th. There was also a complicated game behind this.

The confident Poles claimed before the war broke out that they would wipe out Germany within three days. This was not completely arrogant. The Poles had reason to think so.

As mentioned earlier, Poland itself has considerable strength.

At the same time, Britain and France deployed a total of 83 divisions on the Maginot Line on the French-German border. In order to respond to the attack by the British and French coalition forces, the Germans could not devote all their troops to the war against Poland, and had to deploy part of their troops on the French-German border.

The Germans did indeed do this. When they attacked Poland, they deployed 23 divisions on the Franco-German border, of which only 11 were regular troops. The rest were hastily assembled reserve forces with incomplete weapons and equipment.

The balance of power before the war gave the Poles enough confidence.

When Germany attacked Poland, it had a total strength of 106 divisions, equipped with 3,195 tanks, more than 10,000 artillery pieces, and 2,500 aircraft.

At this time, Britain and France had a total of 110 divisions, equipped with more than 3,000 tanks, more than 26,000 artillery pieces, and more than 3,000 aircraft.

Coupled with Poland's own more than 40 divisions, 870 tanks, 4,300 artillery pieces, and nearly a thousand aircraft, if Poland, Britain, and France go all out, it is indeed possible to defeat Germany within three days.

It's just possible.

The Poles ignored the situation in France and Britain's determination to defend Poland.

The situation France is facing now is very bad. The threat comes not only from Germany, but also from Italy and Spain.

Therefore, France is now surrounded by enemies on three sides, and it is impossible to use all its forces to attack Germany.

In fact France didn't even dare to try.

On September 7, Rundstedt's South Army Group severely damaged the two Polish armies "Lodz" and "Cracow", and occupied the Polish industrial center Lodz and the second largest city Krakow.

The forward of the Army Group, Erich Hoeppner's 16th Panzer Corps, was approaching Warsaw.

The Polish government once again turned to Britain and France for help, hoping that France could launch an attack on Germany on the Eastern Front to relieve Poland's pressure.

At the request of the Polish government, the commander-in-chief of the British and French forces, Maurice Gustave Gamelin, launched the "Saar Offensive", taking the initiative to leave the solid Maginot Line and launch an attack on the German forces in front.

The Germans were well prepared for the attack by the British and French forces.

As soon as the French left the Maginot Line, the German troops on the front quickly retreated into the "Siegfeld Line" further back, leaving only 20 deserted villages for the French.

Even everyone evacuated, how cruel!

The Siegfried Line was called the "Western Wall" by the Germans. It was built after Germany occupied the Rhineland and was basically completed by 1939.

The defense line starts from Klervaux in Germany, close to the Dutch border, and extends along the borders with Belgium, Luxembourg, and France to Basel, Switzerland, with a total length of 630 kilometers. The defense line consists of three parts: the obstacle zone, the main defense zone, and the rear position.

, with a depth of 35 to 75 kilometers.

Look at the Germans, they built a defensive line to protect the entire western part of Germany.

The "Maginot Line" built by the French only covered the Franco-German border. Even the Franco-Belgian border was not covered because it was worried about the opposition of its allies. It deserved to be broken into a sieve by German armored forces.

Although the defensive power of the "Siegfried Line" is not as good as the "Maginot Line", it can also form a certain defensive effect against the British and French coalition forces.

Gan Molin didn't want to fight at all.

He just pretended to deal with the Poles.

The French advanced five kilometers in three days.

After the German armored forces invaded Poland, they advanced a distance of 60 kilometers every day.

At this time, the Germans and the French showed amazing tacit understanding.

Before attacking Poland, Mustache's order to the defenders on the Western Front was that once the British and French forces launched an attack, they would retreat to the "Siegfeld Line" to defend on the spot, and it was strictly forbidden to launch a counterattack against the French army.

When Gamelin attacked Germany, he also gave the order to the attacking troops: once they encountered a German counterattack, they would immediately retreat to the "Maginot Line" for defense and were strictly prohibited from going deep into the German hinterland.

Moreover, Gamelin's "Saar Offensive" only invested 15 divisions.

When replying to the Poles, Gamelin claimed that half of his troops had been committed.

With such a tacit understanding between the two sides, the Poles were out of luck.

The Poles themselves also made serious mistakes. According to British military theorist Liddell Hart: It is no exaggeration to say that the Polish commander's tactics lagged behind by 80 years.

Looking back from 1939, it was probably the Franco-Prussian War 80 years ago.

Liddell Hart was right, it was precisely because of the Polish commander's mistakes that Guderian and his lightning tactics were achieved.

Poland had 870 tanks before the German attack. The commander of the Polish army actually believed that once Germany launched an attack, it would use light cavalry as the vanguard and cooperate with heavy cavalry in the attack. The tanks would only be an auxiliary to the infantry.

Therefore, before the war broke out, Poland had the largest cavalry force in the world.

It's amazing. Although tanks and aircraft have proven their strength in the Brazilian Civil War and the Spanish Civil War, Poland still uses cavalry as its main force and is not disturbed by the Brazilian Civil War and the Spanish Civil War at all.

When a force dominated by cavalry faces the lightning tactics of a mechanized force, the consequences will be extremely serious.

The Polish army also made mistakes in its deployment. It deployed most of its troops near the German-Polish border. As a result, within two days of the war, the Polish troops near the border were quickly cut, surrounded, and eliminated by the German army. The Polish army had no power to fight back.

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The German attack was indeed fierce.

When the war broke out on September 1, the first to attack was not the armored troops, but the bomber troops.

The Germans had made preparations before the outbreak of war and were well aware of the military deployment of the Polish army.

When Germany declared war on Poland, bombers had already entered Polish airspace. The Polish army's camps, command centers, ammunition depots, airports, railways, roads, bridges and other important targets were all bombed by German bombers.

The unsuspecting Polish army suffered heavy losses. 500 aircraft were blown up at the airport before they could even take off. The old-fashioned fighters that took off in a hurry were no match for the BF109. On the first day of the war, Germany gained 7 aces.

pilot.

This is because most of the Polish planes were blown up before they even had time to take off.

Otherwise, the German army would have gained more ace pilots.

In addition to aircraft, countless artillery pieces, cars and other baggage were destroyed before they could retreat, transportation hubs and command centers were damaged, and the Polish army was in chaos.

At this time, the German army took mechanized troops and motorized troops as the lead and quickly broke through the Polish defense from several key positions.

The war was actually over at this time.

When Gamelin launched the "Saar Offensive", the German army had already occupied Poland.

On September 17, Russia launched an attack on Poland.

On this day, the Polish government decided to move to Romania.

On the 28th, the German and Russian armies met at the Bug River, and the German government hoped that Poland would surrender.

The Polish government was determined not to surrender, and Wladyslaw Sikorski formed a government-in-exile in the UK to continue the war against Germany.

Although Warsaw was occupied, the Polish army continued to resist.

The large-scale resistance did not end until October 5, when Germany was finally able to transfer its main forces to the Western Front.

Gan Molin immediately sat on the wax.

Gamelin did not expect the Poles to lose so quickly.

Just looking at the data on paper, even if Poland cannot defeat Germany, it can at least last for one or two years. The Spanish Civil War has lasted for more than three years. Italy has not completely conquered the Abyssinians until now. The Poles cannot continue.

Not even Africans.

The reality is so cruel.

Gamelin was frightened by the combat effectiveness displayed by the German army during the Polish campaign.

During the entire Polish campaign, the Polish army suffered 66,300 deaths and 133,700 wounded, 694,000 were captured by the Germans, and 100,000 fled to neighboring countries.

The German army suffered 10,600 dead, 30,300 wounded, and more than 3,400 missing.

Therefore, Gamelin launched only one bluff "Saar Offensive" during the entire Polish campaign. After Germany and Russia joined forces, the French army quietly retreated to the Maginot Line and returned 20 villages to the Germans.

During this attack, the French army made no mistake.

This is unique among all the wars that broke out between Germany and France.

It is a pity that Germany, which has already divided Poland with Russia, will not let the French go.

According to the agreement between Russia and Germany, Germany was allocated 188,000 square kilometers of territory and 20.2 million people.

Germany's strength was increasing, and the French were fleeing France. One was ebbing away from the other, and Gamelin regretted it.

During the Battle of Poland, France had numerous opportunities to weaken Germany. Even sending bombers to bomb key facilities in Germany could cause some trouble for Germany's offensive. However, Gamelin did nothing and watched Germany and Russia carve up Poland.

Why did Russia wait until the 17th to launch an attack on Poland?

Russia is also waiting for the reaction of Britain and France. If the British and French forces send troops to attack Germany as soon as Germany attacks Poland, then Russia will not send troops to Poland at all.

It was precisely because of seeing through the appeasement policies of Britain and France that Russia sent troops to Poland on the 17th, and in the final process of carving up Poland, it achieved greater gains than Germany.

If you look at it this way, the Russians are the final winner.