THE SEPTEMBER 1939 CAMPAIGN IN POLAND

This is a short superbly illustrated general overview of Poland's military resistance to German and Soviet aggression in September, 1939. The au thors of this study emphasize by the very title the traditional Polish political and historical position that the defeat and occupation of Poland by its two neighbors was only the first of many campaigns of World War II. The Brit ish, also, suffered defeats in Norway, France, and Crete but fought on to a successful conclusion. While the consequences to the Polish Nation of the September defeat, namely the ensuing occupation and partition, were clearly more serious and tragic than the loss of Norway was to the British, all gov ernments (other than the German and the Soviets) accepted that the Polish government and its military recreated in the West was an ally of the western democracies. The development and implementation of Poland's two defensive plans, Plan W (in the event of war with the Soviet Union) and Plan Z (in the event of war with Germany), are very well elaborated by the authors. These and the chapters on the organization of the Polish Armed Forces and on the equipment of the army are the highlights of the book. The authors point out that in spite of the early French influence of Gen eral Paul Henrys (Chief of the French Liaison Mission to Poland in 1919-20) and Colonel Louis Faury (the first director of Poland's War College) their view of a static defensive war did not prevail in the Polish military. The Poles had beaten the Soviets in 1920 by a war of maneuver. It was a war in which actual territory did not matter; the strategic goal being the destruction of enemy forces and the control of crucial railroad junctions. The famous Raid on Kowel demonstrated one of the very first major blitz krieg tactics in miniature. Mobile forces consisting of armored cars and mo torized infantry broke through the Soviet lines and captured the railroad junction of Kowel causing confusion within the Soviet ranks and capturing significant war material. (Adam Zamoyski, The Battle for the Marchlands, New York, East European Monographs, 1981, p. 179. and Norman Davis, White Eagle, Red Star, The Polish-Soviet War 1919-1920, London, MacDonald & Company, 1972, p. 269). The Polish victory in 1920, ac knowledged by many historians as being of world significance, predeter 427