De Gaulle and French betrayal of Poland in Semptember 1939

[ljadw]

That the US intervened against Iraq despite no treaty obligation is a non sequitur against "states do not fight for alliances."

If the Soviets had attacked Poland in 1923, France would have helped Poland but wouldn't send an army to Warsaw through Germany for the simple reason the Franco-Polish alliance didn't require it.

If France did not send an army in 1923 to help Poland against a Soviet aggression,France could not have helped Poland .From the beginning on,Poland was on its own :there was no French army in Poland in 1920.
If the Franco-Polish alliance did not require France to send an army to Warsaw, this alliance had no sense at all :it was only hollow blah blah .
And Poland knew it and knew that no one else would solve Poland's problems .
France had no reason to fight for Poland and could not prevent the defeat of Poland . And the opinion of a lot of French was that France was better off without Poland .And the Poles knew it .
And I am still waiting for examples of states who went to war because they signed a piece of paper .

[ljadw]

So basically, your evidence for yor claim that every person in Poland did not believe that Hitler would attack is the fact that she did not ask to become the Polish Soviet Socialist Republic of the USSR and otherwise only partially conformed to what she should have done in your opinion (as you know Poland did hane an Alliance with France, she did ask units of the RAF and the L'Armee de l'Air to be stationed on Poland and part of the army was mobilised). Not exactly convincing is it? I am afraid your opinions are not evidence.

The FACT is that Hitler only attacked after his deal with the Soviets,which means that without this deal he could not attack .
And people in Poland knew this.

[ljadw]

Was there a promise for a major relief offensive ?
And why would an offensive of 11 divisions not be a major relief offensive .

Martin Alexander writes in his book:

As far as Gamelin was concerned, he had been blatantly misleading in sending Kasprzycki away from Paris believing that, if Poland suffered a German attack, it could count on a bold French relief offensive against the Reich's western frontiers within three weeks.

And as source gives:
Les problèmes de l'Armée de terre française: 1935-1939 by Henry Dutailly
Dutailly, a professor at the École supérieure de guerre doesn't seem to be a born yesterday loser.

The important thing wasn't the number of divisions but the word "relief", i.e., practical assistance given to those in difficulty.

Is there any proof that Kasprzycki believed this ?

The Poles based their defence plans on the belief the French would fulfil their assumed in May 1939 obligations.

Alexander and Dutailly have a lot of imagination :Gamelin did not use the words bold (something meaningless ),relief ,offensive .
And relief does not mean practical assistance given to those in difficulty .

[wm]

An entire forest of strawmen.
The point is and was that war on the Soviet Union was discussed, planned, consulted, allies were sought and courted.
It was well known to Stalin so he responded with diplomatic (although through non-diplomatic channels) with love offensive of his own (for this but other reasons too).
It wasn't like some claimed Stalin didn't seek an understanding with Hitler.

And the initial point was:

The idea of blackmailing Hitler with Stalin is even more useless.
Both Hitler and Beck were aware Stalin sought an understanding with Germany in the thirties. And that Stalin didn't need understanding with Poland or Romania for anything.
Additionally, Beck was reliably informed about the possibility of such understanding since 1938 and about the progress of that in 1939.
The talks and the Hitler-Stalin pact were no surprise at all.

[gebhk]

So basically, your evidence for yor claim that every person in Poland did not believe that Hitler would attack is the fact that she did not ask to become the Polish Soviet Socialist Republic of the USSR and otherwise only partially conformed to what she should have done in your opinion (as you know Poland did hane an Alliance with France, she did ask units of the RAF and the L'Armee de l'Air to be stationed on Poland and part of the army was mobilised). Not exactly convincing is it? I am afraid your opinions are not evidence.

The FACT is that Hitler only attacked after his deal with the Soviets,which means that without this deal he could not attack .
And people in Poland knew this.

So more irrelevant speculation, this time based on an event that hadn't yet happened and zero actual evidence.

[ljadw]

Charles de Gaulle wrote in 1938:
Between allies, the only means of forming a true solidarity in time of conflict is to make them interdependent in their entire means of waging war...to make them create an 'entente of the democracies' in the field of arms, not simply between general staff and general staff.
He didn't mean let the buyer beware and the stink of another Aliexpress scam - he demanded true solidarity, a friendship of democracies.

And that comes from the man who said in 1966 : Yankee go home and leave France
The truth is that there is no such thing as solidarity or friendship between states, only between imbeciles .

[ljadw]

Western Europes view of the The Pact
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File ... ast%3F.jpg

Poland Agony
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File ... n_1939.jpg

Western Europes view of The results of the pact ex post facto
https://www.bing.com/images/search?view ... t=0&sim=11

https://www.bing.com/images/search?view ... ajaxserp=0

If Hitler could have attacked Poland without a deal with Stalin, he would have done it without a deal with Stalin .
And the West was the last person to to have the right to blame Stalin for his pact with Hitler, as the West had had the opportunity for a deal with Stalin .

France political/military leadership should not have made bargins they could not keep

Bargains are not made with the intention to keep them .

[wm]

"Bargains are not made with the intention to keep them" is nonsense.

As George F. Kennan wrote in his "The War Problem of the Soviet Union" (1935) post-Great-War diplomacy was friendly.
It meant agreements were kept ("Clausula rebus sic stantibus" was the only valid exception.)
The Soviets introduced adversary diplomacy and later Hitler adopted it.

[gebhk]

If during the war,Standard Oil had helped the war effort of the enemies of the US, its president would not have resigned,but would have been hanged .

And yet it did and he wasn't, so what is the point of speculating against known facts? It is like arguing that, based on our assumptions, it is impossible for a bumble bee to fly.

Before the war,Germany and Japan were not enemies of the US .Thus trade with these countries was perfectly legal.

More alternative history. Even a quick trip to Uncle Google will explain to you that there was an oil embargo against Japan before the war. So no, it was not perfectly or at all legal to sell oil to Japan before the war.

[ljadw]

If during the war,Standard Oil had helped the war effort of the enemies of the US, its president would not have resigned,but would have been hanged .

And yet it did and he wasn't, so what is the point of speculating against known facts? It is like arguing that, based on our assumptions, it is impossible for a bumble bee to fly.

Before the war,Germany and Japan were not enemies of the US .Thus trade with these countries was perfectly legal.

More alternative history. Even a quick trip to Uncle Google will explain to you that there was an oil embargo against Japan before the war. So no, it was not perfectly or at all legal to sell oil to Japan before the war.

NO :if you are not punished by a court of justice,you are innocent .
The oil embargo against Japan started on August 1 1941,thus all oil exports before this date were legal and you have to prove that after August 1 1941 Standard Oil violated the embargo .

[ljadw]

Other point is that not all violations of the oil embargo (which was not a law,but an executive order ) would be illegal .
US oil companies sold in 1941 some 28 million of dollars of oil to Japan, with the consent of the White House,only since 1937 was Japan buying more oil than in 1941 .
We also do not know how absolute the embargo was : did it veto the transport of oil bought and paid by Japan in July ,or before ?

[gebhk]

NO :if you are not punished by a court of justice,you are innocent

Seriously? Now I know you are just winding us up

[ljadw]

O.J. Simpson was acquitted by court ,and only some one stupid would dare to call him a murderer.

[gebhk]

O.J. Simpson was acquitted by court ,and only some one stupid would dare to call him a murderer.

So in your estimable opinion, clearly a very large number of people, such as those asked this very question in a great many opinion polls, are stupid. Presumably that also includes the jury that unanimously found him responsible for the deaths of his victims in the civil suit filed by the father of one of them. As I said, I can only assume you are pulling our collective leg .

[ljadw]

He was acquitted and a civil suit does not make him a criminal .
Polls and decisions of courts are two different things .