1939 to 1945: A War of Madness - Commemoration and Reflection

On September 1 we commemorate the beginning of World War II which broke out on September 1, 1939, when German troops invaded Poland. In 1945, by the time the Third Reich was defeated, this war of sheer madness had left behind a devastated continent and claimed the lives of millions of people. Not just in Vienna or Austria but all over the world. Just like in our previously published series, wien.at to commemorates the years of 1939 to 1945. The following articles deal with a number of topics related to these years and put them in their respective context.

1 September 1939 - the beginning of World War II

On 1 September 1939 a war was started which was to end in August 1945 with atomic bombs being dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Driven by fascist megalomania World War II sparked off an inferno unprecedented in the world’s history. By the end of it, Europe lay in ruins and 55 million people had lost their lives. On September 1, 1939, the German Reich sowed the wind and reaped the whirlwind. Afterwards the world had changed forever.

Acquisition of "living space" in the east - the Poland campaign

Already in his dogmatic writings in "Mein Kampf", Adolf Hitler made it very clear that the cession of German territories in the East and in particular of the city of Danzig (Gdansk) to Poland as had been stipulated by the Treaty of Versailles after the First World War was unacceptable. He intended to re-conquer these territories claiming that the German people needed "living space" in the East.

This led to the Poland Campaign in September 1939, a hostile act of war which the Nazis had planned and prepared long beforehand. The annexation was in blatant violation of the Law of Nations and based on a lie: The events on September 1 were provoked by an assault on the radio station of Gleiwitz in Upper Silesia which was carried out by SS men disguised as Polish irregular troops. For Hitler this attack represented the Polish "provocation" he had wanted. At 4.45 am the German battleship "Schleswig-Holstein" opened fire on the city of Danzig and the Westerplatte while German troops crossed the border into Poland without declaring war.

The "myth" of the Blitzkrieg in the East

The Polish Campaign lasted only five weeks resulting in the defeat of Poland and giving birth to the myth of the Blitzkrieg. On October 6 the last Polish troops capitulated; the Polish government, however, which had fled the country and gone into exile refused to do so. When the Soviet Red Army invaded Eastern Poland on 17 September it did so in accordance with the agreements reached in the German-Soviet non-aggression pact signed between Germany and the Soviet Union on 24 August 1939. It is for this reason that the term Polish Campaign sometimes also refers to the Soviet occupation of Eastern Poland.

The Polish state ceases to exist

Because of their Common Defence Pacts signed with Poland, France and Great Britain declared war on Germany as early as 3 September. The ensuing military activities, however, were insignificant and failed to help Poland. The Polish state ceased to exist. The occupying forces consisting of troops of the Wehrmacht and the Waffen SS, were soon followed by members of the Gestapo, the SS and the Security Police who immediately started to persecute and murder Polish intellectuals, political dissidents, religious leaders and the Jewish population. The results were mass incarceration and mass murder. The Polish Campaign can therefore also be seen as the start of the war of extermination and the beginning of genocide.

In the years to come the war escalated and in 1940 the tactics of the Blitzkrieg were applied to the Western front as well. The French army capitulated while the axis alliance with fascist Italy enabled German troops to reach the African continent. In the summer of 1940 the Battle of Britain was started with the aim of invading the British Isles, something, the German troops would however never accomplish.