State of the Soviet military in 1939

As such,this was irrelevant for the British Declaration of War : Poland being a democracy or not had no importance,because,it was not about Poland :no one cared if Poland would be a German satellite or not .

WWI was caused because Germany attacked other countries .:because of this,Britain had fought 4 years,and 750000 British soldiers died . 25 years later,Germany again attacked an other country.What should say Chamberlain ? This time,it is not of our business? Business as usual ?

 

No...he should have confronted them before Poland. If as you say they attacked or occupied another country then there were many occasions before Poland to do so if it was our business and we were that concerned.

 

Well,I was saying : attacked, not ccupied .

Whatever : I see not many occasions,but,only one : the occupation of Czechia in 1939,but,even this one was an occupation,not an attack :there was no war in april1939.

As long as Hitler's victims were not defending themselves,Britain would have no reason to intervene .But,when Poland defended herself,Britain's intervention was inevitable /

 

Oh I think we had every right and obligation to intervene in Chek....Chamberlain though sold that right away...It was only Chamberlains intervention that stopped an armed invasion. If he had not intervened then Chek would have fought...And he knew that...He sold them out as much as anyone else did. That is the point if we had the courage of our convictions and the morality we pride ourselves as we look back not...that was the point to tell Hitler we were going to defend Chek with all including armed force.
It could and is said we were not ready though...well we were not ready when he took Poland either. convictions and morality does not take a day off because you are not ready to defend those convictions and morality. But I do see your point.

 

The fact remains that the indepence of Poland was gone by the time Soviets invaded it. Even if the Anglo-French bring unconditional surrender to Germany, the Soviets would occupy the rest of Poland as the Allies would be fighting in German soil. By the time the Allies defeated Germany, Stalin's armed forces would be much stronger and the West would probably not be willing to face them.

There can be two reasons for the Anglo-French declare war to Germany when it invaded Poland:

Fear that Germany might attack them.

Fear that Germany expanded Eastwards and became too strong economically (what is connected with the other reason).

Conclusion: if someone could benefit from Hitler and the war, that would be Stalin. Altought I'm not certain of this, because Stalin was investing considerably in the Red Army, and I do not know if the investments in the RKKA compensated the occupations of the countries he occupied.

 

Returning to the OP ,the opinion of British intelligence about the situation of the Soviet forces in 1939 was negative (but,I am looking for the link):following British intelligence,the Soviet industry could not supply the Soviet forces in an offensive war,and,the Soviet railways could not transport men ,weapons and supplies .

Not that ,IMHO,this was influencing the British government in her decision not to look for an alliance with Britain : such alliance was out of the question ;

 

But LJAd, you must explain this, because you are talking like if the British foreign policy was a robot. If since 1919 their policy was to not allow wars in the continent, what was the reason for this? My impression is that the logic must have been to avoid that France and Britain became treatned. This also would be a way to secure that the interests of Britain and France would not be harm by wars.

 

Britain got involved because they no longer trusted Hitler and it was British policy to not allow any one power to control the continent.

 

1) The German occupation of Poland would not result in a German domination of the continent:in fact,Britain did not object to a German domination of Poland,as long it happend without war .

2)Trust of Hitler did not influence British foreign policy : in fact,they never trusted him : they knew what he wanted,and,as long it happened without war : no objections .

 

Oh yes,:Britain's foreign policy did NOT changed between Versailles and 1 september :already in 1926 the very Francophile A.Chamberlain was talking about appeasement,and,in 1923,Britain's attitude about the French occupation of the Ruhr was very negative .

The reason is :for Britain,the outcome of WWI was very bad,it was a Pyrrhic victory : an other WW would mean the end of the Empire .After Versailles,the CIGS (Wilson) said at a conference at the War Academy :we must do everything to not be committed in an other war .

 

Back to main topic. I think the reason Stalin signed Molotov Rippentrop Pact was Red Army's structural weakness in leadership , training and organization compared to Wehrmacht. Russian instructors probably witnessed efficiency of German arms at first hand in Spanish Civil War. Stalin was aware of Hitler's growing apetite and willingness to start a war as soon as as possible when German dictator feels he was ready. But maybe Stalin thought he and Soviet Union was not ready. Red Army leadership was in tatters after Stalin's cleaning of upper echalons in 1937-38 era. After Munich Conferance and UK - France bowing to Hitler's demands Stalin assumed no help or alliance was possible with West either. This supposed feeling of inferiorty reinforced with Winter War debacle with Finland in 1939 might have convinced to Stalin to keep peace with Hitler whatever the cost up until 22 June 1941 when first German guns started firing. To gain time and extra buffer zone , keep Hitler occupied in elsewhere (Western Europe) Soviet dictator would do every thing possible down to trading with Hitler or sharing his conquests.

 

In Alvin Coox's book about Khalkhin Gol, there's a statement about the IJA being confident to face the RKKA due to the purges. I do not know if the purges were really the driving force behind the poor performance of the RKKA.

 

Yes..out of the question...Chambelrain in his day would never entertain an alliance...even if diplomtic feelers were considered. It was never going to happen at that time.

 

I think we miss out the fact British opinion had by this time had enough....And would not let their govt stand idly by...at this stage the British people would have been in the mood to replace the govt if a stand was not at last made. Realisation had set in with the majority that war would come and could not be avoided and a stand had to be made. As LJ says...was Poland in this case...but if Poland had been allowed to fall without British movement then the British Govt of the time would not last much longer.

 

But yes back to topic.

 

An enemy.

The only thing Poland and Germany had jn common js a dispute over the German minority in the Versailles Poland and the land ownership. Poles were rather harsh with minorities.

 

Exactly Tamino...I have a problem with allying myself with a country that was running a jewish program at same time Germans were...How bad theirs would have turned is open to dispute if they had not been invaded...Jewish society was excluded in Poland before ww2 as much as in Germany. We eventually had a common enemy...and that is same as with Russia and is a reason to allie oneself with...But Polands anti jewish laws were not known to the British public in 1939...I wander what their thoughts would have been if they had known of the Polish anti jewish laws.

 

The war was not fought because Jews, neither it was literally because Poland. The fact is that if Hitler got sucked in an attrition war with the Anglo-French, and was eventually defeated, the Soviets would end up occupying much more territory than Hitler with the part of Poland he got in '39 (and this is precisely what occured historically!). In a hypotetical scenario were the war went well to the Anglo-French, as they would be launching an offensive against Germany in 1942-43, the Soviets would be launching an offensive in the Nazi half of Poland. Would the West be willing to face them? I'm not so sure. My impression is that no. This tends to justify that the Anglo-French realized that Hitler was a treat for them. The thing was never to secure the status quo of Eastern European nations, because, as I already said, Stalin changed or would have changed the status quo of them anyway.

 

Hitler was a "Treat" for them?

Please.

Britain and France effectively lost both their Empires because of the war and surrendered their place as "first of Western Civilized Nations" to the United States.