The Blitz of Poland

The invasion of Poland began on September 1, 1939. This battle marked the beginning of WWII. The invaders included Germany, the Soviet Union, and a Slovak contingent. The invasion began one week after the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. This treaty was a non-aggression pact in which Germany and the Soviet Union must remain neutral in the event that either nation were attacked by a third party. The treaty also included a secret protocol dividing Northern and Eastern Europe into German and Soviet spheres of influence, anticipating potential "territorial and political rearrangements" of these countries. However, on September 1, the two countries joined forces and attacked Poland from all angles. The Wehrmacht strategy involved using tanks to encompass pockets of the enemy and annihilate them by bringing up massed infantry armies. The invasion began when the Luftwaffeattacked the Polish town of  Wieluń, destroying 75% of the city and killing close to 1,200 people. The German invasion lasted a few weeks. Next The Soviets invaded.Soviet forces attacked Poland on 17 September. It was agreed that the USSR would relinquish its interest in the territories between the new border and Warsaw in exchange for inclusion of Lithuania in the Soviet "zone of interest". By 17 September, the Polish defense was already broken and the only hope was to retreat and reorganize along the Romanian Bridgehead. However, these plans were rendered obsolete nearly overnight, when the over 800,000 strong Soviet Red Army entered and created the Belorussian and Ukrainian fronts after invading the eastern regions of Poland. The Soviet invasion lasted another couple of weeks and eventually came to an end when General Franciszek Kleeberg surrendered after the four-day Battle of Kock near Lublin on October 6th. 

---