I sit in one of the dives
On Fifty-second Street
Uncertain and afraid
As the clever hopes expire
Of a low dishonest decade:
Waves of anger and fear
Circulate over the bright
And darkened lands of the earth,
Obsessing our private lives;
The unmentionable odour of death
Offends the September night.
— W.H. Auden, “September 1, 1939”
Today’s the 65th anniversary of the German invasion of Poland, the formal beginning of WWII. France and Britain declared war on September 3. The Soviets followed the Nazis in on September 17.
Organized Polish resistance ended on October 6, 1939. Some 100,000 Polish soldiers would escape to form the Free Polish Brigade in England, where they would fight in the air during the Battle of Britain and on land after the Normandy invasion.
The Nazis appointed former SA stormtrooper Hans Frank to Gauleiter (Governor General) of Poland. Under his direction over 6,000,000 Poles died, including 3,000,000 Jews.
As Germany was near collapse in 1945, most of the forced laborers in Germany were French. There were no longer enough Poles left alive to feed Germany’s slave labor requirements.
(via Cronaca)