First to Fight

by Roger Moorhouse

  Both sides would have declared themselves well satisfied with proceedings. Hitler had his carte blanche over Poland, and was free to turn his armies eastward, safe in the knowledge that the Red Army would not intervene against them. Less immediately important to him, but no less significant, was the trade agreement, which promised Germany access to the Soviet Union’s vast resources of raw materials – a huge boon if, in the event of war, the British were to impose their time-worn strategy of blockading Germany. However, it was Hitler’s firm belief that the British and the French would back down. His opponents were ‘worms’, he said, predicting that the invasion of Poland ‘would never, never, never’ provoke a wider war.47

  Stalin, too, would have been delighted. Within the space of a few short weeks, he had secured a non-aggression pact with his primary ideological opponent, and signed off on a trade agreement that would potentially spur on the next phase of Soviet industrialisation. In addition, while the continent of Europe was still mired in crisis, the Soviet Union could remain nominally aloof. More than that, in the event of an outbreak of war, it would not only secure the return of almost all the lands lost by the Russian Empire at the end of the First World War, but would also in all likelihood see its enemies fighting against one another. Little wonder, perhaps, that as the signatories gathered in the Kremlin for the commemorative photograph, beneath Lenin’s stern gaze, Stalin was beaming widely.

  News of the Nazi–Soviet Pact broke upon the outside world, in Churchill’s words, ‘like an explosion’. Certainly no one in Britain had expected the move; that very week, a Foreign Office briefing had declared such an arrangement ‘unlikely’.48 For many in and around Whitehall, the pact appeared to presage something like an apocalypse: MP ‘Chips’ Channon wrote in his diary that ‘the Nazis and the Bolsheviks have combined to destroy civilisation, and the outlook for the world looks ghastly’.49 Beyond Westminster, the prognosis was slightly rosier, with some even contriving to excuse Soviet actions as defensive and precautionary, but the consensus was that it appeared to make war inevitable. In the circumstances, it fell to The Times to sum up the mood. In an editorial the newspaper conceded that full details of the pact were yet to emerge, but it expressed the doubt that it would ‘make any material difference’. Britain’s position was clear, it went on, its obligations to Poland were unaffected.50

  In Poland, news of the Nazi–Soviet Pact was received with a combination of resignation and numb horror. Here, few were under any illusion about what the pact implied; Poland’s recent history of occupation and partition was too raw and too fresh for that. One Warsaw diarist noted glumly that ‘nothing good’ would come of Hitler’s negotiation with the Soviets, adding that when the Germans and Soviets found a common language, ‘what could that language be if not the partition of our country?’51 The head of the British military mission to Poland, the redoubtable Colonel Sir Adrian Carton de Wiart, found himself urgently recalled to Warsaw from his country estate at Prostyń in the far east of the country, where he was shooting snipe. Briefed on his arrival by the British ambassador the next morning, he realised that ‘war was not a question of weeks but of days’.52 Visiting the Polish commander-in-chief, Edward Śmigły-Rydz, the following day, he was dismayed to learn that the Polish defensive plan envisaged engaging the Germans as soon as they crossed the frontier, in terrain admirably suited to the use of tanks. If Śmigły-Rydz had been a favourite of Piłsudski, Carton de Wiart noted in his memoir, it must have been ‘for his loyalty and integrity, for I cannot think it was for his capabilities’.53

  Meanwhile, the Polish Foreign Office was looking for solid commitments from the country’s allies. The foreign minister, Colonel Józef Beck, wrote to his ambassadors in London and Paris to declare that the announcement of the pact had merely demonstrated that the Soviets had ‘for a long time been playing a double game’. The only possible response, he wrote, was ‘to reiterate the firm position of England, France and Poland’, and to that end, he urged his ambassadors to seek consultations with the British and French governments.54

  Two days after that, on the afternoon of 25 August, Hitler summoned the British ambassador, Nevile Henderson, to a meeting in the Reich Chancellery in Berlin. Concerned at the news from London that his signature of a non-aggression pact with Stalin had left the Anglo-Polish guarantee unaffected, he sought to make a similarly ‘decisive step’ in his relations with Britain. Consequently, in a long lecture to the ambassador, he declared that the ‘Macedonian conditions’ on Germany’s eastern frontier had to be rectified. The problem of the Corridor and of Danzig had to be solved, and he intended to solve it, by force if necessary.55 In return for British acquiescence in that policy, Hitler made a startling offer. He had always wanted an ‘Anglo-German understanding’, he told Henderson, and in order to achieve it he was willing ‘to pledge himself personally’ for the continued existence of the British Empire, and ‘to place the power of the German Reich at its disposal’. A positive response from London, he said, would be ‘a blessing for Germany, and also for the British Empire’ – but he warned that this would be his ‘last offer’.56 Though Henderson raised the objection that his government would consider the offer only as part of a wider, peaceful settlement of the Polish crisis, Hitler was adamant and suggested that the ambassador fly back to London forthwith to present it to the British government.57 Ribbentrop even put a shoulder to the wheel, by telephoning Henderson on his return to his office to inform him of yet another confected Polish ‘atrocity’.58

  Hitler’s sense of urgency was down to his timetable. Facing Poland he had some 1.5 million men poised to strike, divided into two army groups. Army Group North, with around 650,000 men, consisted of the 4th Army facing east across the Polish Corridor, and the 3rd Army which would move southward from East Prussia. Army Group South contained the 8th, 10th and 14th armies, the last bolstered by the addition of some 50,000 Slovak troops – in all nearly 900,000 men, who would strike north-eastward and eastward from their starting positions in Silesia and Slovakia.59

  Hitler had given the order to prepare the invasion of Poland two days previously, with operations to start at dawn the following morning, 26 August. If he were to stick to that schedule he would have to give the final order not much later than three o’clock that very afternoon, otherwise German troops would have to stand down, and a new timetable for action would need to be prepared. Hitler was hoping that his offer to the British would suffice at least to keep London confused and uncommitted, while Poland could be destroyed. Determined not to delay his plans, he summoned the chief of the German High Command, General Wilhelm Keitel, and shortly after 3.00 p.m., gave the instruction for the invasion of Poland to begin.60 With that, orders were transmitted down the chain of command to the countless German units in the field, poised close to the Polish frontier and awaiting final instructions. German consulates in Poland were directed, with immediate effect, to send all German citizens to Germany or to neutral countries.61 The invasion of Poland – ‘Fall Weiss’, or ‘Case White’ in German code – was scheduled to begin at 4.30 the following morning.

  While those orders were being transmitted, that afternoon, the Polish ambassador in London, Count Edward Raczyński, met with the British foreign secretary, Viscount Halifax, in the Foreign Office on Whitehall. Unlike Hitler’s attempt to browbeat Henderson a few hours earlier, their discussion was short, cordial and entirely lacking in histrionics. Before them was the draft of an ‘Agreement of Mutual Assistance’, drawn up over the previous two days, which was intended to cement the existing Anglo-Polish collaboration and restate Britain’s resolve to stand by Poland in the event of German aggression. It was only a short document – some eight articles of around 500 words – but it contained the significant commitment that if either signatory were to ‘become engaged in hostilities with a European power in consequence of aggression by the latter’, the other party would lend ‘all the support and assistance’ possible.62 After reading the text through, Halifax and Raczyński added the
ir signatures to the foot of the page. The ‘war of nerves’, Raczyński would later recall, appeared to be drawing to an end.63

  Hitler might have disagreed. Having given his order that afternoon, he was pacing his Reich Chancellery office ‘even more agitated’, according to Keitel, than he had been earlier in the day. The reason for his nervous excitement was twofold. First, word had reached him late that afternoon that the Anglo-Polish Agreement had been signed, confirming that the British, far from being bullied and bribed, were determined to stand by their Polish ally. Second, receiving the Italian ambassador, Bernardo Attolico, Hitler learned that Mussolini would not be joining his adventure, as Italy was unready for war.64 Momentarily crushed by what he saw as a gross betrayal, Hitler cut a sorry figure, staring blankly into the distance. Pulling himself together, he summoned Keitel again and demanded that ‘Case White’ be called off, so that he might once again attempt to isolate Poland from its allies. After a lengthy discussion, Hitler issued recall orders at 7.30 that evening. As Keitel recalled: ‘D-Day was postponed.’65

  *

  At nine o’clock that night, 25 August, Lieutenant Dr Hans-Albrecht Herzner called his men together for a final briefing in the barracks at Čadca, on the Slovak side of the Polish border. Herzner was a tall, thin-lipped, 32-year-old reservist seconded to the Abwehr, who had arrived earlier that evening from Breslau, under false papers. He had orders to lead a clandestine operation across the frontier, which would commence Germany’s war against Poland.

  After a brief roll call, Herzner supervised the final preparations. His group consisted of twenty-four men: ethnic Germans from the region, who were dressed in civilian clothes, with just a swastika armband to show their allegiance. Only Herzner and his driver were wearing Wehrmacht uniform. Each man was given a machine gun, four magazines and a pistol.66 The group was then split into two assault parties and loaded onto trucks for the short drive north-west. Disembarking at the hamlet of Dejovka, they continued on foot and, after waiting for reinforcements that failed to arrive, crossed the Polish frontier at half past midnight. Acutely aware of the historical significance of the moment, Herzner paused in the darkness to scribble a spidery note on a Wehrmacht message pad:

  Generalkommando VIII. AK. Ic AO II, Breslau.

  Crossing Polish border with KOJ at 00.30 hours near point 627 north-north-west of Čadca.

  [signed] Herzner67

  Herzner’s ‘KOJ’, or ‘Combat Group Jablunka’, was one of a number of units established by the Abwehr, just before the outbreak of war, for the purposes of infiltration and sabotage. As has been shown, other such groups had been tasked with capturing or destroying strategically vital bridges, securing power plants, or sowing confusion.68 Herzner’s task was simple, but no less crucial. He was to cross the frontier in advance of the German invasion, so that he could capture the railway station at Mosty – 5 kilometres inside Polish territory – and hold it until the arrival of German forces, expected a few hours later. The strategic significance of Mosty was that it was the closest station to the rail tunnel beneath the JablonkÓw Pass, the shortest route between Warsaw and Vienna. If the German invasion in this sector were to be successful, it was vital that the tunnel be captured intact – and it was the Abwehr’s belief that the Poles’ sabotage charges in the tunnel were controlled from the station building at Mosty.

  At 2.45 that morning, Herzner’s group arrived on the hillside overlooking their target. They had not had an easy journey. While skirting Polish sentries on the frontier and around the tunnel, the second unit had become lost in the forest, so the KOJ was now down to a mere dozen men. After waiting in vain for support, Herzner decided that the approaching dawn forced his hand. Shortly before sunrise, his men surrounded the station building, disarmed the station staff and secured the area. Their mission, it seemed, had been accomplished. It was 4 a.m. on 26 August 1939. The German invasion was expected to commence within the hour.69

  Herzner faced two problems, however. The first was that his lockdown of the station building at Mosty was not as complete as he might have hoped: one of the staff had managed to alert the local Polish garrison using a telephone in the basement of the station. More seriously for Herzner, however, was that the German invasion that he was spearheading was not going to materialise.

  Hitler’s recall order had reached front-line units between nine and ten o’clock the night before. In the circumstances, with many units already preparing their forward positions, the success of the order was remarkable. Even diversionary and sabotage units were recalled: in one case a group was already 200 metres inside Polish territory when a breathless messenger, in German uniform, caught up with them.70 Not everyone could be reached in time, however. Herzner and his men had set out before the halt order had arrived, and – as ordered – were maintaining radio silence. Even regimental messengers sent to bring them back had been unable to locate them in the darkness.71 Though he didn’t yet know it, Herzner and his twelve men had invaded Poland single-handedly. They were on their own.

  While Herzner was waiting in vain for the German advance, he soon faced more immediate problems. At dawn, the Polish guard detail from the north end of the tunnel attacked the station building. After fighting them off, and with no relief in sight, Herzner attempted to make telephone contact with his superiors, but couldn’t negotiate his way past the Polish operator.72 Desperate for information, at around 5 a.m. he sent one of his men to commandeer a locomotive, waiting nearby under steam, and take it south, through the tunnel, to deliver a message to division headquarters at Čadca.73 Soon after, Herzner received a telephone call from his superiors tersely instructing him to ‘release his prisoners, vacate the station building and return by the quickest route’. Leading his men back, pursued by the tunnel guards and Polish police units, he crossed the Slovak border at 1.30 pm. His ‘invasion’ of Poland had lasted precisely 13 hours.74

  The day after the debacle at the JablonkÓw Pass – as Herzner caught his breath, and Polish generals angrily demanded of their German counterparts whether the result was ‘peace or war’75 – Hitler attempted to carry on as usual. He wrote to Mussolini, expressing his regret over the Duce’s decision not to join his adventure and asking that his ally at least support him in an ‘active propaganda campaign’.76

  The Poles, for their part, continued the secret, partial mobilisation which had been in progress since mid-August. By the last week of that month, the process had been stepped up. As well as individual divisions and brigades, all state police, air force and air defence units were recalled, the eastern districts of Lwów and Przemyśl were mobilised, and reservists were evacuated from Poznań and Pomerania to the east of the Vistula. In all, around three-quarters of Poland’s combat forces were mobilised – the most that could be achieved while keeping the matter under wraps.77 Jan Karski, then a lieutenant in the artillery, recalled the chaos at Warsaw’s main station, where he realised that the mobilisation had been ‘secret’ only in the sense that there had been no public announcements. Nevertheless, he noted, the mood was still bullish. Discussing the ongoing crisis that night, his major told him: ‘England and France are not needed this time. We can finish this on our own.’78

  While the Poles secretly mobilised and Hitler chided his would-be ally, the British and the French continued their vain efforts at negotiation. Henderson returned to Berlin to inform Hitler of the final rejection of his offer, but expressed the British government’s desire for a lasting understanding with Germany, once an amicable settlement with Poland had been reached.79 Meanwhile, the French prime minister, Édouard Daladier, wrote to Hitler to ask that he rejoin efforts to find a peaceful solution to the crisis, and reminded him that a return to war in Europe would mean a victory only for destruction and barbarism.80 Hitler, however, was unmoved. He had made up his mind, and any delay that he permitted was merely a ruse to wrong-foot his opponents. As General Walter Warlimont discovered on arriving at the Reich Chancellery that afternoon, any feeling of relief that war had been av
erted was wholly misplaced. As Hitler’s Wehrmacht adjutant, Colonel Rudolf Schmundt, told him: ‘Don’t start celebrating too soon – it’s only a question of a few days’ postponement!’81

  Tiring of the charade of negotiation, the Poles finally ordered a general mobilisation on 29 August – only to be browbeaten by the British and French into cancelling the order, wary as they were of taking any steps that Berlin might choose to interpret as ‘provocative’.82 The result was more chaos at the railheads, as travel orders were issued and countermanded, and troops were left stranded. The Polish army would field around a million men across thirty-seven infantry divisions, eleven cavalry brigades, a dozen National Guard battalions, and three divisions of frontier troops, the KOP. Although some of those units were complete, many were lacking cadres and equipment, and had now been prevented from reaching their positions. Of the thirty-four cavalry squadrons earmarked for the Poznań Army, for instance, only nineteen were already in situ; and of the fifty-four infantry battalions assigned to the Łódź Army, only thirty-four were in position. The Kraków Army had barely half of its allocation of heavy artillery.83 Allied attempts at mediation had done little except hamstring Poland’s defence.

  Finally, the tension was broken by its instigator. At 12.40 p.m. on 31 August, Hitler again gave the order for ‘Case White’ to begin at dawn the following day. ‘Since the situation on Germany’s eastern frontier has become intolerable and all political possibilities of peaceful settlement have been exhausted,’ he wrote, ‘I have decided upon a solution by force.’84 Though Hitler was hoping, indeed expecting, that the British and the French would waver in their commitment to Poland, he can have been under few illusions about the willingness of the Polish government and people to fight. Hitler prided himself on being an avid reader of history, and a glance at Poland’s long tradition of opposition to foreign occupation would surely have convinced him of that. He also had the correspondence of his ambassador in Warsaw, Hans-Adolf von Moltke, to remind him of Polish resolve. In one report, from early August 1939, Moltke had sought to counter the German assumption that Polish morale was fragile and that their will to resist was declining: ‘The old hatred of everything German and the conviction that it is Poland’s destiny to cross swords with Germany’, he wrote, ‘was too deep for passions to abate easily.’ Moreover, he added, the weeks of crisis ‘have so far failed to make any decisive breach in Polish morale and material powers of resistance’. He concluded that a ‘decisive collapse … cannot be expected’.85 One way or another, it seemed, Hitler would have his war.