[thehappypm]

Poland was invaded in September 1939.

France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg were invaded in May 1940. Only then did the allies really start to fight back. Polish allies did nothing until France was invaded.

I agree there was not really a great solution after WW2 for Poland, the Iron Curtain was basically inevitable given how shaky the alliance between the USSR and the West was.

[hollerith]

France and Britain's response was to promptly declare war on Germany, which is a little more than doing nothing given that just 21 years earlier they had taken most of the casualties in the defeat of Germany in the world's largest war.

[lacogubik]

> Polish allies did nothing until France was invaded.

On the contrary [0] - "Germany had started low-intensity undeclared war on Czechoslovakia on 17 September 1938. In reaction, the United Kingdom and France on 20 September formally asked Czechoslovakia to cede its territory to Germany, which was followed by Polish territorial demands brought on 21 September and Hungarian on 22 September."

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munich_Agreement

[shakow]

> Polish allies did nothing until France was invaded

You know what, just draw us a battle plan in which the WAllies beat Germany in 1939, that would revolutionize the academic understanding of early WWII.

[thehappypm]

I don't know what the right action would be, but the action taken -- essentially do nothing -- was clearly the wrong move and led to Germany taking over Western Europe for several years.

[shakow]

> but the action taken -- essentially do nothing -- was clearly the wrong move

What was the right move then? Please detail. Would it be an “attaque à outrance” with an unready French army and an embryonic BEF against fortified German positions, with neatly inferior air forces, not enough siege artillery to break the Siegried line, a flimsy logistic branch, and following a totally hurried plan due to an uncooperative Belgium which screwed up all pre-war planning? And all that within a nation which already suffered humongous and material human losses barely 20 years before and could not really afford the same thing again, neither from a political nor a practical perspective if it was to handle a long war.

No, I argue that even with hindsight, globally, the right call was made: there was absolutely no way to save a Poland which happily sacrificed every opportunity to get military allies less than 1,500km away during the whole interwar period; the only playable hand was to bet on a long, tracted war where the French and the British could economically strangle Germany like they did in 1918 and free Poland afterwards – implicating, on the ground, turtling behind the border defenses long enough for the blockade to do its job. Problem: (i) Belgium royally screwing up the plan, (ii) USSR joining the waltz, (iii) the incredibly lucky strike of the Germans in the Ardennes.

Sometimes, the only winning move is not to play.

[agumonkey]

Do you know what made Belgium uncooperative ? I wonder if there's a convention now to enforce cooperation to dampen any nascent war effort.

[shakow]

AFAIK, they just didn't want to get dragged into another war by the Germans, and perceived the joint UK/FR/BE war plan as provocative towards Germany, and left it to proclaim their neutrality. Unfortunately for them, proclaiming their neutrality didn't save them in 1914, and it didn't save them in 1939 either.

Now I totally understand why they were not fond of FR/UK deliberately planning to sacrifice half their country to establish strong defensive lines on their rivers, but sometimes you can't have it all and just have to go with the less shitty plan.

[tatersolid]

> Do you know what made Belgium uncooperative?

I’d imagine that the literal millions of dead under Belgian soil, and the total destruction wrought by WWI made them hesitant to take any sides in potential conflict. You don’t position yourself in the middle a fight between two heavyweight boxers when you are a flyweight.

[bryondowd]

Perhaps doing nothing was the best move. Perhaps making a move would have resulted in Germany focusing more on the Western front and maintaining good relations with Russia. Very different conflict at that point. Without the losses on the Eastern front, perhaps Germany is able to fend off a French and British offensive, and end up invading both France and Britain.