I was trying to make a presentation about this war, and it was painstakingly difficult to look at all the little divisions and their strength and to map them in a way that will also explain the big picture, and this video does this so well! I have a new appreciation for these videos, somehow I like them even more than I did before. Wonderful job!
I was honestly wondering how time-consuming it must be to be able to accurately map the movement of just one division, nevertheless all the other divisions combined.
@@TheZod00 not very hard, most corps or armies move in close formations except panzer divisions, and fast look at division histories in websites such as wikipedia and axisforum should do it.
@@TheZod00 - He dose this every week for the World War 2 Cahnnel. You should take a look at the work he dose for those guys, he's been doing it for a number of years now.
@@kamilszadkowski8864 Yes, that what I mean by the sadness. I can't imagine being in one of those groups. You are now at the mercy of the enemy you were just trying to kill and are cut off from your family and way of life for who knows how long. It must have utter despair
Germany: *Invades Poland very fast, proving they're not to be underestimated* France: *does nothing* Germany: *Takes France in 1 mothh* France: *surprised pickachu face*
@@eggshells7514 Most of those forces were badly equipped natives, they only had a small amount of their own French army (compared to their main force) stationed in Africa. They even pulled a lot of their forces in Africa back to France during and after the Fall of Poland, however they were still inferior compared to the Germans even though they had the number advantage.
"So why did it take the germans only more than a month to completely defeat Poland?" I would say landscape and lack of equipment, but they didn't do that bad. Even with a decent army they would still lose. Poland has lasted for 35 days after invasion from West, North, South at the same time and from the East (after 17 of September) Meanwhile France - the biggest army in Europe that time, has been attacked only from North-East and lasted "only" 46 days
Poland did much better than France. But French people still think what rescued them from german invasion and defeated Nazis was their spirit of freedom, patriotism etc. while intervention of US and responsive offence of USSR are only reasons there is a state called "France".
The reason Poland took relatively longer was because it was a learning experience. First time trying the new tactics. Mistakes were made. Things went better on the next few countries. : )
Glad I found this channel hope you got more videos in the works this was really well done. Most people get taught that Poland was steamrolled when in reality they put up a good fight under the circumstances.
What it forgets to say in this video is that Britain and France told Poland to demobilise when war was coming. This meant that they couldn’t retreat east because most their population was in the west (and the loyalty of the people in the east was questionable)
@@manatarms7652 Ya that angers me that they were so worried about not provoking Germany and when they do everything possible to not anger them they get gun shy when it came to fulfill their obligations.
@@Roketsune no they weren't dummy actually study the operation and the supply problems the Germans faced and the effectiveness of the 7TP tank vs the Germsn Panzer 1 and 2. You sound like another whiny wehraboo.
The best war history coverage channel on RUclips. Given enough troops on Patreon we may some day get coverage of English or French or Russian revolution.
The best channels telling the truth and Not a lie. Germany Hit back after poland kept raiding their neighbours Borders. If Germany didnt attacked forward the war would be in german ground. Britain wanted to destroy the german, them managed to find a way and get a way, without beeing the traitor. Like the US doing since decades ... and the dumbs eating lie after lie...
@@Muexxxor if that's true, I'm sure those "raids" on the border came up during the peace negotiations during August with Mussolini and you can name primary sources that mention that, right? 😏
i like it even better than king's and generals. this channel has a better pace, and does name every single friggin battalion by number, which, frankly, let's all admit, nobody cares or remembers
The reason I love your eastern front videos is not so much for the fact that they shed light on WW2, but more because they contain a lot of information pertinent to the Napoleon invasion of Russia. Thanks :)
It also should be said that the British demanded that the Polish stop their mobilisation in mid-August, "because it would be a provocation for a German Attack", despite a German military buildup at the border. So Polish divisions were understrength at the beginning of the Campaign, as a consequence of the delayed mobilisation.
All part of the useless policy of appeasement. With hindsight, had Poland mobilised on a greater scale, those trying to re-write history would use the large mobilisation as proof that Poland was the main agitator for war.
@@infinummjb I don't dispute that for a minute. Poland was in a no win situation regardless of what military stance it took, it was always going to be invaded.
@@sowianskizonierz2693 No they could not because they were much weaker as you saw soon after they declared war on Germany. France collpased immediately and Britain survived just barely from German invasion, Battle of Britain.
Thank you. Polish campaign operations are not covered in usual documentaries. Even the most detailed ones skimp the ground war at Poland. This episode was really needed.
we have to many of them in polish ;) btw. its not that western allies had no time to help us. They didnt want to send troops to Poland becouse of few other reasons. If you want to find out more about it tell me and i will respond ;p
Let's not exaggerate, most German (regarding this topic) and some Polish documents have survived the war. The only thing that has been almost completely lost are Polish film materials from that war.
this episode is totasl LIE ...not mention truth about Sovet attack on 17th September..... at leats Polish fight with 2 powers form weak and east but French surrender almost without any fight ;)
Yeah, I'm waiting for a proper cover and Eastory will manage that, however it is tremendous and difficult task, probably the most difficult when it comes to WW2
@keithsze001 oh yeah, lol, happy V-J day no, PRC just popularized the warcrimes and the struggles of Chinese people, not as a patriotic and ultimately victorious war against Japan. What I meant is that if KMT is the one victorious, then maybe we'd see it more in things like popular media
@@sharkronical The Nationalist-Communist cooperation against the Japaneses who had already subjugated northeastern China is widely known in mainland China as “第二次国共合作” which is taught in Chinese middle school students' mandatory history courses. Nationalists' battles won and their representation of China on Day of Victory are also mentioned. Also there are tons of Chinese movies and TV dramas which depict the KMT as a patriots who wear ironed uniforms and carry modern weapons from the U.S. but stigmatize the Communists as mobs of beggars. Who knows how they could explain the crushing defeat of KMT in just four years after victory over Japan?
@@joehill9707 you don't win civil wars with military only. I don't know that part of history, but I suppose there was no strong social structure supporting the nationalist government. In cases like this it is usually because of economic crisis and/or lack of openness to social compromises. I guess the nationalists did not want to win larger parts of population and tried relying only on the groups that strongly supported them and strong arm approach to handling dissent? It is also common that the regime that falls was unable to trim the parasitic classes privileges. I am a conservative, but a conservative needs to be realistic. If your conservative regime is trying to suppress the left with police and military that is recruited from the same society, if it is unable to emancipate itself enough to be able to enforce it's will on the powerful groups like aristocracy, the pressure is going to rise and instead of letting some steam off by opening the valves, you are just waiting for the whole thing to blow up. Rather than accepting social compromise, you just allow a revolution and for power to be captured by radicals. In this manner, I blame the fallen regimes for the consequences of revolutions more than revolutionaries. In every society there will be various people that push for a revolution, but they are not the ones that make crucial decisions, they are just waiting there to seize their moment. A good government is supposed to never give them a chance.
As Polish guy I'm happy of this episode, because September campaign isn't popular in the West, although it begun war in Europe. There is also popular myth, that polish cavalry charged on tanks, it's not true, it was german propagnda to proove primitivity of polish army. It's a pity that the Allies didn't help us, maybe war would be shorter, but maybe not.
I have heard that story. Poland used cavalry used their horses as transport and dismounted when in combat to fight as ground units. Unfortunately when during the polish campaign they were caught in transition when they routed a german bridge and were surprised by a supporting german armoured unit and got massacred. After that the myth was born. At least you lasted longer than france with less men and equipment.
@@kondwanimututa2302 Germany used horses for transport as well, millions of them. But their propaganda reels showing masses of tanks is still prevailing in our heads today.
@@kondwanimututa2302 Poland lasted 36 days, French 46, but France was much larger, had greater and better equiped army, and support of Britain. Both Poland and France fighted on 2 fronts, but USSR was much stronger than Italy
@@stasiowski4919 Not really the battle of France was lost on the first week when the germans crossed the mouse river and out flanked the france divisions in the Netherlands and Belgium. The rest of the campaign was just driving to the ocean and encircling.
@@Vitalis94 True people overhype the german army which had been preparing for war since hitler election to chancellor. You could technically say they prepared for war since they signed the treaty of Versailles since they invested in synethic oil in 1920s even though it was cheaper to buy aboard. You would only do this if you wanted an independent source of oil to wage war. So it's not surprising that if you prepare 20 years for war that you do every well for a while.
2:40 "The Allies had not expected the events to take place so quickly" --- As pointed out by Roger Moorhouse in his book "First to Fight", the promises of the Allies have been empty from the start. Thus they weren't as you claim, caught off guard by the quick German advance, as they never intended to help Poland.
Ships sailing to Constanca, filled with equipment British _really_ disliked to part with, say otherwise. But another "WW1 Serbia" did not materialize and _everything_ Allies did - or tried to do - had been completely derailed by time. There are also cases where failure to help had been a *good* outcome - like Churchill and his Plan Catherine. But then again, one would presume Polish elites had seen a map of Europe once or twice in their lives and knew how to count kilometers.
France was weak as we can see how easily Germany invaded it too. Also Britain survived just barely the attack of nazis even it happened much later than 1939 and there was time to prepare .So there was no real capacity by France (or England) to interfere quickly - just like this presentation told. Germany was nr 1 military superpower in Europe. And secondly soviets were backstabbers when attacking to Poland too and preventing poles to retreat to Romanian border.
This is completely stupid nonsense I see pushed by Poles all the time is. The fact is, Poland was militarily defeated within 2 weeks and France was still in the process of mobilizing. It saw that an attack into Germany would not be of any benefit and decided to abort the Saar Offensive (which had only got underway shortly before Warsaw was encircled).
@@matthewbadley5063 And this is a completely stupid nonsense I see pushed by westerners all the time. The fact is, Poland had been militarly maimed by its allies, who had stopped several attempts of Polish mobilisation, and the plans for the defence had to be hastily scrapped over to appease the Western Allies, who in the end didn't do anything. This is the main reason for why the Polish army wasn't prepared for the September campaign. And what about the UK, whose only perticipation in the first months of the war was dropping paper leaflets, instead of bombs.
@@matthewbadley5063 Looks like youre not smart enough. Poland fell because it was weak, and between the two powers. I referred to the equally quick defeat of France, despite the fact that they were better trained and, above all, better armed than the Poles.
The most I knew about this campaign was, the Germans blitz through the polish lines, the poles stuck to their city defences and defended them until long after all hope was lost, and that some poles were able to escape through romania into britain.
"The Taliban began their offensive on the first city, utilizing their Toyota pickups to intimidate the garrison into surrendering during the first 8 seconds of the siege. The government responded by mobilizing their strategic reserves into surrendering before the Taliban could establish a bridgehead"
4:50 - On the soviet border there were some polish forces called "KOP" (Korpus Ochrony Pogranicza - Border Protection Corps ), so it wasn't totaly undefended
Yeah, that is another myth about this campaign. That the Eastern border was undefended and that the Soviets suffered very few casualties which also isn't entirely true.
Russians also joined the war against Japan very late after it was clear Japan is losing. It was easy to annex areas from Japan then , just like it was easy to steal half of Poland and areas from all European neighbors of Soviet union that time. Stalin's red world revolution was advancing well. Fortunately NATO stopped them.
@William Allford Polish leader forbade to engage the Soviets _if_ the retreat to Romania was possible. But with the Soviets not willing to allow the Poles to retreat themselves, some clashes were inevitable. Plus, the Soviets used to encircle some cities and thus these cities' garrisons had been resisting. Anyway, your claims about Eastern Poland from your second comment require several corrections. Piłsudski wasn't a dictator, not yet anyway. When on 11 November 1918 Poland was proclaimed, there hadn't been any governal institutions yet. Therefore Piłsudski got the position of the temporary chief of state, with condition that it is only temporary. And Piłsudski kept his word: he wasn't abusing this position, nor was he sabotaging the formation of the democratic institutions. When the polish-soviet war came to an end, Piłsudski renounced his position and allowed Poland to become fully democratic. The thing is, in 1926 he made a coup and introduced his authoritarian rule... and there are many people who incorrectly make no distinction between these two completely different periods. Anyway, while the east of Poland was indeed inhabited by many orthodox people, for Poles it didnt matter, because Poles saw then the polish nationality in a completely different way. At that time, the people were the civilians of Poland regardless of faith and ethnicity as long as they were loyal to the state. And in many cases they were. Piłsudski himself was a Lithuanian. And finally, the Curzon Line was proposed on 8 December 1919, months after Poland already had the control over the lands east of it.
Slovakia s military value was near 0 and when the soviets atacked Poland was almost defeated the last stand at the romanian bridgehead was almost as delusional as festüng austria
@@jorgeprieto8643 You need to read more history books and watch less propaganda. Regular Polish army was fighting for next 3 weeks after soviet invasion. The last Polish units gave up their weapons on October 6 after the Battle of Kock, nowhere near Romania. Slovakia's military value was indeed very low but the point is Slovakia was german puppet and allowed Germans to invade Poland not only from North and West but also from the South.
Oh. Do not be so modest and don't forget about Gdańsk/Danzig who was German ally and collaborator. So: Germany, Gdańsk, Slovakia and Soviet Union vs Poland (in correct order).
Yugoslavia probably would be most interesting case,since it was war within the war,alliances were forged and broken on a whim ,line between good and bad was blurred to the maximum and in the end,plenty of innocents died
Stuff like this 4:28 is just too fucking impressive, the amount of communication and brilliance to pull that off so quickly is just amazing. Especially when you consider that the equipment and tech that was used were pretty much fresh of the shelves.. the planes, the tanks, the radios, etc etc.. so damn cool.
To be honest Germany had the most modern technology and tactics which is how they managed to do these things unlike the other nations. Im not talking about having the most modern tanks but the most modern tactics and coordinations and things like radio equipment as well as theory about warfare or air warfare. I mean in the French Campaign, the French still used flags for example
Great work, but you have one issue. Poland in this map don't aquire Zaolzie terrain as well as other smaller territories regained in October 1938 from Czechoslovakia.
The fact that Poland started the Second World War by taking over Zaolzie is ordinary propaganda, the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact began the Second World War and Poland took Zaolzie because in the 1920s it was the Czech Republic that invaded Poland and it was annexed by Zaolzie and Poland received only in 1938 what hers.
Excellent content (said as a material supporter of your videos). Although individual actions and battles can’t be shown in the scope of this panoramic overview, it would have been nice to see a) Westerplatte location where the war started b) Gleiwitz radio station marked on the map and c) animated appearance of main dates of Luftwaffe bombing is f Warsaw. Just small visuals to alert the viewer to when these events happened in the chronology of the campaign.
Manstein wrote in his book, Lost Victories, the Poles only real hope was to put the bulk of their forces behind the Bug/Vistula, leaving only a screening/delaying force in the western parts of Poland. Conduct a fighting withdrawal with those forces screening forces, buying time for the bulk of their forces to deploy and dig in behind the rivers. He states that Poland was going to lose, even if they did what he suggested. But by keeping the bulk of their forces behind the Bug/Vistula, they could potentially, hold out long enough for the French and Brits to get enough forces on the continent to attack Germany from the west...which he writes was Germany's nightmare scenario.
Yes, but the Poles did not believe that France and Great Britain would enter the war if Poland gave up her western territories without a fight. The specter of Munich was very much alive.
I think we were afraid that Germans gonna just swallow a bunch of territory, allies gonna to ignore that and Poland is going to end up without majority of it industrial potential.. Most of the industry was in the west.. east was basically a bunch of poor villages and towns with low density population
Poles thank the English for "help". Poland has never had such an ally. It is a pity for the Polish pilots who died in defense of the English sky. Great Britain betrayed the Poles twice ... during the Polish-Bolshevik war and the Second World War, giving Poland over to Stalin in Jauta. Hanba to the English.
The purpose of England and France, from the beginning, was to destroy Germany. "Defending" Poland was just the pretext they needed. So much so that they did not declare war on the Soviet Union when it also invaded the country a few days later.
Britain did her part. The British contribution was the Royal Navy (which strangled Germany and won the war in the long run) and to reinforce the French on the Western Front. If you want someone to blame, blame France.
@@visaodissidente5560 for Britain and France to declare war on both Germany and the Soviet Union would be suicide and the capabilities the British and French had to hurt the Soviet Union from such a distance were non-existent.
Really ? Would be more interesting why Churchill did not stand there in 1945 when the decision were made that Polish borders would be moved. But if British have tea time then it is their tea time.
@@typxxilps Stalin had half Europe in his hands and war machine going strong. His position was so strong that other allies were not capable to kick him out. Do you suggest that WW2 should have been continued right away? Cold war started soon to solve that problem and it lasted long time.
The last message before Germany entered warsaw from poland was this and this is the saddest thing ive ever read:Hallo hallo can you hear us? This is our last message. Today, German troops entered Warsaw. We extend fraternal greetings to the soldiers fighting in Hel and to all those fighting wherever they are. Poland has not perished yet. Long live Poland!
After hearing first 20 second my conclusion is - In the Danish compaing the German forces were stronger, but Danmark was rich country with many geografical advantages to defend itself... So why it took only half of the day for the German army to defeat Denmark...? France in 1940 was a superpower and colonial empire... So why it took only just over a month to defeat France...?
The danish campaign ended because the Germans landed troops in Copenhagen and threatened to bomb the city of Denmark didn't surrender. As for France, that was a case of poor communication and the Belgians not letting the allies move in and dig in on really good defensive lines until after the Germans had invaded.
@@Syn_1 Even if France could dig in within Belgium they would still have to surrender in 3 weeks. Because German panzers were coming from the south (Ardenne - Sedan) and would encircle them around the Belgium-Franco border area (as opposed to around Dunkirk)
Because the Danish military was virtually non-existent and wasn't near anyone who would send in troops immediately to defend them. Defensible positions and terrain are meaningless when you have no troops to hold and take advantage of it. Also, Denmark is a puny country both in landarea and population relative to Germany. It was not capable of putting up much resistance even if it had heavily invested in its military (which may well have triggered a war with Germany well before 1940). Denmark was screwed from the start and the Danes knew it. They could also expect unusually lenient treatment from their fellow Aryans if they surrendered immediately.
As for the French, it was a combination of disunity in the French government, low morale and fighting spirit in the French military, inferior use and deployments of their armorer forces, the inherent vulnerablity and shortcomings of their defensive Maginot-based strategy (largely the matter of Belgian neutrality and politics that undermined the Alied defensive strategy and ability to mobilize on that front), and the Germans surprising the French and British by sending armored spearheads through the supposedly impassible Ardennes Forest (which was itself a plan that only came into being through a series of events and factors, and was not the original German plan). A confluence of factors and events that made France devastatingly ineffective and Germany devastatingly effective.
As french person (maybe biased) I would say the french army wasnot that bad (it has better tanks). The problem was a high commander of WWI who didnot adapt to new strategies( for exemple they didnot use the radio so they couldnt communicate well). Also we didnot have a strong air force which was a huge mistake. The german plan was also good because of their swiftness. But i dont want to forget some little battles: we retained in 9 vs 3000 the incredible italian army :) (Pont Saint Louis ). The French campaign for the Italy has been a defeat And when we had a commander who knew how to use his tanks (De gaulle) we have been able to retain some german troops
Hey Eastory, do you happen to be willing to share where you get the beautiful maps that you make the animations on top of? It’s hard to find thorough and detailed European maps that also manage to cover a lot of territory, so I’d love to know the source
Good explanation of events, but with several inaccuracies with the map (that also might have affected the explanation): - There was no large encirclement near Katowice - Sieradz was captured on the 9th but the map didn't portray it that way so it must be the style it seems - The Polish forces on the Bzura were not trapped till the 16th as the Germans were fighting in Sochazew and could risk overstretching their forces trying to encircle a gargantuan pocket of resistance. Warsaw (and so is the Bzura) would though be cut off from the rest of Poland on the 13th. - The Poles trapped after the battle of Przemyśl trying to broke free from the German encirclement managed to successfully do so. They did not capitulate and counter-attacked the German encirclement. -The battle of Radom also looked odd as the battle went like: Radom was already captured and the Radom area surrounded as a large pocket, so the German forces way south of Radom started attacking the trapped Polish forces at the road towards Iłża before eventually dividing the pocket of soldiers that retreated to the forests. But at least the encirclement is showed... Nonetheless nobody is perfect. Keep up the good content
Yes, there was no encirclement of Polish troops in Katowice. But the city's defense was taken over by the local population (which in itself is unique) which was able to keep it up to 4 September to noon. So it was an "island" on the map of German conquest and this animation shows it correctly.
How does a 6 minutes long video compare to the 1940 french campaign video which lasts over twice as long despite the french campaign being just one week longer? You provide very little background information. You make no mention of the french offensive in the Saar area, close to no mention of the fighting with the soviets (not a single mention of the fighting in the north-eastern part of the country which was even more intense than the fighting around Lwów - and it is not even animated!). There is also no mention of fighting on the coast which lasted throughout the whole campaign, until 3rd of october. You did not provide dates or any context, neither for siege of Warsaw (and fighing around it) nor Lwow - for example a fact that the red army claimed to have arrived in order to help polish units fight the Germans (that's partly why Lwow capitulated to the soviets so quickly when the red army approached the city - the defenders saw the german units withdrawing before soviets which was in line with soviet claims ---> read en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Lwów_(1939) ). The animation of movement of polish forces is very simplified and, as a result, may sometimes be misleading. You should take into consideration splitting the forces or at least providing proper narrative instead (when necessary). For example, around 4:17 a viewer may come to a conclusion that not a single soldier from 11th, 24th and 38th division managed to get to Lwow which is not true: "On September 17, the Division fought in the Janów Forest, halting advance of German 7th I.D. and 57 I.D. Remnants of the unit, numbered at no more than 1000 men, managed to break into besieged Lwów, where it capitulated." --> en.wikipedia.org/wiki/11th_Infantry_Division_(Poland) pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitwa_w_lasach_janowskich_(1939) is exactly about that battle but sadly there is no english version. In my opinion this particular video is nowhere close in terms of quality to your previous ones.
nope, they had no way to counter mobile german units, unless they builts a maginot like fortress system all the way from the north sea to Slovakia, there was no way to hold the germans.
Fun fact, french army entered ruhr region with close to 0 resistance from German army but decided to go back to original border so they could be conquered in 1 month too xD
You know, Poland fell pretty quickly, but given the situation, they held out pretty well, especially when compared the the allies in France, who were defeated in 44 days with alot more time to prepare, and having equipment alot better than that of Poland.
@@caxopog The absolute same can be said about "still" Britain and it's ridiculous expeditionary force, Belgium or the Netherlands. The weaknesses of France and it's western allies weren't really preparation nor a huge military technology disadvantage (they're plenty of videos on yt who explains this on detail) but outdated doctrines from WWI and extremely retarded high command.
@@sharkywillzy5616 and overconfidence,hypocricy and pride. "We won with them once and they try the same tactic by attacking Belgium? Well guess we will win again" "Hmmm we the French will not help the Poles. We are not gonna die for them. Britain you will help us right? We can't defend without you" "Poles helped us in battle for Britain and shot down the most German planes during it?! How dare they be better than us?! Dont invite them to the victory parade and make them pay for using OUR planes to save OUR country!!!"
Your videos are amazing! They look so professional and well done, it's just awesome to watch them. I always start at the very beginning and watch it 100% through to the end, no skipping. What program do you use by the way? All the animated map programs I see are rather arcadic and hard to use and look rather outdated. Your's looks so professional.
If polish army Poznan which wasn’t under attack made counterattack earlier, they could cause heavy losses to the Germans and attack would be more effective. Unfortunately supreme command refused to carry out this offensive in first days of the campaign.
And if French and British attacked Germany during the September campaign the war would have ended right there. We can play "what ifs" like that all day
You know that phase of studying about WW2 where you're just constantly saying "How the fuck did they manage to succeed?!" to a vast majority of German successes because you're so perplexed that everything was going according to plan so much so that you wondered if you were reading some fantasy war novel where the evil guys have massive amounts of plot armour at the start? Yeah. I'm in that phase again. _How the fuck?_
- big country overall: in 1939 Germany had the same population and comparable GDP as continental UK and France combined. - better preparation: Germans have been focusing heavily on producing weapons years before the others. - modern tactics: Germany pioneered concentrated tank formations, close air support, flexible combat groups ("Kampfgruppe") and the widespread use of radio communications. - poor enemy leadership: in France the high staff was composed of senile men who expected a repeat of WW1 with stationary trench warfare. Meanwhile in the Soviet Union, Stalin has murdered the majority of experienced officers in his Great Purge. Those were the main reasons really.
I had such feeling when I first read about WW2. But if you actually start studying how and why Germany won those early campaigns it becomes quite clear it was not only easy for them, but they were pretty much destined to conquer most of Europe until 1941. They had massive advantages against all of their enemies up until that point. It also becomes clear that germany had no way of ever winning the war - their strategic and tactical plans were only suited for quick and decisive campaigns, so when they started a war of exhaustion with the soviets they had no way of winning it.
In my opinion they did make some advancements in tank doctrine, but the biggest factor is early allied incompetence and unwillingness to accept the fact a large scale war was coming and properly prepare
@@Lehr-km5be this narrative is false but extremely common. Germany could win the war had they become succesful in Fall Blau. 1942 soviet population were starving and their oil and lend-lease supply cut off, soviets would probably settle in for peace as stalin actually thought about that scenario pre-1943. Or they would never be able to launch any offensives in the future. But I am not sure what would happen if USA were to deliver atomic bombs on Ruhr.
From what I have read, it is now clear that the French/British had no plans in place to attack Germany and not only would such plans have taken months to create, they never even started. The promise of assistance within two weeks was therefore a lie. In regards to this video, the way that it is stated that the Germans had tanks implies that the Poles did not. The Poles did in fact have tanks but much like the French and British armies, they had not adopted the tactic of massed tank warfare and consequently, their tanks were used in an infantry support role and too spread out to be effective against the localized "fists" of massed panzer units that were used to breach the front. They also lacked sufficient numbers of anti-tank guns. Finally, they lost air superiority early, which is a key point that is entirely overlooked in this video. Otherwise, great job. I enjoyed this.
This is absolutely moronic, there's archival resources and mobilization timetables proving the intent and ability to begin a 40-division offensive in two weeks. The trouble is that this would not be sufficiently large to defeat Germany or take the Saarland with 29 German divisions holding the area, it would only be good to reduce pressure on Poland. The Allied high command met two days before the due date of the offensive and canceled it because Poland had been defeated so fast that Germany could stop them and clean up Poland, which meant the offensive was pointless.
Also, did you even watch the video? You can literally see that the Germans did not apply any doctrine of "massed tank warfare" in Poland and that their armored divisions were scattered out among different armies and used mostly to ease the advance of the German infantry.
@@roberthansen5727 point me to the archival documents of the actual invasion plans. I'm sure there were mobilization plans but that doesn't prove anything in of itself. I'll wait. Thanks in advance.
Another key factor is just geography. Germany attacked from the West, North, and South. The promised help from the UK and France never materialized. Then the Soviet Union joined from the East. Despite this, Poland still lasted roughly as long as France, despite France having the Maginot Line and not facing any of the major geographical difficulties that Poland faced.
@@maxdavis7722 Actually a 1000+ years, despite Bismarck's, Hitler's, and others' best efforts to wipe us out. Meanwhile, the USA is tearing itself apart after a measly 300 years
@@maxdavis7722 ah yes, the country kept safe by seas on every side - and not to mention oceans of Polish blood in WW2. But please, continue with your ironic comments.
@@objectivistathlete just having a sea between the enemy doesn’t mean you are protected it’s how effective your navy is. Britain’s always outshined the axis navy in Europe. Look at the pacific war there was sea between Japan and most countries and yet they got invaded.
Worse is russia that backstabbed Poland and attacked it cowardly from the back when Poland was deep in war with another power. Shameless and opportunistic russia.
@@francoislechanceux5818 Backstabbed? Polish military strategy before 1939 was focused solely on countering Soviet invasion. They weren't allies to begin with, the enemy attacking can't be called backstabbing.
@@Vitalis94 An enemy with a modicum of honor in him does not attack when the opponent is already on the ground deeply wounded. Russians love attacking when you are down and out. They did that against Poland. They did that against Japan. An honorless country can never be a trustworthy ally even in the next 1000 years. It's a DNA or cultural default.
Britain's contribution was the Royal Navy. Without the blockade Germany would have had all the oil she needed and would have conquered the USSR. Think yourselves lucky we were there.
@@juliantheapostate8295 keep deluding yourself as ive seen in multiple other comments, RoYaL nAvY lmao while britain were getting smashed by the u boats which was well on its way to starve the island, all i see is you bragging about the overstretched navy which did not have the same impact with the blockade as in the previous war, britain was simply not powerful enough to mess with Germany alone, they had to hide in their island
Erich von Manstein in his book said describing the invasion of Poland, he emphasizes the enormous German advantage - Poland had only two armored divisions - and the fact that it was only capable of resisting briefly. He accuses the Polish generals of the lack of a developed military doctrine, which he explains by the fact that Poland had existed too briefly as an independent state and therefore did not have a continuous military tradition. He believes that the Polish temperament predisposes Poles to offensive and criticizes the fact that the newly formed Polish army adopted the French doctrine, based on the defensive.
Hey, your videos are great, I think a pretty good idea for one of your videos could be the: Spanish civil war animated 1936-1939, I think it will be a very good idea for one of your videos.
@@Jean_Jacques148 this is a good and very overlooked point. Germany has been arming itself heavily since 1935, to the point there were shortages of common goods in 1938 - BEFORE the war even began. Meanwhile other nations like Czechoslovakia, Poland and the UK only really started preparing in 1939.
Only to some point when germans started not to follow it and noobody was suprised anymore by suprise and schwerpunkt attacks. The most important thing were kampfgruppe and other very flexible formations that made leadership much much easier and they could split their unites in hours
Historical fact: It isnt...leaving your fucking flanks exposed isnt a good way to wage a war, specially when your enemies also have the knowledge to counter your movements Eg: Kursk pincer through Orel and Belgorod which led to Operation Kutuzov and the absolute destruction of the German offensive capability.
Yes, the Polish campaign lasted 5 weeks, but why the French campaign in 1940 lasted only 6 weeks? The Germans attacked Poland without a declaration of war and had a secret agreement with the Soviets to divide Poland.
Because the French general staff was in WW1, not in WW2. They lacked the technology, thinking and thus tactics for WW2 - Tanks for example were not independant forces from infantry which was the main rule of WW2. N
"had a secret agreement with the Soviets to divide Poland." There is no solid evidence of the existence of this document. The public was presented with only one unreliable document with a forged signature of Molotov. This document had a lot of grammar mistakes and Finland for some reason was considered to be a part of Eastern Europe. The very meaning of this document does not make logical sense, like, the countries are going to divide a sovereign European country in half in front of the whole world and they had to sign some "secret" document so no one would know about it? This is not how things work.
@@kurilrick2207 Sure mate, dream on. It does make sense as officially they of course pretend it has been for various reasons, like the Russians only wanted to protect Polish minorities and lies like that. Stalin and Hitler were both totalitarian regimes focused on aggressive expansion.
@@kurilrick2207 Finland was widely considered an Eastern European or more specifically a Baltic nation at that time. It had been a part of the Russian Empire until just a couple decades before. In fact, basically all the territory between Germany and the Soviet Union had been a part of either the German or the Russian Empires until the 1st World War. Only the Southern parts had belonged to the now defunct Austro-Hungarian Empire. The point of the treaty was to divide the territories between the two in agreement. If either invaded the "buffer states" unilaterally, the other would naturally see it as a provocation. This is how geopolitics work and have worked for a very long time.
Looking at the modern Polish defensive strategy, it's reliance on NATO, I can't comprehend why they didn't learn anything. I mean, given our history, Poland should've been armed to the teeth. We should have been an European Israel - with a modern army, always ready for potential attack. Yet the army still uses mostly Soviet era equipment to this day. There is no clear strategy at all, and nepostism is prevalent in the Army. And don't get me started on the Air force and the Navy...
@@Vitalis94 For one Poland does not share most of its border with hostile countries, and Russian troops are 100km at closest away save in Kaliningrad. Second there is an actual NATO presence in the region guaranteeing rest of Europe joins, and in particulary an noninsignificant US presence in Poland itself. Russia is not so dumb as to embark on a blatant invasion. Without allies, Poland would be forced to adopt a concessionary policy towards Russia.
*germany invaded Poland* Poland: it will take all of our strength and determination to fight, but we might have a chance *Soviet Union also invades Poland* Poland: well shit…
@@remusbuddenkotte4811 The video doesn't tell us the lessons Germans took from this campaign: Their munition consumption was hugely above their initial estimation, their fuel consumption dangerously exceeded their expectations (fuel was a big painful problem for Germans), their losses in equipment and personnel was also much higher than anticipated. Without the Soviets attacking from the East, Germans would most probably have won anyway, but not as spectacularly as it appeared at the time - they may have very well looked much weaker and much more vulnerable, and that may have prompted high-rank officers to kill Hitler and not risk a war with the Allies.
@@remusbuddenkotte4811 Weiß ich nicht, denke wahre Kampfstärke kann nur erreicht werden wenn der Schützenpanzer und diverse andere Dinge in der Armee erstmal richtig gegendert werden sonst läuft hier nichts in DE ;)
Poland was basically that guy in the party, who leads the way, hoping that his teammates will support him, yet finds himself completely alone while his team loots around in the area they have passed. He gets killed, then sits on the spectator cam, raging that his teammates abounded him, giving occasional tips on how to act.
Everyone here needs to watch Europa the last battle. It explains the axis side of the story in great detail. So much context was not in our history classes, textbooks, or the history channel. It takes a lot of courage to get through this 10 part documentary, as some parts are more heavier than others. The entire documentary is very well cited, and contains facts and documents from the German perspective. It also features iconic figures such as: FDR, Churchill, Gandhi, Muhammad Ali, Henry Ford, general Patton, Dwight Eisenhower, JFK, etc. This documentary explains how communism had grown and expanded, how the US and Britain got into the war, and much much more! 743 minutes of runtime with rich, vital context that was never told to us. You'll need to do some digging, as posting the link, gets my comment removed. It is truly a captivating, and essential documentary to watch in our modern era. Great video by the way to the creator of this video! I loved the breakdown between the two nations and their military differences.
The only thing not present in the western education, is the history of Eastern Europe. And that's why there are people today who think to themselves "I don't know a sh*t about Eastern Europe, so I'll just check out what the nazi propaganda has to say about it". And so they fall to nazi fairy tales, because that's just the only source known to them.
the failed and late mobilisation also was an important factor... I had read somewhere that Poland announced mobilisation and than cancelled it under pressure from UK and France... That contributed to chaos and and the second call for soldiers was only as late as 30 August... Many soldiers simply didn't get to the units... It was a bit like covid in Italy... They were the first to experience new danger...
In fact, Britain and France didn't mean to help Poland in September 1939 anyways. They agreed on not acting in Abbeville on September 12, so before the main battle of the campaign, the Battle of Bzura. Polish troops could have a chance to defend until spring if not the Soviet backstab. Anyways, Poland stood against both Germans and Soviets in 39 for as long as France with the British and Polish (yes) help against only Germans in 1940... Britain just bought some time by sacrificing Poland in an inevitable war.
So the western allies of Poland managed to make her positions worse while not giving her any help. Hmm, nope, this is not the current state, just a recap from 80 years ago.
ONLY a month? France fell in 42 days, defended itself for two weeks longer only, and France had, firstly, a better army, secondly, they were already prepared to attack, and thirdly, they fought only on one front.
@lati long Maybe Poland would fall anyway, left to itself, but let's say they would fight until November 7, for example. That would then give the French and the English enough time to attack, and even though the French used the tactics of World War I defensive combat, they could conclude that if they were fighting Poland for so long, maybe they could attack Germany. However, I realize that Poland alone against Germany would have collapsed anyway, because the local authorities based most of their plan on the fact that France would help from the west.
We French, alongside with the Britishs should have launched a big offensive at the beginning of september, but we were afraid of the losses i guess. As Churchill said : you have choosen between war and dishonor, you choose dishonor and you have war...
@ᚺᚪᛁᛞᛖᚱ But as Rad Sargeant said - Poland lost the most per population. USSR lost 1 in 7. China lost 1 in 13. Poland lost 1 in 6. Plus, by 1946, they had lost land and 30% of their population. All for doing nothing wrong but being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
I was trying to make a presentation about this war, and it was painstakingly difficult to look at all the little divisions and their strength and to map them in a way that will also explain the big picture, and this video does this so well! I have a new appreciation for these videos, somehow I like them even more than I did before. Wonderful job!
I was honestly wondering how time-consuming it must be to be able to accurately map the movement of just one division, nevertheless all the other divisions combined.
@@TheZod00 not very hard, most corps or armies move in close formations except panzer divisions, and fast look at division histories in websites such as wikipedia and axisforum should do it.
@@TheZod00 - He dose this every week for the World War 2 Cahnnel. You
should take a look at the work he dose for those guys, he's been doing it
for a number of years now.
bruh
Check out the ww2 in real time Channel for help
Everytime I see a bunch of those army groups trying to retreat and getting encircled, I feel a sense of sadness.
Imagine how soldiers must have felt. Some of the Polish officers and NCOs committed suicides feeling shame for failing to defend their country.
@@kamilszadkowski8864 Yes, that what I mean by the sadness. I can't imagine being in one of those groups. You are now at the mercy of the enemy you were just trying to kill and are cut off from your family and way of life for who knows how long. It must have utter despair
Except when seeing encircled nazi swines getting slaughtered in East.
I dont, each encirclement means victory and a devastating success.
Yep
Germany: *Invades Poland very fast, proving they're not to be underestimated*
France: *does nothing*
Germany: *Takes France in 1 mothh*
France: *surprised pickachu face*
Denmark 😶🌫
@@mariuszmiroslaw2290 yeah why does everyone bully France for not surviving long
Because most of France’s army was in North Africa
@@eggshells7514 Most of those forces were badly equipped natives, they only had a small amount of their own French army (compared to their main force) stationed in Africa.
They even pulled a lot of their forces in Africa back to France during and after the Fall of Poland, however they were still inferior compared to the Germans even though they had the number advantage.
Poland was taken in 4 days, this Video ist mit correct
"So why did it take the germans only more than a month to completely defeat Poland?"
I would say landscape and lack of equipment, but they didn't do that bad. Even with a decent army they would still lose.
Poland has lasted for 35 days after invasion from West, North, South at the same time and from the East (after 17 of September)
Meanwhile France - the biggest army in Europe that time, has been attacked only from North-East and lasted "only" 46 days
Thats the issue when its WW2 but your general staff is stuck in WW1 to the point you call grandpa out of the grave and make him supreme commander
Not to mention France had Britain to help it while Poland was all alone
Poland did much better than France. But French people still think what rescued them from german invasion and defeated Nazis was their spirit of freedom, patriotism etc. while intervention of US and responsive offence of USSR are only reasons there is a state called "France".
Even if they had a more advanced military than Germany, they can't survive against both the Germans and Soviets.
The reason Poland took relatively longer was because it was a learning experience. First time trying the new tactics. Mistakes were made. Things went better on the next few countries. : )
Awesome video, now that you’ve covered most of Europe I’m exited for the Pacific campaign. It’s gonna be a blast.
He didn't cover all of Europe. There is still the italian campaign and North Africa (if you count North Africa as part of the European theatre)
@@untruelie2640 true, however I just want him to move onto the pacific theatre and then Africa.
@@untruelie2640
tbh africa was quite simple
you just swap ownership of cities 4 times each time.
@@PuellaMagiHomuraAkemi Well, not THAT simple. Just look up the "Operation Crusader" documentary by TIK.
@@untruelie2640
I prefer the 1973 one, quite entertaining too and better than the stuff you get to see nowadays.
Great work as always! Now you almost got all of WW2 in Europe :)
How did you comment 3 days ago
2nd
@@thegovernmentoftajikistan7841 early access
@@jona7357 lmao
Pacific war next?
Glad I found this channel hope you got more videos in the works this was really well done. Most people get taught that Poland was steamrolled when in reality they put up a good fight under the circumstances.
What it forgets to say in this video is that Britain and France told Poland to demobilise when war was coming. This meant that they couldn’t retreat east because most their population was in the west (and the loyalty of the people in the east was questionable)
A hopeless struggle against the German/Soviet dual aggression.
@@manatarms7652 Ya that angers me that they were so worried about not provoking Germany and when they do everything possible to not anger them they get gun shy when it came to fulfill their obligations.
Poland WAS steamrolled, you dunce. They weren't just overrun with laughable ease, but they absolutely were steamrolled.
@@Roketsune no they weren't dummy actually study the operation and the supply problems the Germans faced and the effectiveness of the 7TP tank vs the Germsn Panzer 1 and 2. You sound like another whiny wehraboo.
The best war history coverage channel on RUclips. Given enough troops on Patreon we may some day get coverage of English or French or Russian revolution.
The best channels telling the truth and Not a lie. Germany Hit back after poland kept raiding their neighbours Borders. If Germany didnt attacked forward the war would be in german ground. Britain wanted to destroy the german, them managed to find a way and get a way, without beeing the traitor. Like the US doing since decades ... and the dumbs eating lie after lie...
@@Muexxxor if that's true, I'm sure those "raids" on the border came up during the peace negotiations during August with Mussolini and you can name primary sources that mention that, right? 😏
i like it even better than king's and generals. this channel has a better pace, and does name every single friggin battalion by number, which, frankly, let's all admit, nobody cares or remembers
The reason I love your eastern front videos is not so much for the fact that they shed light on WW2, but more because they contain a lot of information pertinent to the Napoleon invasion of Russia. Thanks :)
“Effective assistance to Poland”… well - Britain and France DID NOTHING :D
Like always, they light the fire and run away
@@isimisoko perfect summary of their entire history
@@isimisoko just like in Ukraine
@@hmmm3210 true
@@hmmm3210 bob
It also should be said that the British demanded that the Polish stop their mobilisation in mid-August, "because it would be a provocation for a German Attack", despite a German military buildup at the border. So Polish divisions were understrength at the beginning of the Campaign, as a consequence of the delayed mobilisation.
Britain and France could have stopped WW2 but didn't.
All part of the useless policy of appeasement.
With hindsight, had Poland mobilised on a greater scale, those trying to re-write history would use the large mobilisation as proof that Poland was the main agitator for war.
@@bazmondo still, it's better to be strong but vilified than weak and dead.
@@infinummjb I don't dispute that for a minute.
Poland was in a no win situation regardless of what military stance it took, it was always going to be invaded.
@@sowianskizonierz2693 No they could not because they were much weaker as you saw soon after they declared war on Germany. France collpased immediately and Britain survived just barely from German invasion, Battle of Britain.
Thank you. Polish campaign operations are not covered in usual documentaries. Even the most detailed ones skimp the ground war at Poland. This episode was really needed.
we have to many of them in polish ;) btw. its not that western allies had no time to help us. They didnt want to send troops to Poland becouse of few other reasons. If you want to find out more about it tell me and i will respond ;p
Let's not exaggerate, most German (regarding this topic) and some Polish documents have survived the war. The only thing that has been almost completely lost are Polish film materials from that war.
this episode is totasl LIE ...not mention truth about Sovet attack on 17th September..... at leats Polish fight with 2 powers form weak and east but French surrender almost without any fight ;)
@@grzegorzkrolikowski4040 C'mon! Don't forget about heroic defense of Denmark 🏳
@@grzegorzkrolikowski4040 Denmark fell in six hours with literally almost no fighting
Finally! The second Sino-Japanese war, looking forward to it, I recomended your channel to a lot of my friends
Yeah, I'm waiting for a proper cover and Eastory will manage that, however it is tremendous and difficult task, probably the most difficult when it comes to WW2
@keithsze001 because it was mostly between KMT and Japan. I'm guessing PRC don't care to popularize it because of that
@keithsze001 oh yeah, lol, happy V-J day
no, PRC just popularized the warcrimes and the struggles of Chinese people, not as a patriotic and ultimately victorious war against Japan. What I meant is that if KMT is the one victorious, then maybe we'd see it more in things like popular media
@@sharkronical The Nationalist-Communist cooperation against the Japaneses who had already subjugated northeastern China is widely known in mainland China as “第二次国共合作” which is taught in Chinese middle school students' mandatory history courses. Nationalists' battles won and their representation of China on Day of Victory are also mentioned.
Also there are tons of Chinese movies and TV dramas which depict the KMT as a patriots who wear ironed uniforms and carry modern weapons from the U.S. but stigmatize the Communists as mobs of beggars. Who knows how they could explain the crushing defeat of KMT in just four years after victory over Japan?
@@joehill9707 you don't win civil wars with military only. I don't know that part of history, but I suppose there was no strong social structure supporting the nationalist government. In cases like this it is usually because of economic crisis and/or lack of openness to social compromises. I guess the nationalists did not want to win larger parts of population and tried relying only on the groups that strongly supported them and strong arm approach to handling dissent? It is also common that the regime that falls was unable to trim the parasitic classes privileges.
I am a conservative, but a conservative needs to be realistic. If your conservative regime is trying to suppress the left with police and military that is recruited from the same society, if it is unable to emancipate itself enough to be able to enforce it's will on the powerful groups like aristocracy, the pressure is going to rise and instead of letting some steam off by opening the valves, you are just waiting for the whole thing to blow up. Rather than accepting social compromise, you just allow a revolution and for power to be captured by radicals. In this manner, I blame the fallen regimes for the consequences of revolutions more than revolutionaries. In every society there will be various people that push for a revolution, but they are not the ones that make crucial decisions, they are just waiting there to seize their moment. A good government is supposed to never give them a chance.
As Polish guy I'm happy of this episode, because September campaign isn't popular in the West, although it begun war in Europe. There is also popular myth, that polish cavalry charged on tanks, it's not true, it was german propagnda to proove primitivity of polish army. It's a pity that the Allies didn't help us, maybe war would be shorter, but maybe not.
I have heard that story. Poland used cavalry used their horses as transport and dismounted when in combat to fight as ground units. Unfortunately when during the polish campaign they were caught in transition when they routed a german bridge and were surprised by a supporting german armoured unit and got massacred. After that the myth was born. At least you lasted longer than france with less men and equipment.
@@kondwanimututa2302 Germany used horses for transport as well, millions of them. But their propaganda reels showing masses of tanks is still prevailing in our heads today.
@@kondwanimututa2302 Poland lasted 36 days, French 46, but France was much larger, had greater and better equiped army, and support of Britain. Both Poland and France fighted on 2 fronts, but USSR was much stronger than Italy
@@stasiowski4919 Not really the battle of France was lost on the first week when the germans crossed the mouse river and out flanked the france divisions in the Netherlands and Belgium. The rest of the campaign was just driving to the ocean and encircling.
@@Vitalis94 True people overhype the german army which had been preparing for war since hitler election to chancellor. You could technically say they prepared for war since they signed the treaty of Versailles since they invested in synethic oil in 1920s even though it was cheaper to buy aboard. You would only do this if you wanted an independent source of oil to wage war. So it's not surprising that if you prepare 20 years for war that you do every well for a while.
Excellent research! Have watched so many videos and read books, but nobody even bother to explain the polish campaign. Thank a lot. Great video.
2:40 "The Allies had not expected the events to take place so quickly" --- As pointed out by Roger Moorhouse in his book "First to Fight", the promises of the Allies have been empty from the start. Thus they weren't as you claim, caught off guard by the quick German advance, as they never intended to help Poland.
Ships sailing to Constanca, filled with equipment British _really_ disliked to part with, say otherwise.
But another "WW1 Serbia" did not materialize and _everything_ Allies did - or tried to do - had been completely derailed by time.
There are also cases where failure to help had been a *good* outcome - like Churchill and his Plan Catherine.
But then again, one would presume Polish elites had seen a map of Europe once or twice in their lives and knew how to count kilometers.
Funny thing is that the British still told Poland not to engage in any meaningful diplomacy with Germany.
France was weak as we can see how easily Germany invaded it too. Also Britain survived just barely the attack of nazis even it happened much later than 1939 and there was time to prepare .So there was no real capacity by France (or England) to interfere quickly - just like this presentation told. Germany was nr 1 military superpower in Europe. And secondly soviets were backstabbers when attacking to Poland too and preventing poles to retreat to Romanian border.
This is completely stupid nonsense I see pushed by Poles all the time is. The fact is, Poland was militarily defeated within 2 weeks and France was still in the process of mobilizing. It saw that an attack into Germany would not be of any benefit and decided to abort the Saar Offensive (which had only got underway shortly before Warsaw was encircled).
@@matthewbadley5063 And this is a completely stupid nonsense I see pushed by westerners all the time. The fact is, Poland had been militarly maimed by its allies, who had stopped several attempts of Polish mobilisation, and the plans for the defence had to be hastily scrapped over to appease the Western Allies, who in the end didn't do anything. This is the main reason for why the Polish army wasn't prepared for the September campaign. And what about the UK, whose only perticipation in the first months of the war was dropping paper leaflets, instead of bombs.
'so why was Poland defeated only in a month?' - tell it to french.
I blame Brexit.
France after marching 5 miles into the Saarland: We did it boys, we destroyed the nazi.
"Tell it to the french"
It's not the fault of France that Poland was defeated so quickly.
@@matthewbadley5063 Looks like youre not smart enough. Poland fell because it was weak, and between the two powers. I referred to the equally quick defeat of France, despite the fact that they were better trained and, above all, better armed than the Poles.
Just got the notification, didn’t even watch yet, but I’m gonna say “amazing video” preemptively.
Everyone does that when Eastory uploads.
One of the most overlooked and interesting campaigns of WW2
Yeah
The most I knew about this campaign was, the Germans blitz through the polish lines, the poles stuck to their city defences and defended them until long after all hope was lost, and that some poles were able to escape through romania into britain.
Would love to see this format on the recent events in Afghanistan!
"How did an army, who significantly outnumbered and outequipped their enemie, loose in just a week"
@@chattw6885 why does that sound like a shit online news sites headline
@@chattw6885 For the record, this is the Afghan army. The one which barely got paid and had no loyalty to its own government.
"The Taliban began their offensive on the first city, utilizing their Toyota pickups to intimidate the garrison into surrendering during the first 8 seconds of the siege. The government responded by mobilizing their strategic reserves into surrendering before the Taliban could establish a bridgehead"
@@chattw6885 simply because donald trump ordered the us army to retreat
Amazing video man! I came here as quick as i could to watch yet another astonishing video, cheers!👍👍🎉🥂
4:50 - On the soviet border there were some polish forces called "KOP" (Korpus Ochrony Pogranicza - Border Protection Corps
), so it wasn't totaly undefended
Yeah, that is another myth about this campaign. That the Eastern border was undefended and that the Soviets suffered very few casualties which also isn't entirely true.
I might be mistaken but KOP battalions were joined into the regular army I believe before the Soviet invasion
You kamhir tomorow
Russians also joined the war against Japan very late after it was clear Japan is losing. It was easy to annex areas from Japan then , just like it was easy to steal half of Poland and areas from all European neighbors of Soviet union that time. Stalin's red world revolution was advancing well. Fortunately NATO stopped them.
@William Allford Polish leader forbade to engage the Soviets _if_ the retreat to Romania was possible. But with the Soviets not willing to allow the Poles to retreat themselves, some clashes were inevitable. Plus, the Soviets used to encircle some cities and thus these cities' garrisons had been resisting.
Anyway, your claims about Eastern Poland from your second comment require several corrections. Piłsudski wasn't a dictator, not yet anyway. When on 11 November 1918 Poland was proclaimed, there hadn't been any governal institutions yet. Therefore Piłsudski got the position of the temporary chief of state, with condition that it is only temporary. And Piłsudski kept his word: he wasn't abusing this position, nor was he sabotaging the formation of the democratic institutions. When the polish-soviet war came to an end, Piłsudski renounced his position and allowed Poland to become fully democratic. The thing is, in 1926 he made a coup and introduced his authoritarian rule... and there are many people who incorrectly make no distinction between these two completely different periods. Anyway, while the east of Poland was indeed inhabited by many orthodox people, for Poles it didnt matter, because Poles saw then the polish nationality in a completely different way. At that time, the people were the civilians of Poland regardless of faith and ethnicity as long as they were loyal to the state. And in many cases they were. Piłsudski himself was a Lithuanian. And finally, the Curzon Line was proposed on 8 December 1919, months after Poland already had the control over the lands east of it.
Very informative, it's always easier to understand individual parts of massive wars when you break them down to smaller conflicts and episodes.
I’ve watched your videos over and over again. Thank you brother, great work!
@Jovan Lozanac Brilliantly done, lets play hoi4?
@Jovan Lozanac I'd rather barbarossa your stalin line, sorry
how perfect I was just rewatching your videos right when you upload this
And yet Poland, first to fight, was the country that posed the biggest resistance to Germany until summer 1941.
True
This is the kind of content I like about your channel. Keep it up!👍
Except it was not "Germany vs Poland" but "Germany and Soviet Union and Slovakia vs Poland".
Exactly
Slovakia s military value was near 0 and when the soviets atacked Poland was almost defeated the last stand at the romanian bridgehead was almost as delusional as festüng austria
@@jorgeprieto8643 You need to read more history books and watch less propaganda. Regular Polish army was fighting for next 3 weeks after soviet invasion. The last Polish units gave up their weapons on October 6 after the Battle of Kock, nowhere near Romania. Slovakia's military value was indeed very low but the point is Slovakia was german puppet and allowed Germans to invade Poland not only from North and West but also from the South.
Lithuanians attack vilnius
Oh. Do not be so modest and don't forget about Gdańsk/Danzig who was German ally and collaborator. So: Germany, Gdańsk, Slovakia and Soviet Union vs Poland (in correct order).
By far, this is one of the best educational history channels on RUclips! Well done indeed!
Awesome work mate, I suggest u cover the balkans in ww2 next. Its pretty interesting stuff
The Balkans in the most recent war would be great too.
Yugoslavia probably would be most interesting case,since it was war within the war,alliances were forged and broken on a whim ,line between good and bad was blurred to the maximum and in the end,plenty of innocents died
Glad to see these videos are still coming
Stuff like this 4:28 is just too fucking impressive, the amount of communication and brilliance to pull that off so quickly is just amazing. Especially when you consider that the equipment and tech that was used were pretty much fresh of the shelves.. the planes, the tanks, the radios, etc etc.. so damn cool.
To be honest Germany had the most modern technology and tactics which is how they managed to do these things unlike the other nations. Im not talking about having the most modern tanks but the most modern tactics and coordinations and things like radio equipment as well as theory about warfare or air warfare. I mean in the French Campaign, the French still used flags for example
shame all that technology and planning was put to such awful ends.
@@cageybee7221 absolutely agreed
@@PuellaMagiHomuraAkemi maybe in the early war, yes. later on they realised the same old blitzkrieg won't get them anywhere
@Yousef mostafa The warfare part is cool.
That has nothing to do with with the extermination of Jews etc.
Incredible work, as always!
Waiting for Eastory to upload makes me feel like a kid on Christmas. Keep up the good work!
France and britain: we will help you if Germany attacks
Poland: we are getting invaded
France and Britain: I'm gonna pretend I didnt see that
This seems so familiar with NATO and Russia now. Hahahahaah Im getting scared
It's like people don't actually learn from history, or at least that they forget what they did learn after a generation or two.
@@juanpescanova5910 lol don’t be. Russia can barely beat the Ukrainians
France and Britain: we are getting invaded by North Africa immigrants
Poland: I'm gonna pretend I didn't see that
@@juanpescanova5910 NATO never promised to defend Ukraine, and if they wage were against Russia, ww3 would start
Great work, but you have one issue.
Poland in this map don't aquire Zaolzie terrain as well as other smaller territories regained in October 1938 from Czechoslovakia.
Thanks! Some things always seem to slip through. Should have checked it.
Exactly. This is the beginning of World War II.
@@Eastory The Slovak Republic doesn't exist on your map
The fact that Poland started the Second World War by taking over Zaolzie is ordinary propaganda, the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact began the Second World War and Poland took Zaolzie because in the 1920s it was the Czech Republic that invaded Poland and it was annexed by Zaolzie and Poland received only in 1938 what hers.
@@pawep3098 It belongs to to Czechs and righfully so they control the region today.
When are you going to release the video about Sauron's Armies of Mordor invading Middle Earth?
Bruh
bruh
bruh
Bruh
Bruh
Excellent content (said as a material supporter of your videos). Although individual actions and battles can’t be shown in the scope of this panoramic overview, it would have been nice to see a) Westerplatte location where the war started b) Gleiwitz radio station marked on the map and c) animated appearance of main dates of Luftwaffe bombing is f Warsaw. Just small visuals to alert the viewer to when these events happened in the chronology of the campaign.
Keep up the great work! There are no better frontline videos. I'm already excited about the upcoming japanese-chinese war
Eastern was a big influence too comparable to OverSimplified, this channel needs to prosper! I like your videos
Manstein wrote in his book, Lost Victories, the Poles only real hope was to put the bulk of their forces behind the Bug/Vistula, leaving only a screening/delaying force in the western parts of Poland. Conduct a fighting withdrawal with those forces screening forces, buying time for the bulk of their forces to deploy and dig in behind the rivers. He states that Poland was going to lose, even if they did what he suggested. But by keeping the bulk of their forces behind the Bug/Vistula, they could potentially, hold out long enough for the French and Brits to get enough forces on the continent to attack Germany from the west...which he writes was Germany's nightmare scenario.
Yes, but the Poles did not believe that France and Great Britain would enter the war if Poland gave up her western territories without a fight. The specter of Munich was very much alive.
I think we were afraid that Germans gonna just swallow a bunch of territory, allies gonna to ignore that and Poland is going to end up without majority of it industrial potential.. Most of the industry was in the west.. east was basically a bunch of poor villages and towns with low density population
Poles thank the English for "help". Poland has never had such an ally. It is a pity for the Polish pilots who died in defense of the English sky.
Great Britain betrayed the Poles twice ... during the Polish-Bolshevik war and the Second World War, giving Poland over to Stalin in Jauta. Hanba to the English.
The purpose of England and France, from the beginning, was to destroy Germany. "Defending" Poland was just the pretext they needed. So much so that they did not declare war on the Soviet Union when it also invaded the country a few days later.
Britain did her part. The British contribution was the Royal Navy (which strangled Germany and won the war in the long run) and to reinforce the French on the Western Front.
If you want someone to blame, blame France.
@@visaodissidente5560 for Britain and France to declare war on both Germany and the Soviet Union would be suicide and the capabilities the British and French had to hurt the Soviet Union from such a distance were non-existent.
@@juliantheapostate8295 absolutely no. Britain is at least as guilty. The appeasement policy that led to WW2 is primarily Britain's brainchild.
@@uncleadi Remind me who declared war on Germany in 1939 and the reason for it?
You know, it's true how we Poles ask this thing aproconately 39 times per minute:
*"Where the f is France and UK?!"*
Really ?
Would be more interesting why Churchill did not stand there in 1945 when the decision were made that Polish borders would be moved.
But if British have tea time then it is their tea time.
@@typxxilps In 1945 the only game in town was the US. WW2 ended any power and influence Britain had
@@typxxilps Stalin had half Europe in his hands and war machine going strong. His position was so strong that other allies were not capable to kick him out. Do you suggest that WW2 should have been continued right away? Cold war started soon to solve that problem and it lasted long time.
This is the only channel that I click whenever I see the new video
No matter what
The last message before Germany entered warsaw from poland was this and this is the saddest thing ive ever read:Hallo hallo can you hear us? This is our last message. Today, German troops entered Warsaw. We extend fraternal greetings to the soldiers fighting in Hel and to all those fighting wherever they are. Poland has not perished yet. Long live Poland!
Germany was not alone in attacking Poland. Why does no one talk about the treacherous Slovakians?
The mouse and the elephant pas together over a bridge, and mouse says:
Do you hear how the bridge vibrates under OUR footsteps?
Because after all we Poles like them. :)
The error of showing Slovakia as part of Germany is also common.
@@viz12345 Poland also loves Hungary ( #Węgry, ) yet they chose opposite sides in WWII!
Poland Invaded Slovakia in 1938
After hearing first 20 second my conclusion is - In the Danish compaing the German forces were stronger, but Danmark was rich country with many geografical advantages to defend itself... So why it took only half of the day for the German army to defeat Denmark...? France in 1940 was a superpower and colonial empire... So why it took only just over a month to defeat France...?
The danish campaign ended because the Germans landed troops in Copenhagen and threatened to bomb the city of Denmark didn't surrender. As for France, that was a case of poor communication and the Belgians not letting the allies move in and dig in on really good defensive lines until after the Germans had invaded.
@@Syn_1 Even if France could dig in within Belgium they would still have to surrender in 3 weeks. Because German panzers were coming from the south (Ardenne - Sedan) and would encircle them around the Belgium-Franco border area (as opposed to around Dunkirk)
Because the Danish military was virtually non-existent and wasn't near anyone who would send in troops immediately to defend them. Defensible positions and terrain are meaningless when you have no troops to hold and take advantage of it.
Also, Denmark is a puny country both in landarea and population relative to Germany. It was not capable of putting up much resistance even if it had heavily invested in its military (which may well have triggered a war with Germany well before 1940).
Denmark was screwed from the start and the Danes knew it. They could also expect unusually lenient treatment from their fellow Aryans if they surrendered immediately.
As for the French, it was a combination of disunity in the French government, low morale and fighting spirit in the French military, inferior use and deployments of their armorer forces, the inherent vulnerablity and shortcomings of their defensive Maginot-based strategy (largely the matter of Belgian neutrality and politics that undermined the Alied defensive strategy and ability to mobilize on that front), and the Germans surprising the French and British by sending armored spearheads through the supposedly impassible Ardennes Forest (which was itself a plan that only came into being through a series of events and factors, and was not the original German plan). A confluence of factors and events that made France devastatingly ineffective and Germany devastatingly effective.
As french person (maybe biased) I would say the french army wasnot that bad (it has better tanks). The problem was a high commander of WWI who didnot adapt to new strategies( for exemple they didnot use the radio so they couldnt communicate well).
Also we didnot have a strong air force which was a huge mistake.
The german plan was also good because of their swiftness.
But i dont want to forget some little battles: we retained in 9 vs 3000 the incredible italian army :) (Pont Saint Louis ).
The French campaign for the Italy has been a defeat
And when we had a commander who knew how to use his tanks (De gaulle) we have been able to retain some german troops
I'm here so fast that Germans didn't even start the war
Were you here before the Marco Polo bridge incident?
@Kallenie It’s not a funny one dw about it
I was here so late that the aliens invaded the Earth already.
100+ likes
is Austria who Started the both world wars
Hey Eastory, do you happen to be willing to share where you get the beautiful maps that you make the animations on top of? It’s hard to find thorough and detailed European maps that also manage to cover a lot of territory, so I’d love to know the source
I like to That too
Me too!
I dont think there is just one soure for such vast and detailed information
Good explanation of events, but with several inaccuracies with the map (that also might have affected the explanation):
- There was no large encirclement near Katowice
- Sieradz was captured on the 9th but the map didn't portray it that way so it must be the style it seems
- The Polish forces on the Bzura were not trapped till the 16th as the Germans were fighting in Sochazew and could risk overstretching their forces trying to encircle a gargantuan pocket of resistance. Warsaw (and so is the Bzura) would though be cut off from the rest of Poland on the 13th.
- The Poles trapped after the battle of Przemyśl trying to broke free from the German encirclement managed to successfully do so. They did not capitulate and counter-attacked the German encirclement.
-The battle of Radom also looked odd as the battle went like: Radom was already captured and the Radom area surrounded as a large pocket, so the German forces way south of Radom started attacking the trapped Polish forces at the road towards Iłża before eventually dividing the pocket of soldiers that retreated to the forests. But at least the encirclement is showed...
Nonetheless nobody is perfect. Keep up the good content
Yes, there was no encirclement of Polish troops in Katowice. But the city's defense was taken over by the local population (which in itself is unique) which was able to keep it up to 4 September to noon.
So it was an "island" on the map of German conquest and this animation shows it correctly.
How does a 6 minutes long video compare to the 1940 french campaign video which lasts over twice as long despite the french campaign being just one week longer?
You provide very little background information. You make no mention of the french offensive in the Saar area, close to no mention of the fighting with the soviets (not a single mention of the fighting in the north-eastern part of the country which was even more intense than the fighting around Lwów - and it is not even animated!). There is also no mention of fighting on the coast which lasted throughout the whole campaign, until 3rd of october. You did not provide dates or any context, neither for siege of Warsaw (and fighing around it) nor Lwow - for example a fact that the red army claimed to have arrived in order to help polish units fight the Germans (that's partly why Lwow capitulated to the soviets so quickly when the red army approached the city - the defenders saw the german units withdrawing before soviets which was in line with soviet claims ---> read en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Lwów_(1939) ).
The animation of movement of polish forces is very simplified and, as a result, may sometimes be misleading. You should take into consideration splitting the forces or at least providing proper narrative instead (when necessary). For example, around 4:17 a viewer may come to a conclusion that not a single soldier from 11th, 24th and 38th division managed to get to Lwow which is not true:
"On September 17, the Division fought in the Janów Forest, halting advance of German 7th I.D. and 57 I.D. Remnants of the unit, numbered at no more than 1000 men, managed to break into besieged Lwów, where it capitulated." --> en.wikipedia.org/wiki/11th_Infantry_Division_(Poland)
pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitwa_w_lasach_janowskich_(1939) is exactly about that battle but sadly there is no english version.
In my opinion this particular video is nowhere close in terms of quality to your previous ones.
Yappin
If Poland had Mobilize a few months earlier they would have held they could estimate to have closer to 2 million men in the field
nope, they had no way to counter mobile german units, unless they builts a maginot like fortress system all the way from the north sea to Slovakia, there was no way to hold the germans.
Fun fact, french army entered ruhr region with close to 0 resistance from German army but decided to go back to original border so they could be conquered in 1 month too xD
@@KillerOfNO0bS you know what the Germans have like 15 divisions while the Allies have like 120 in total in 1939
@@KillerOfNO0bS not really
they wanted to but allies told them not to.
You know, Poland fell pretty quickly, but given the situation,
they held out pretty well, especially when compared the the allies in France,
who were defeated in 44 days with alot more time to prepare,
and having equipment alot better than that of Poland.
Your Right Poland did better than France haahhahah
@@memazov6601 And still, no one actually talk about Britain who avoided defeat coz it's an isle.
yea, also given the fact that France have a lot of time after start of the war to prepare it's defences and mobilize it's troops.
@@caxopog The absolute same can be said about "still" Britain and it's ridiculous expeditionary force, Belgium or the Netherlands. The weaknesses of France and it's western allies weren't really preparation nor a huge military technology disadvantage (they're plenty of videos on yt who explains this on detail) but outdated doctrines from WWI and extremely retarded high command.
@@sharkywillzy5616 and overconfidence,hypocricy and pride. "We won with them once and they try the same tactic by attacking Belgium? Well guess we will win again" "Hmmm we the French will not help the Poles. We are not gonna die for them. Britain you will help us right? We can't defend without you" "Poles helped us in battle for Britain and shot down the most German planes during it?! How dare they be better than us?! Dont invite them to the victory parade and make them pay for using OUR planes to save OUR country!!!"
Well done episode...very detailed for a short video. Thankyou!
Your videos are amazing! They look so professional and well done, it's just awesome to watch them. I always start at the very beginning and watch it 100% through to the end, no skipping.
What program do you use by the way? All the animated map programs I see are rather arcadic and hard to use and look rather outdated. Your's looks so professional.
Yet another banger from the man himself
If polish army Poznan which wasn’t under attack made counterattack earlier, they could cause heavy losses to the Germans and attack would be more effective. Unfortunately supreme command refused to carry out this offensive in first days of the campaign.
If this was a hoi4 game they would propably have taken berlin :D
@@radosawczuj1054
nah if this was hoi4 Poland would already not exist in 1937 anymore :D
vanilla is so broken words can't describe
Commander of Army Poznań gen. Kutrzeba wrote in his diaries that it was possible, but marshall Rydz Śmigły opposed.
@@tukaes6651 Precisely!
And if French and British attacked Germany during the September campaign the war would have ended right there. We can play "what ifs" like that all day
You know that phase of studying about WW2 where you're just constantly saying "How the fuck did they manage to succeed?!" to a vast majority of German successes because you're so perplexed that everything was going according to plan so much so that you wondered if you were reading some fantasy war novel where the evil guys have massive amounts of plot armour at the start?
Yeah. I'm in that phase again.
_How the fuck?_
- big country overall: in 1939 Germany had the same population and comparable GDP as continental UK and France combined.
- better preparation: Germans have been focusing heavily on producing weapons years before the others.
- modern tactics: Germany pioneered concentrated tank formations, close air support, flexible combat groups ("Kampfgruppe") and the widespread use of radio communications.
- poor enemy leadership: in France the high staff was composed of senile men who expected a repeat of WW1 with stationary trench warfare. Meanwhile in the Soviet Union, Stalin has murdered the majority of experienced officers in his Great Purge.
Those were the main reasons really.
I had such feeling when I first read about WW2. But if you actually start studying how and why Germany won those early campaigns it becomes quite clear it was not only easy for them, but they were pretty much destined to conquer most of Europe until 1941. They had massive advantages against all of their enemies up until that point. It also becomes clear that germany had no way of ever winning the war - their strategic and tactical plans were only suited for quick and decisive campaigns, so when they started a war of exhaustion with the soviets they had no way of winning it.
Sheer luck and an early advantage that eventually wore off
In my opinion they did make some advancements in tank doctrine, but the biggest factor is early allied incompetence and unwillingness to accept the fact a large scale war was coming and properly prepare
@@Lehr-km5be this narrative is false but extremely common. Germany could win the war had they become succesful in Fall Blau. 1942 soviet population were starving and their oil and lend-lease supply cut off, soviets would probably settle in for peace as stalin actually thought about that scenario pre-1943. Or they would never be able to launch any offensives in the future. But I am not sure what would happen if USA were to deliver atomic bombs on Ruhr.
This video is just great! You have my support in any making of the future videos, as soon as I can I'll join your patreon!
I really like those sort of videos. Keep up.
How do you do that animations?
Pls make a video explaining how to do it.
He keyframes the divisions but idk how to make the line
From what I have read, it is now clear that the French/British had no plans in place to attack Germany and not only would such plans have taken months to create, they never even started.
The promise of assistance within two weeks was therefore a lie.
In regards to this video, the way that it is stated that the Germans had tanks implies that the Poles did not.
The Poles did in fact have tanks but much like the French and British armies, they had not adopted the tactic of massed tank warfare and consequently, their tanks were used in an infantry support role and too spread out to be effective against the localized "fists" of massed panzer units that were used to breach the front. They also lacked sufficient numbers of anti-tank guns.
Finally, they lost air superiority early, which is a key point that is entirely overlooked in this video.
Otherwise, great job. I enjoyed this.
This is absolutely moronic, there's archival resources and mobilization timetables proving the intent and ability to begin a 40-division offensive in two weeks. The trouble is that this would not be sufficiently large to defeat Germany or take the Saarland with 29 German divisions holding the area, it would only be good to reduce pressure on Poland. The Allied high command met two days before the due date of the offensive and canceled it because Poland had been defeated so fast that Germany could stop them and clean up Poland, which meant the offensive was pointless.
Also, did you even watch the video? You can literally see that the Germans did not apply any doctrine of "massed tank warfare" in Poland and that their armored divisions were scattered out among different armies and used mostly to ease the advance of the German infantry.
@@roberthansen5727 point me to the archival documents of the actual invasion plans. I'm sure there were mobilization plans but that doesn't prove anything in of itself.
I'll wait.
Thanks in advance.
@@roberthansen5727 right, Blitzkrieg didn't exist. Ok.
The Japanese invasion of China at the end is so exciting. It's also incredibly underrepresented in media.
The true beginning of WW2.
yay new eastory video, i love these videos so much, keep it up
This guy's voice gives me ASMR, watching the arrows is so hypnotic
Korean war would be dope but awesome video. Really shows how speed was a key element in the German doctrine.
Another key factor is just geography. Germany attacked from the West, North, and South. The promised help from the UK and France never materialized. Then the Soviet Union joined from the East. Despite this, Poland still lasted roughly as long as France, despite France having the Maginot Line and not facing any of the major geographical difficulties that Poland faced.
Congratulations you survived a month.
@@maxdavis7722 Actually a 1000+ years, despite Bismarck's, Hitler's, and others' best efforts to wipe us out. Meanwhile, the USA is tearing itself apart after a measly 300 years
@@objectivistathlete I’m not from America im from England and as this video stated Poland lasted a month against Germany.
@@maxdavis7722 ah yes, the country kept safe by seas on every side - and not to mention oceans of Polish blood in WW2. But please, continue with your ironic comments.
@@objectivistathlete just having a sea between the enemy doesn’t mean you are protected it’s how effective your navy is. Britain’s always outshined the axis navy in Europe. Look at the pacific war there was sea between Japan and most countries and yet they got invaded.
5:27 This border is so striking
i clicked as quick as i could, love this channel
"thawnks!" 00:23
idk why but it stuck with me and i like the way you said it
Thank you Britain and France, you are really helpful.
Worse is russia that backstabbed Poland and attacked it cowardly from the back when Poland was deep in war with another power. Shameless and opportunistic russia.
@@francoislechanceux5818 Backstabbed? Polish military strategy before 1939 was focused solely on countering Soviet invasion. They weren't allies to begin with, the enemy attacking can't be called backstabbing.
@@Vitalis94 An enemy with a modicum of honor in him does not attack when the opponent is already on the ground deeply wounded. Russians love attacking when you are down and out. They did that against Poland. They did that against Japan. An honorless country can never be a trustworthy ally even in the next 1000 years. It's a DNA or cultural default.
Britain's contribution was the Royal Navy. Without the blockade Germany would have had all the oil she needed and would have conquered the USSR.
Think yourselves lucky we were there.
@@juliantheapostate8295 keep deluding yourself as ive seen in multiple other comments, RoYaL nAvY lmao
while britain were getting smashed by the u boats which was well on its way to starve the island, all i see is you bragging about the overstretched navy which did not have the same impact with the blockade as in the previous war, britain was simply not powerful enough to mess with Germany alone, they had to hide in their island
@ 4:03 i really thought you said "Soviet front" for the longest time and i was so confused xD
Erich von Manstein in his book said describing the invasion of Poland, he emphasizes the enormous German advantage - Poland had only two armored divisions - and the fact that it was only capable of resisting briefly. He accuses the Polish generals of the lack of a developed military doctrine, which he explains by the fact that Poland had existed too briefly as an independent state and therefore did not have a continuous military tradition. He believes that the Polish temperament predisposes Poles to offensive and criticizes the fact that the newly formed Polish army adopted the French doctrine, based on the defensive.
And that’s why they lost. This shows that Germany’s military doctrine was the best of ww2
It looks better than your older vids good Job man
Hey, your videos are great, I think a pretty good idea for one of your videos could be the: Spanish civil war animated 1936-1939, I think it will be a very good idea for one of your videos.
There's a reason even the USSR had trouble with Germany at first. Blitzkrieg was one hell of a good strategy.
It was good because the rest of Europe was unprepared for war. And of this kind.
Tatic*
Its not a strategy
@@Jean_Jacques148 this is a good and very overlooked point. Germany has been arming itself heavily since 1935, to the point there were shortages of common goods in 1938 - BEFORE the war even began. Meanwhile other nations like Czechoslovakia, Poland and the UK only really started preparing in 1939.
Only to some point when germans started not to follow it and noobody was suprised anymore by suprise and schwerpunkt attacks. The most important thing were kampfgruppe and other very flexible formations that made leadership much much easier and they could split their unites in hours
Historical fact: It isnt...leaving your fucking flanks exposed isnt a good way to wage a war, specially when your enemies also have the knowledge to counter your movements Eg: Kursk pincer through Orel and Belgorod which led to Operation Kutuzov and the absolute destruction of the German offensive capability.
I would to point out for all of those that don't know. The Polish army did in fact have tanks
horses with guns ain't tanks
@@PuellaMagiHomuraAkemi you gotta work on your jokes, that one really wasn't funny.
@@Brandon0406
Was it supposed to be?
@@PuellaMagiHomuraAkemi either yes or you don't know anything about the polish army.
It's also worth pointing out that light tanks were of limited use, even in 1939
Yes, the Polish campaign lasted 5 weeks, but why the French campaign in 1940 lasted only 6 weeks? The Germans attacked Poland without a declaration of war and had a secret agreement with the Soviets to divide Poland.
Because the French general staff was in WW1, not in WW2. They lacked the technology, thinking and thus tactics for WW2 - Tanks for example were not independant forces from infantry which was the main rule of WW2. N
@@PuellaMagiHomuraAkemi Shouldn't they learn something after the campaign in Poland? And not to prepare for 9 months to ...... surrender !!! :-)
"had a secret agreement with the Soviets to divide Poland."
There is no solid evidence of the existence of this document. The public was presented with only one unreliable document with a forged signature of Molotov. This document had a lot of grammar mistakes and Finland for some reason was considered to be a part of Eastern Europe. The very meaning of this document does not make logical sense, like, the countries are going to divide a sovereign European country in half in front of the whole world and they had to sign some "secret" document so no one would know about it? This is not how things work.
@@kurilrick2207
Sure mate, dream on. It does make sense as officially they of course pretend it has been for various reasons, like the Russians only wanted to protect Polish minorities and lies like that.
Stalin and Hitler were both totalitarian regimes focused on aggressive expansion.
@@kurilrick2207 Finland was widely considered an Eastern European or more specifically a Baltic nation at that time. It had been a part of the Russian Empire until just a couple decades before. In fact, basically all the territory between Germany and the Soviet Union had been a part of either the German or the Russian Empires until the 1st World War. Only the Southern parts had belonged to the now defunct Austro-Hungarian Empire.
The point of the treaty was to divide the territories between the two in agreement. If either invaded the "buffer states" unilaterally, the other would naturally see it as a provocation. This is how geopolitics work and have worked for a very long time.
@Eastory - So good to see you back fit and well, after your long stint on the Eastern Front
with the gang at the World War 2 Channel!!
Work of art and fantastic way to visualise and make sense of the confusing battlefield.
Lesson of the day; Do not trust anyone to back you up, not even your father.
Looking at the modern Polish defensive strategy, it's reliance on NATO, I can't comprehend why they didn't learn anything.
I mean, given our history, Poland should've been armed to the teeth. We should have been an European Israel - with a modern army, always ready for potential attack. Yet the army still uses mostly Soviet era equipment to this day. There is no clear strategy at all, and nepostism is prevalent in the Army. And don't get me started on the Air force and the Navy...
@@Vitalis94 I get your point my friend. :)
@@Vitalis94 Yea, it's like waiting for history to repeat
@@Vitalis94 For one Poland does not share most of its border with hostile countries, and Russian troops are 100km at closest away save in Kaliningrad.
Second there is an actual NATO presence in the region guaranteeing rest of Europe joins, and in particulary an noninsignificant US presence in Poland itself.
Russia is not so dumb as to embark on a blatant invasion. Without allies, Poland would be forced to adopt a concessionary policy towards Russia.
@@geddycurrent1174 not in the slightest.
*germany invaded Poland*
Poland: it will take all of our strength and determination to fight, but we might have a chance
*Soviet Union also invades Poland*
Poland: well shit…
@@remusbuddenkotte4811 The video doesn't tell us the lessons Germans took from this campaign:
Their munition consumption was hugely above their initial estimation, their fuel consumption dangerously exceeded their expectations (fuel was a big painful problem for Germans), their losses in equipment and personnel was also much higher than anticipated. Without the Soviets attacking from the East, Germans would most probably have won anyway, but not as spectacularly as it appeared at the time - they may have very well looked much weaker and much more vulnerable, and that may have prompted high-rank officers to kill Hitler and not risk a war with the Allies.
Poland would have lost the war one way or another.
"but we might have a chance"
Yeah no :D
@@remusbuddenkotte4811
Weiß ich nicht, denke wahre Kampfstärke kann nur erreicht werden wenn der Schützenpanzer und diverse andere Dinge in der Armee erstmal richtig gegendert werden sonst läuft hier nichts in DE
;)
@@mojoblues66 Just like Finland, Ukranie or Spanish republic.
Poland was basically that guy in the party, who leads the way, hoping that his teammates will support him, yet finds himself completely alone while his team loots around in the area they have passed. He gets killed, then sits on the spectator cam, raging that his teammates abounded him, giving occasional tips on how to act.
Everyone here needs to watch Europa the last battle. It explains the axis side of the story in great detail. So much context was not in our history classes, textbooks, or the history channel. It takes a lot of courage to get through this 10 part documentary, as some parts are more heavier than others. The entire documentary is very well cited, and contains facts and documents from the German perspective. It also features iconic figures such as: FDR, Churchill, Gandhi, Muhammad Ali, Henry Ford, general Patton, Dwight Eisenhower, JFK, etc. This documentary explains how communism had grown and expanded, how the US and Britain got into the war, and much much more! 743 minutes of runtime with rich, vital context that was never told to us. You'll need to do some digging, as posting the link, gets my comment removed. It is truly a captivating, and essential documentary to watch in our modern era. Great video by the way to the creator of this video! I loved the breakdown between the two nations and their military differences.
The only thing not present in the western education, is the history of Eastern Europe. And that's why there are people today who think to themselves "I don't know a sh*t about Eastern Europe, so I'll just check out what the nazi propaganda has to say about it". And so they fall to nazi fairy tales, because that's just the only source known to them.
Great work and please make the next video on Indo Pakistan war
5:00 between death and death we chose death
the failed and late mobilisation also was an important factor... I had read somewhere that Poland announced mobilisation and than cancelled it under pressure from UK and France... That contributed to chaos and and the second call for soldiers was only as late as 30 August... Many soldiers simply didn't get to the units... It was a bit like covid in Italy... They were the first to experience new danger...
Italians were the first to completely ignore an already quite known and dramatic danger and go to a football match en masse.
Italy wasn't the first man. They were just first to notice effect on their seniors. The first mobilisation happened in China.
In fact, Britain and France didn't mean to help Poland in September 1939 anyways. They agreed on not acting in Abbeville on September 12, so before the main battle of the campaign, the Battle of Bzura. Polish troops could have a chance to defend until spring if not the Soviet backstab. Anyways, Poland stood against both Germans and Soviets in 39 for as long as France with the British and Polish (yes) help against only Germans in 1940... Britain just bought some time by sacrificing Poland in an inevitable war.
When everybody need Eastory the most, he came back :P
Thanks for the assist! Helped me with history
So the western allies of Poland managed to make her positions worse while not giving her any help. Hmm, nope, this is not the current state, just a recap from 80 years ago.
Yes, it is.
ONLY a month? France fell in 42 days, defended itself for two weeks longer only, and France had, firstly, a better army, secondly, they were already prepared to attack, and thirdly, they fought only on one front.
@lati long Stalin attacked Poland on September 17, and the last Polish city surrendered on October 2
@lati long Maybe Poland would fall anyway, left to itself, but let's say they would fight until November 7, for example. That would then give the French and the English enough time to attack, and even though the French used the tactics of World War I defensive combat, they could conclude that if they were fighting Poland for so long, maybe they could attack Germany. However, I realize that Poland alone against Germany would have collapsed anyway, because the local authorities based most of their plan on the fact that France would help from the west.
USSR in this case the Italy of the East 😂
We French, alongside with the Britishs should have launched a big offensive at the beginning of september, but we were afraid of the losses i guess.
As Churchill said : you have choosen between war and dishonor, you choose dishonor and you have war...
I have waited for this for so long! Your videos are amazing, keep it up!
This was an unexpected nice surprise. Well done.
Poor Poland.
Possibly more than any other country - they got screwed SOOO bad during WW2.
And I am not Polish - BTW.
That moment when you win WWII and lose your lands anyway
Highest loss of civilian life per total population in the world.
@ᚺᚪᛁᛞᛖᚱ But as Rad Sargeant said - Poland lost the most per population.
USSR lost 1 in 7.
China lost 1 in 13.
Poland lost 1 in 6.
Plus, by 1946, they had lost land and 30% of their population.
All for doing nothing wrong but being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
@@Spacey_key they didn’t win ww2, they were occupied by Germany and then by the soviets
@@McRocket Germany also lost land lol
What program do you use for that beautiful topography I wonder?
Also the Soviet invasion of Poland suprised Britain and France, and was unexpected to the Polish who were only planning for a war on Germany.
Nah we knew the soviets would attack since 1920. It was obvious they would want revenge.
Yeah so "unexpected" when massive number of Soviet divisions are standing on Soviet polish border
What was unexpected was Stalin teaming up with Hitler
Another excellent video, thank you !
I am learning to understand English from your videos. you have good pronunciation😉