Polish President Karol Nawrocki has said that Auschwitz “might not have happened” if the world had reacted sooner to Nazi crimes in occupied Poland, accusing Western Europe of indifference in the early years of World War II.

Glad I kept reading that sentence

I feel like he’s really actually talking about the future more than the past.

Is he saying Poland should care more about ukraine?

That was overall a very minor point in his speech, which is overwhelmingly yet another tirade on how the evil Federal Republic of Germany should pay reparations and the usual nationalist nonsense.

Not to mention Britain and France’s entire reason for being at war was a defensive alliance and in 1939-41, the period Nawrocki is complaining about, they were tragically busy getting their arses kicked across Europe and Africa. It certainly wasn’t for lack of trying that they failed to prevent the Holocaust.

He is right. This is happening in Ukraine now. I blame Obama and EU did next to nothing when Putin invaded Crimea.

There’s a real conversation to be had about Western Europe dragging its feet early on, but this ain’t it. Feels clumsy at best and inflammatory at worst.

Not really indifference, but the idea that someone like Hitler could be placated by just giving them the thing they want, and hoping they won’t ask for more.

Not gonna lie he had me in the first half

Well, hindsight is 20-20 you know.

Eh yeah, almost all of Western Europe was kind of occupied.

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Count the polish population in too, they were the ones snitching on polish jews

Umm… Western Europe declared war on Sep 3rd 1939. Guess who made profits for two years selling arms and supplies to the British and only reacted in 1941?

Does this guy know that Poland actually annexed part of Czechoslovakia together with Germany?

Ehhhh the allied forces at the start of the war dwarfed the German forces. Germany would have been stuck fighting a two front war if the allies had gone on the offensive.

But the planning for France and Great Britain in case of a new war was one of bleeding Germany dry. The had strong arms forces but they were built around holding the line, static fighting. The plan was to force Germany into attrition while at the same time starving it of resources.

On the surface, it made sense, particularly since the French had laid considerable groundwork to do just that.

The allies had more tanks, more planes, more men and more material. Germany shouldn’t have stood a chance, but the French and British wanted to avoid the horrors of the First World War and planned on visiting those horrors on Germany alone by preparing for them well in advance.

The Polish president isn’t wrong. Germany would have been in an even worse position if the allies hadn’t allowed the Sudetenland to happen, and the French were roaring to go, but the British were not looking to go to war and wanted to give peace one more chance. It is important to note that Hitler planned for the Sudentenland crisis to be the start of the war. He was surprised the allies actually allowed him to take over the Sudetenland and even more surprised when the allies didn’t intervene when he invaded the rest of Czechoslovakia.

What the Polish president seems to forget however, is that Poland was an active participant in the non-reaction against Hitler, indeed Poland participated in the dismembering of Czechoslovakia. It had issues with Czechoslovakia that went all the way back to the 1920s and it took the opportunity to annex land that was part of Czechoslovakia for two reasons: Poland wanted a land border with Hungary and it feared Soviet intervention more than German intervention. The Soviets were ready and willing to help Czechoslovakia, Poland refused to allow them transit. Poland was more comfortable with a rump state as it’s neighbour. It was a perspective and course of action from Poland that would worse it’s position the year after when it faced Germany isolated.

There are plenty of errors to go around for the failure to stop Hitler when he was easy to stop (Ruhr Remilitarization, Sudentenland Crisis, Repudiation of the armed forces limitations, and a few more). Some of them are Polish.

The title is a rollercoaster of emotions

He’s not wrong. Wake-up call for USA.

Nawrocki renewed his calls for Germany to pay reparations for the devastation of World War II.

“To this day, the German state has not paid reparations to Poland for the evil of the Second World War. This is not how a world of peace is built,” he said.

Here we go again…..

And of course he continues crying about how the 99% of Germans who were not involved should pay reparations to the 99% of Poles who were not involved again.

Pretty much no historian would argue that Western Europe had plenty of opportunities to stop Hitler and instead appeased him for way too long, due to a distaste for conflict after WW1. Hell, France could have basically single handedly ended it if they defended the Rhineland but they were paralyzed by political infighting.

I mean might as well, why not…

Appeasement was what we call it literally.

Well, can’t change the past, but maybe we can learn from it for the future or the present even.

“MIGHT not”???