Germans invade Poland - Sep 01, 1939 - HISTORY.com Germans invade Poland Publisher A+E Networks At 4:45 a.m., some 1.5 million German troops invade Poland all along its 1,750-mile border with German-controlled territory. Simultaneously, the German Luftwaffe bombed Polish airfields, and German warships and U-boats attacked Polish naval forces in the Baltic Sea. Nazi leader Adolf Hitler claimed the massive invasion was a defensive action, but Britain and France were not convinced. On September 3, they declared war on Germany, initiating World War II. To Hitler, the conquest of Poland would bring Lebensraum, or “living space,” for the German people. According to his plan, the “racially superior” Germans would colonize the territory and the native Slavs would be enslaved. German expansion had begun in 1938 with the annexation of Austria and then continued with the occupation of the Sudetenland and then all of Czechoslovakia in 1939. Both had been accomplished without igniting hostilities with the major powers, and Hitler hoped that his invasion of Poland would likewise be tolerated.

To neutralize the possibility that the USSR would come to Poland’s aid, Germany signed a nonaggression pact with the Soviet Union on August 23, 1939. In a secret clause of the agreement, the ideological enemies agreed to divide Poland between them. Hitler gave orders for the Poland invasion to begin on August 26, but on August 25 he delayed the attack when he learned that Britain had signed a new treaty with Poland, promising military support should it be attacked. To forestall a British intervention, Hitler turned to propaganda and misinformation, alleging persecution of German-speakers in eastern Poland. Fearing imminent attack, Poland began to call up its troops, but Britain and France persuaded Poland to postpone general mobilization until August 31 in a last ditch effort to dissuade Germany from war. Shortly after noon on August 31, Hitler ordered hostilities against Poland to begin at 4:45 a.m. the next morning. At 8 p.m. on August 31, Nazi S.S. troops wearing Polish uniforms staged a phony invasion of Germany, damaging several minor installations on the German side of the border.

They also left behind a handful of dead concentration camp prisoners in Polish uniforms to serve as further evidence of the supposed Polish invasion, which Nazi propagandists publicized as an unforgivable act of aggression. At 4:45 a.m. on September 1, the invasion began. Nazi diplomats and propagandists scrambled to head off hostilities with the Western powers, but on September 2 Britain and France demanded that Germany withdraw by September 3 or face war. At 11 p.m. on September 3, the British ultimatum expired, and 15 minutes later British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain went on national radio to solemnly announce that Britain was at war with Germany. Australia, New Zealand, and India followed suit shortly thereafter. At 5:00 p.m., France declared war on Germany. In Poland, German forces advanced at a dizzying rate. Employing a military strategy known as the blitzkrieg, or “lightning war,” armored divisions smashed through enemy lines and isolated segments of the enemy, which were encircled and captured by motorized German infantry while the panzer tanks rushed forward to repeat the pattern.

Meanwhile, the sophisticated German air force–the Luftwaffe–destroyed Polish air capability, provided air support for the blitzkrieg, and indiscriminately bombed Polish cities in an effort to further terrorize the enemy. The Polish army was able to mobilize one million men but was hopelessly outmatched in every respect. Rather than take a strong defensive position, troops were rushed to the front to confront the Germans and were systematically captured or annihilated. In a famously ill-fated strategy, Polish commanders even sent horsed cavalry into battle against the heavy German armor. By September 8, German forces had reached the outskirts of Warsaw, having advanced 140 miles in the first week of the invasion. The Polish armed forces hoped to hold out long enough so that an offensive could be mounted against Germany in the west, but on September 17 Soviet forces invaded from the east and all hope was lost. The next day, Poland’s government and military leaders fled the country. On September 28, the Warsaw garrison finally surrendered to a relentless German siege. That day, Germany and the USSR concluded an agreement outlining their zones of occupation. For the fourth time in its history, Poland was partitioned by its more powerful neighbors.

Despite their declaration of war against Germany, Britain and France did little militarily to aid Poland. Britain bombed German warships on September 4, but Chamberlain resisted bombing Germany itself. Though Germans kept only 23 divisions in the west during their campaign in Poland, France did not launch a full-scale attack even though it had mobilized over four times that number. There were modest assaults by France on its border with Germany but these actions ceased with the defeat of Poland. During the subsequent seven months, some observers accused Britain and France of waging a “phony war,” because, with the exception of a few dramatic British-German clashes at sea, no major military action was taken. However, hostilities escalated exponentially in 1940 with Germany’s April invasion of Norway and May invasion of the Low Countries and France. In June 1941, Hitler attacked the USSR, breaking his nonaggression with the Soviet Union, and Germany seized all of Poland. During the German occupation, nearly three million Polish Jews were killed in the Nazi death camps. The Nazis also severely persecuted the Slavic majority, deporting and executing Poles in an attempt to destroy the intelligentsia and Polish culture.

A large Polish resistance movement effectively fought against the occupation with the assistance of the Polish government-in-exile. Many exiled Poles also fought for the Allied cause. The Soviets completed the liberation of Poland in 1945 and established a communist government in the nation. Related Videos World War II Timeline: September 1, 1939-September 6, 1939 - Start of World War II: September 1939-March 1940 | HowStuffWorks World War II Timeline: September 1, 1939-September 6, 1939 World War II officially began on September 1, 1939, when Nazi Germany invaded Poland. Below is a timeline tracing some of the important events of the first week of September, 1939. World War II Timeline: September 1-September 6 September 1: World War II begins as the Germans invade Poland with a three-front Blitzkrieg. They attack the Polish army with an overwhelming force of 1.5 million troops backed by tactical aircraft in the sky and mobile armor on the ground.

Up Next Japan Bombs Pearl Harbor: July 1941-December 1941 September 2: Poland pleads for assistance from sworn allies Britain and France. They respond the following day by demanding Nazi Germany's withdrawal and declaring war against the Nazi regime. India, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand (and soon South Africa) issue their own declarations of war. September 3: Conservative parliamentarian Winston Churchill is named first lord of the admiralty. Britain's Royal Air Force (RAF) carries out the first propaganda air raid of the war, salting northern Germany with six million pamphlets. Without warning, a German U-boat torpedoes the Athenia, a British passenger ship carrying 1,400 civilians from England to Canada, killing 118. September 4: The first RAF air assault is a disaster, with only eight of 29 bombers striking German naval bases. Ten of the RAF bombers get lost, seven are shot down, three attack one of Britain's own ships, and one attacks neutral Denmark. Spain's General Francisco Franco offers his support to the Axis while publicly declaring neutrality. September 5: The Nazis occupy the medieval Polish city of Kraków.

The United States officially declares its neutrality. September 6: RAF Hurricanes and Spitfires that scramble during a false air raid alert end up shooting at each other, with the Spitfires downing the Hurricanes. World War II Headlines Below are more images and headlines from World War II that examine the details of Nazi Germany's aggression in early September, 1939. Junkers Ju-87 (Stukas) vital to success of Blitzkrieg: Close air support was a prerequisite for the success of the Wehrmacht's Blitzkrieg operations. In 1939 and early 1940, the gull-winged, single-engine Junkers Ju-87 (Stuka) -- with three machine guns and a maximum bomb load of 1,540 pounds -- was vital to such operations. The terror sirens of these diving aircraft struck fear into those on the ground below, while their bombs and guns amplified this terror with death and destruction. However, once opposed by more modern fighter aircraft -- such as the British RAF's Spitfires and Hurricanes beginning in 1940 -- the Ju-87s proved vulnerable. They were subsquently utilized only occasionally in support of front-line offensive operations.

German general Fedor von Bock tops in the field: German general Fedor von Bock was a distinguished old-style Prussian officer who commanded the German Anschluss forces in 1938. In 1939 he commanded Army Group North during the Polish campaign and, in 1940, Army Group B during the Blitzkrieg that speedily overran the Low Countries and defeated France. Later, Bock was twice relieved of commands in Russia: first in 1941 following a failed offensive against Moscow, and subsequently in 1942 after disagreements with Adolf Hitler over operational decisions. Having survived both those campaigns and Hitler's displeasure, he was killed in an Allied air raid on May 4, 1945. View Enlarged Image Poland succumbs to German invasion: The event that finally destroyed any residual hopes in London or Paris that appeasement might yet succeed was Adolf Hitler's invasion of Poland. At dawn on September 1, 1939, successive waves of bombers and fighter-bombers raided deep into Poland.

Simultaneously, the tanks, artillery, and infantry of two German army groups, comprised of five separate armies, launched devastating attacks against the sizable but outdated and poorly deployed Polish forces. Warsaw finally fell on September 27, the effectiveness of Nazi Germany's Wehrmacht had been validated, and the Blitzkrieg concept of warfare was born. Continue reading to learn more about the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, which marked the beginning of World War II. To follow more major events of World War II, see: Start of World War II: September 1939-March 1940 | HowStuffWorks Start of World War II: September 1939-March 1940 World War II Image Gallery German infantrymen -- known as panzergrenadiers -- secured Nazi Germany's quick victory over Poland. See more pictures of World War II . Publications International, Ltd. On Sep­tember 1, 1939, just before Adolf Hitler's invasion of Poland that marked t­he beginning of World War II, Zygmunt Klukowski, a young Polish doctor, confided in his diary that everyone was talking about war.

"Everybody," he continued, "is sure that we will win." The reality was startlingly different. Nazi Germany's war with Poland, begun on September 1, was an uneven contest. Five German armies with 1.5 million men, 2,000 tanks, and 1,900 modern aircraft faced fewer than a million Polish troops with less than 500 aircraft and a small number of armored vehicles. In addition, German planning and technical support -- and German understanding of the importance of modern tactical airpower -- gave the aggressor great advantages. Up Next Are there Nazi war criminals still at large? Within five days, German forces occupied all of the frontier zones. By September 7, forward units were only 25 miles from Warsaw, the Polish capital. Polish air forces were eliminated, and the Polish army was split and encircled. By September 17, the war was virtually over. Ten days later, after a devastating air assault, ­Warsaw surrendered. "We were not yet ready," wrote Dr.

Klukowski two weeks later, "to discuss the causes of our defeat...This is a fact, but we just can't believe it." ­This was the war Adolf Hitler had hoped for in 1939. But in addition to the localized conflict with Poland, the German invasion provoked a global conflict. Britain and France declared war on Nazi Germany on September 3 when it became clear that negotiating a German withdrawal was hopeless. In Britain and France, the populations had braced themselves for war in the closing weeks of the summer. There was little popular enthusiasm for war, but a strong wave of anti-German and anti-Fascist sentiment produced a resigned recognition that Adolf Hitler would only stop if he was faced by force. Almost immediately, the British and French empires (except for Ireland) joined the contest, turning it into a worldwide war, fought not only in Europe but across the oceans. German invasion also triggered Soviet Union intervention. The terms of the German-Soviet pact, signed in August 1939, gave Joseph Stalin a sphere of influence in eastern Poland.

On September 17, once it was clear that Poland was close to defeat, Red Army units moved into Poland and met up with victorious German troops along a prearranged frontier. On September 28, the two dictatorships signed another treaty, which divided Poland between them. Abandoned by Western powers and failed by a group of Polish women For the Western powers, this provoked fears of a totalitarian alliance against them. For Poland, dismemberment and harsh totalitarian rule was the reality. Britain and France did nothing to help their smaller ally. Their military staffs had drawn up a "war plan" during the summer of 1939 in which the loss of Poland was accepted as inevitable. The core of the plan was to blockade and contain Nazi Germany until the war of attrition forced the Germans to abandon the contest as they had done in 1918. Britain and France expected a war of at least three years. This explains why for the first six months of the war the Western states did very little. The lull was nicknamed the "Phony War" -- a war with no fighting. A small amount of naval activity did occur, which gave citizens on both sides something to cheer about.

In December 1939, Britain's Royal Navy so damaged the German pocket battleship Graf Spee that it was scuttled in the South Atlantic. Conversely, German submarines began to sink Allied merchant ships. On October 14, 1939, a German submarine managed to penetrate the defenses of the main British naval base at Scapa Flow in the Orkney Islands, and there sank the battleship Royal Oak. The Germans bombed Polish citizens mercilessly, but for a while refrained from bombing cities in the West. The British only dropped leaflets on German cities. The chief beneficiary of the war in Poland was the Soviet Union. Suffering almost no casualties, the Red Army took parts of Poland that had been seized by Russia and Austria back in the 18th century but returned to Poland after World War I. The region was integrated at once into the Soviet system. More than one million Poles, those regarded as a threat to the Communist order, were deported to labor camps in the Soviet Union. The three Baltic States -- Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia -- had been assigned to the Soviet Union sphere by the August and September agreements.

They were compelled by Soviet pressure to accept Soviet military garrisons and political advisers on their soil. In the fall of 1939, the USSR demanded that the Finnish government cede some territory and allow bases on Finnish soil. Joseph Stalin had, in fact, already drawn up plans for a Communist Finland, and he expected the same response as the Baltic States had given. Instead, Finland rejected the Soviet demands, and on November 30 Soviet forces invaded along the entire Finnish frontier. Finland's army of 200,000 mounted a spirited defense. Only after the mobilization of further Soviet forces in February 1940 did Finnish resistance wear down. Finland sought an armistice on March 6, and a week later it conceded all the territory and a base that had been originally demanded. For Adolf Hitler, the Soviet advance in Eastern Europe and the spread of Communist influence were prices he had to pay for securing the German rear while Nazi Germany attacked Britain and France. But it was a dangerous situation. In October 1939, he hinted to his military staff that he would settle with the USSR as soon as he could.

He hoped the West might seek terms, but when it became clear they were serious about war, he planned to attack the French front in November 1939. Poor weather prevented it, and Hitler reluctantly accepted a postponement until spring. Urged forward by the German navy, Hitler decided to seize Norway and Denmark for the naval war against British trade supplies from America. What had begun as a war to extend German power in Eastern Europe had become an open and unpredictable conflict with the intervention of Britain and France. Only in Poland was the war really over. Dr. Klukowski watched in dismay as German troops looted shops and churches and forced Jews to give up their valuables and clean the streets. As he wrote late in 1939, "It is really hard to live in slavery." Follow the events of the first week of World War II in early September 1939, on the next page.

To follow more major events of World War II, see: September 1, 1939 | Modern American Poetry Ernest Hilbert: On "September 1, 1939" The most enduring and popular line from "September 1st, 1939" (the day Hitler's panzers jumped the border into Poland, effectively sparking the Second World War)—"We must love one another or die"—was thought unsuitable by Auden because, strictly speaking, it isn't true. It was perfectly timed, in an historical sense, on the eve of the most destructive war in history, but, as Auden later lamented, not a word of poetry could have prevented the horrors of the Second World War. Of course, great poetry is often at once true and a bit of a reassuring fib. He changed the line to "we must love one another and die" because love cannot avert—even if it may forestall—death (though Dante Alighieri and possibly even Dylan Thomas might dispute that, and John Donne and Christina Rossetti suggest it a bit harsh). He then realized how unlovely the line had become once relieved of its original rhetorical punch, so he eliminated it altogether.

It was only much later, when assembling a selected poems, that he was persuaded by friends to reinstate the line. Morgan Walker: A Hidden Message: Auden’s Personal Protest in Time of War W.H. Auden’s “September 1, 1939” can be interpreted as having two messages regarding society. On the surface, the poem comments on how the dishonesty and manipulation of government can lead to war. The author uses this primary interpretation as a vessel to mask and deliver his underlying critique of homophobia. In order to create duality in interpretation of the poem, Auden uses codified language to conceal the underlying theme of the lack of acceptance of homosexuality in society. The poem creates metaphors, such as a contrast of light and dark and uses implications through historical figures and government to show the offense done to homosexuals. The two interpretations of the poem are able to coexist without impeding or contradicting one another. By setting up a historical scenario and then commenting on societal errors, Auden is able to effectively shift tones without harshly criticizing the audience on social injustices. Wystan Hugh Auden was born in England in 1907 and had two older brothers.

Auden’s family moved around the country for various reasons, typically because of his father’s work. The first extremely significant event in Auden’s life that shows a major connection with his future profession in poetry was when Wystan was eight years old, he was sent to St. Edmund’s boarding school. While attending school he received what would be considered a traditional education given to English boys of upper classes. His level of studies and high education lead to receiving a scholarship to Oxford in which we was going to study in the natural sciences. While at the University, his tutor, Nevill Coghill was extremely sympathetic to Auden’s youthful curiosity and helped to guide Auden into an English literature major (Farnan 34). These events set up the beginning of Auden’s future in poetry. While at Oxford, Auden seemed to have feelings for fellow undergraduate men and these feelings had gone unexpressed. While at college, he tried to develop heterosexual traits through such things as psychoanalysis and celibacy (Bucknell 1). After graduating from college and Auden sought out to expand his education and gain freedom. He found this freedom in Berlin when he lived in the middle-class suburb of Nikolassee.

While in Berlin, Auden began to experiment with his new found freedom through sexual activity (Farnan 36). In Berlin, Auden indulged himself in the relationships that he had been denied in college. He wrote to friends back home about male brothels and men who were available for money in the bars and around the neighborhood (Bucknell 1). Auden’s new life in Berlin began a process of self-examination that allowed him to understand his sexual nature. He later moved back to England, but frequently visited Berlin because he missed the lifestyle. After one of the visits in July 1930, Auden wrote six love poems in German that were inspired by the love affairs that he had in Berlin and the kind of man that he longed for. The poems are very direct and had a tone of melancholy, disillusioned, even cynical love and express such ideas as selfish love, and that it is short and sometimes brutish (Bucknell 1). They were written in such a fashion and in a foreign language because Auden never expected them to be published.

He felt that by writing them in a foreign language, it allowed him to disguise certain aspects in case others tried to read it, which freed him to speak more openly on the difficult theme of love (Bucknell 2). Auden even kept track of many of his feelings and experiences in a journal that he kept in which he stated such things as how his guilt about his homosexuality drove him to search for new lovers (Faran 38). In 1939, Auden made a major move to America in order to alter his lifestyle and explore new horizons. Soon after he arrived, a major event happened in his life. While attending an event organized by the League of American Writers, Auden met a young man named Chester Kallman (Osborne 190). Auden and Kallman started a relationship soon after, and became friends and lovers until his death (Osborne 192). Though in 1935, Auden married a woman named Erika Mann, this was primarily a act of kindness to allow Mann to escape from the Nazi’s in Germany (Osborne 105).

Auden lived most of his life with Kallman and Mann, and continued his relationship with Kallman. Auden’s love for Kallman was extremely strong and it would be unrealistic to think that Auden’s love life would not affect the subject matter of his poetry. The fact that Auden met and fell in love with Kallman in 1939, the same year that he wrote “September 1, 1939,” gives some inkling that the subject matter of the poem could have deep seeded roots in Auden’s personal feelings about love particularly coupled with fact that some of Auden’s previous poems have been suggested as having dual interpretations. In the article “’But Who Would Get It?’: Auden and the Codes of Poetry and Desire,” Richard Bozorth examines a passage from “The Temple,” in which a character Stephen cries out “Destroy this temple.” Bozorth argues that the line would mean very little to readers who are unaware that “the temple” is Spender’s image for the eroticized male body. Bozorth believes that “the line divides readers by way of privileged knowledge” (Bozorth 712).

Bozorth goes on to give another example from the same work in which he argues that the lines are nor only cryptic but encrypted and contain code-names that are most likely only known to inside readership in which only those close to Auden would understand the references. Bozorth believes that the codes that Auden creates quite often “invoke insider knowledge about homosexuality (Bozorth 712). In another one of Auden’s poems, “As I walked out one evening,” the lines “You shall love your crooked neighbour/With your crooked heart” comment on the unfaithfulness of all lovers. However, Bozorth suggests that because “crookedness” is one of Auden’s favorite tropes for homosexuality, it is very likely that Auden is declaring the transience of gay love (Bozorth 712). Auden finds ways to create duality in his work so that he can bring a deep meaning to multiple groups of people. Since Auden has a personal connection with the homosexual community it would make sense that he is creating a second meaning behind his work that speaks to homosexuals. By creating a second meaning to his work, homosexuals are able to connect with his poetry and understand it on a deeper level.

Auden’s poetry attempts to involve the reader and create a “self critical dialogue with the new perspective on himself” (Blair 35). Auden goes about attempting to accomplish this by creating generality in his poems. Auden wants to lead a variety of readers to respond to his poetry in their own way (Blair 36). To lead his audience to a state of self-examination, Auden must avoid abstract language so that his audience does not become confused with his wording. On the other hand, Auden felt that he could not be too narrow with his language because then his audience would be extremely limited (Blair 37). When writing poems, Auden felt he had to balance the ideas of philosophy and history. This idea shows up in his poem “September 1, 1939” in which Auden uses the historical event of war as a platform to state his own personal philosophy. Auden’s style and form both reflect his ideology in writing poetry and creating deeper meanings within them.

His diction ranges from classically poetic to very scientific and obscene and he chooses words that have duality in meaning, either referencing a topic that has nothing to do with the superficial meaning of the poem, or having some historical significance (Blair 126). Auden’s poem “Many Happy Returns,” for example, is a birthday letter to a seven year old boy, and yet its good wishes do not exemplify conventional wishes and hopes for materialistic items or even feelings of happiness (Blair 136). Within this particular poem, Auden uses the conventions of a particular holiday and uses language in the poem to create an altered perception of what one may typically view as the norm. Auden seems to exemplify this in “September 1, 1939” by creating one historical context for the poem on the surface while commenting on the treatment of the homosexual community at the time. Auden felt that only through playing with form and technique within a poem can a reader or writer be tricked into discovering new insight into a poem (Blair 153).

“September 1, 1939” was written within the first year of Auden’s residence in the United States, and superficially expresses Auden’s political opinions about WWII and his skepticism of governmental authority. The poem contains attacks on a consumer society and has representations of large, abstract and anti-spiritual social machines that exemplify the “lie of authority” (Firchow 177). Auden uses historical references and literary devices such as metaphors to help drive his opinion home about his disgust for what he sees as a dishonest government. Concerning the war, Auden believes that the people of the world should be more truthful to one another. This idea plays into the actions of governments at the time. Governments used quite a bit of propaganda during wartime to depict certain groups of people and countries in certain lights. Auden only seeks to suggest that people put more emphasis in honesty and loyalty in one another (Firchow 180). The primary interpretation is very similar to what can be read as a secondary interpretation regarding the intolerance of homosexuality.

Through the poem, specifically the mask of Auden’s opinions about WWII, Auden is able to express his deeper feelings that the world should be more open and honest with one another regarding homosexuality. The world should tolerate all different types of people, who may differ in ethnicity, beliefs or sexual preference. His creation of metaphors and use of historical references are set up in his primary interpretation to give support to his ideas but they also have a deeper seeded meaning that allows Auden to secretly comment the societal treatment of homosexuality. In the poem, Auden creates a metaphor of light and dark, that in the primary interpretation sets up a contrast between the individuals who are honest and hopeful for the future against those who are corrupt and dishonest. The meaning behind the metaphor in terms of the intolerance of homosexuality interpretation is the light represents those who are accepting and embrace homosexual lifestyle and the dark is those who are intolerant and look down on homosexuals.

In lines “Waves of anger and fear/Circulate over the bright/And darkened lands of the earth” Auden is expressing the feelings of “fear” that are being felt, not only about the fear moving about the corrupt places of the world during war, but over the feelings that people felt towards the homosexual community (6-8). At the time, homosexuality was not openly spoken about, and therefore not openly accepted by society. The feelings of fear represent the feelings that people felt towards the notion of homosexuals because being openly gay was somewhat of a new concept that was beginning to surface in society. In line 47, Auden continues his metaphor of light and dark by stating that “The lights must never go out.” This line means similar things in both interpretations of Auden’s poem. He is trying to express the idea that if love is lost, humans are doomed. In the perspective of war, the love is the honesty and respect between humans, while the homosexual interpretation takes the idea that if we do not learn to love and tolerate one another, we are doomed.

The world must be accepting of all types of people, and the “lights [that] must never go out” are those who are tolerable and accepting of other people (47). Auden goes on to describe the dark as “conservative” in line 67. He does this not to just comment on the people who are controlled by a deceiving government, but to show how people and governmental institutions are typically unwavering in their opinions. In this particular case, Auden in suggesting that people are far too conservative in their opinions and should step away from conservative thinking and embrace changing times and new ideas. Auden ends his metaphor with the image of an “affirming flame” which in both interpretations use this image to show the strength that Auden feels for emotions about the subjects in which he’s speaking about. Auden also employs historical references to to support his perspectives. The first major reference is the mention of Martin Luther. Auden’s claim that “scholarship can/Unearth the whole offence/From Luther until now” to parallel the religious ideology that Hitler shared with Martin Luther (12-14). Both men were anti-semites but also both spoke against homosexuality (Zeiss 1).

The inclusion of the reference to Martin Luther adds historical validity to the current events and the prosecution that is currently taking place in the times of war with dishonest governments and the unequal treatment of homosexuals throughout time. Another historical reference that Auden makes is Ninjinsky and Diaghilev. The line speaks of what “Is true of the normal heart;” which in the context of the war, Auden uses this reference to emphasize the idea that people seek isolation and avoid love for one another and confrontation (61). In the context of tolerance for homosexuality, Auden includes this reference because Nijinksky and Diaghilev were homosexuals and the subject Auden uses Nijinsky to speak is love (Kolb 149). The “error bred in the bone/of each woman and each man/Craves what it cannot have” can not only refer to the idea of avoiding confrontation but the “error” can be seen as homosexual nature and the “crav[ing] what it cannot have” would be referring to members of the same sex. The other major reference that Auden makes is the mention of Eros. Essentially Auden states, that like Eros he shows an affirming flame.

The inclusion of Eros is used to evoke feelings of compassion that helps to show humans in a loving light. Eros was the the god of love and sexuality in Greek mythology and by including him in the poem, Auden wants to show the equality in all love around the world. Love is equal ground for all, and people should feel free to love whomever they wish, male or female. Auden has several other instances in which his language is ambiguous and can be interpreted in more than one way scattered through the poem. The scenario in which Auden sets up that the “dense commuters come/Repeating their morning vows,/’I will be true to the wife,/ I’ll concentrate more on my work,’” can be seen as a people who are controlled and manipulated by their government through propaganda, lies and deception (69-72). However, these lines can also reflect the idea that there are homosexual men and women who force themselves into a false life of heterosexuality who remind themselves repeatedly that they are heterosexual through statements such as these. These men and woman would feel forced to live this way because of the lack of acceptance of homosexuals at the time.

Auden also speaks of “undo[ing] the folded lie,/The romantic lie in the brain/Of the sensual man-in-the-street” which refers to speaking out against the deceptive government (79-81). However, the “romantic lie in the brain” could be the idea that some homosexuals have been brainwashed to act heterosexually and adopt a heterosexual lifestyle. Auden saying that “All [he has] is a voice” to speak out against these injustices, sends the message that Auden is using this poem as a platform to speak out against the mistreatment of homosexuals (78). Other references in the poem such as the “international wrong” are applicable in both interpretations as the wrong and injustices that are being done in the world, either the lying by governmental bodies when referring to the war, or the mistreatment of homosexuals(44). Early on in the poem, the reference to “Those to whom evil is done,/Do evil in return” refers to Hitler persecuting the Jews, and the wrong that governmental bodies administer on its people will eventually be reciprocated and the people who were the subject of injustice, will retaliate and even the score.

The idea of retaliation works in both interpretations of the poem, because just like the idea that the people who are treated wrongly by the government will retaliate, the same holds true for the injusticed homosexuals who are abused and not treated as equals. The idea that the poem is commenting on the inequality of homosexuals in society, works along with the primary interpretation of the poem because in both instances Auden is using the poem to speak out against injustices and seek truth and equality either in government or society. Auden’s poem is read primarily as a critique on the dishonesty of government because of the outbreak of war and what was occurring in the world. Since the war is such a significant event, and the poem is written at the brink of the war, it is what the majority of readers is considering when reading this poem. However, Auden’s personal life and the language and references within the poem give evidence to a deeper meaning. Auden loved to play with language and help people self-reflect by reading his work. By creating a poem with two levels of interpretation Auden is able to speak about two different subjects that he feels very strongly about both of which work together to rally for a more honest tolerable world.

Peter Levine: On "September 1, 1939" The poem begins, “I sit in one of the dives / On Fifty-second street. …” That would be a gay bar, probably the Dizzy Club, to which Auden had been introduced by his American lover Chester Kallman. But “I” implies that the writer sits alone. There’s a gay couple in stanza 6, Nijinksy and Diaghilev, who are introduced in contrast to the “normal heart.” Auden is asking whether his own love is “normal”–and also whether human love (in general) is a source of evil or a solution to it. Kallman and a few others would recognize this particular bar, and maybe they knew or could imagine what Auden really did on the evening when Hitler invaded Poland. In that sense, the poem was a private communication. But it was destined for The New Republic and written in an accessible style about events in the world. Thus it was also an effort to communicate to a public of strangers. Even if Auden’s original readers missed the reference to a gay bar, they would know what a “dive” is.

It’s a place for solitary drinking or for secretive, sometimes shameful encounters. In that sense, it is private: a place one goes not to be seen. At the same time, it’s public in that it’s no one’s home and anyone can walk in: in fact, the British might call it a public house (a “pub”). Throughout the poem, Auden wants us to consider the relationship between private and public. A related question is the role of lyric poetry, which can be private, subtle, and confessional, or transparent, impersonal, and political–or both. Auden later repudiated “September 1, 1939,” along with four other political poems, requiring that a note be added whenever they were anthologized: “Mr. W. H. Auden considers these five poems to be trash which he is ashamed to have written.” I think that’s because he later decided that the explicit, hortatory, public slogans of these poems (for instance, “We must love one another or die”) were false to his own experience. But to communicate effectively in the public sphere requires a degree of simplification and even falsification.

The war, Auden observes, “obsess[es] our private lives” and brings “the unmistakable odor of death.” Here the causal arrow points from a vast public act of the German state toward the private lives of men sitting at a Midtown bar. In subsequent stanzas, Auden will reverse the direction, exploring how private desires and sins influence public evils. The whole poem alludes to Yeats’ “Easter, 1916,” in which a major theme is the power of heroic political acts to erase petty human sins and entanglements (“the casual comedy”). Yeats even forgives “A drunken, vainglorious lout” who “had done most bitter wrong / To some who are near my heart,” because that man was a martyr in the Irish uprising. But the events of September, 1939 are vicious rather than heroic, and they mirror–rather than erase–the private sins of the “sensual man-in-the-street.” Auden pictures himself in the dive when the first day of World War II was ending in Europe, which is 6-8 hours ahead of New York.

I mention the time lag because he views that infamous day in global perspective: “Waves of anger and fear/ Circulate over the bright / And darkened lands of the earth.” As he sits at the bar, Poland is literally dark because night has fallen there; it is also figuratively blackened by the Nazis’ assault. The second stanza introduces an explanation for the day’s events, the kind of story that “accurate scholarship” might provide. Martin Luther’s ideas ultimately drove a whole culture mad, until a child growing up in Linz–Adolf Hitler–inherited a fundamental worldview (an “imago,” in Jungian jargon) that turned him into a “psychopathic god.” I do not know what precise intellectual history Auden has in mind. Perhaps he believes that Martin Luther’s antisemitism was the root of modern German antisemitism, or perhaps he is thinking of another aspect of Luther’s thought, such as his deference to “princes.” It doesn’t matter much, because what the poem introduces here is a general style of analysis: grand political events are traced to the high, theoretical concepts of long-dead authors.

It’s a style that Auden himself used in his prose writing and that his friends, like Hannah Arendt, practiced with great sophistication. So maybe we are to imagine Auden brooding over German intellectual history at Dizzy’s on Sept. 1. But the last four lines of the stanza offer a completely different explanation: I and the public know What all schoolchildren learn, Germany invades Poland - Sep 01, 1939 - HISTORY.com Germany invades Poland Publisher A+E Networks On this day in 1939, German forces bombard Poland on land and from the air, as Adolf Hitler seeks to regain lost territory and ultimately rule Poland. World War II had begun. The German invasion of Poland was a primer on how Hitler intended to wage war–what would become the “blitzkrieg” strategy. This was characterized by extensive bombing early on to destroy the enemy’s air capacity, railroads, communication lines, and munitions dumps, followed by a massive land invasion with overwhelming numbers of troops, tanks, and artillery. Once the German forces had plowed their way through, devastating a swath of territory, infantry moved in, picking off any remaining resistance.

Once Hitler had a base of operations within the target country, he immediately began setting up “security” forces to annihilate all enemies of his Nazi ideology, whether racial, religious, or political. Concentration camps for slave laborers and the extermination of civilians went hand in hand with German rule of a conquered nation. For example, within one day of the German invasion of Poland, Hitler was already setting up SS “Death’s Head” regiments to terrorize the populace. The Polish army made several severe strategic miscalculations early on. Although 1 million strong, the Polish forces were severely under-equipped and attempted to take the Germans head-on with horsed cavaliers in a forward concentration, rather than falling back to more natural defensive positions. The outmoded thinking of the Polish commanders coupled with the antiquated state of its military was simply no match for the overwhelming and modern mechanized German forces. And, of course, any hope the Poles might have had of a Soviet counter-response was dashed with the signing of the Ribbentrop-Molotov Nonaggression Pact. Great Britain would respond with bombing raids over Germany three days later. Fact Check We strive for accuracy and fairness.

But if you see something that doesn't look right, contact us ! Get This Day In History every morning in your inbox! When did WW1 and WW2 start? - Quora Quora WW1 started in slow motion throughout the summer of 1914. The cause was the assassination of Austrian royalty, and it took a while for the belligerents to mobilize, as per their alliance obligations. WW2... is complicated. It started in 1931 (Sept 18) when Japan invaded China and occupied Manchuria. in 1935 (Oct 3) when Italy invaded Abyssinia (Ethiopia) and occupied it. in 1937 (July 7) when Japan invaded the rest of China, and occupied it. in 1939 (Sept 1) when Germany and USSR invaded Poland; occupied it. in 1939 (Nov 30) when USSR invaded Finland, but didn't occupy it. in 1941 (Dec 7) when Japan raided US naval base in Hawaii.

From China's point of view, it began either in 1931 when the Japanese took Manchuria and became their colony, or when endless open hostilities commenced in 1937. A few months after the fighting started, the Rape of Nanking happened (during which Americans, British, Germans expats all worked together to save as many innocent people as possible), but it is not covered as part of WWII history in the West, because WWII has not started yet, for them. China actually had a fruitful relationship with Germany for most of the Weimar and Nazi eras, and maintained diplomatic relations with Germany until 1941, when it declared war on them after Pearl Harbour. From most of Europe's point of view, the Poland campaign of 1939 is the most widely accepted start date. And for most of the world, because modern history is Eurocentric. Britain and France declared war on Germany, and chickened out with the USSR... and they didn't start fighting on land until the German Blitzkrieg destroyed France. Oops.

From America's point of view, it sort of began in 1939 as well (US sent lots of military supplies to Britain and France), but it really hit home (pun intended) with Pearl Harbour, and luckily for them, that was as close to home the war ever got. The US was also involved in China, e.g. the Flying Tigers AVG. From the Soviet point of view, the "Great Patriotic War" arguably began when the Germans kicked their ass in Operation Barbarossa (June 22 1941), though some say Stalin was preparing to "liberate" the rest of Europe anyway, and the Germans hastily struck first. The USSR and Japan were bound by mutual non-aggression and did not attack each other: they fought in Mongolia in 1939 and the Soviets invaded Mongolia, Manchuria, Korea, and the Kuril Islands in 1945 when the Germans were defeated and Japan's fall was imminent. And Japan and Russia are technically STILL AT WAR because no treaty was concluded due to the Kuril Islands dispute. Yes, WWII is "technically" still going on. From the Japanese point of view, there was no WWII.

1868-1945 was the birth and death of Modern Japan as an Empire. They modernized, they got shunned by the West, and they decided the only way to get what they want was to fight for it. They got atom bombed and surrendered to the Allies, minus Russia. From the German point of view, there was also no WWII. 1918-1939 was just an intermission. Their country was founded in 1871 and was immediately threatened or given cold shoulder by its neighbours. Like Japan, isolated and determined to make a name for itself, it fought to get what it wanted. As you see, the diplomacy and conflicts that make up the WWII era is quite complicated and contradictory. If you were looking for the (Eurocentric) textbook answer: WWI began on June 28th, 1914 WWII began on Sept 1st, 1939 1.1k Views · View Upvotes · Answer requested by Quora User Written Nov 4, 2015 Its actually very debatable.

Many feel that WWI and WWII are the same war, just with a 20 year break, so the answer to both would be 28 July 1914, when the arceduke of Austria-Hungary Franz Ferdinand was shot. Some say that they are seperate wars, so WWI is still 28 July 1914 while WWII is September 1, 1939, when Poland was invaded. However, some say it started on 3 October 1935 when Italy invaded Abyssinia, or Ethiopia. Some even push it to July 7, 1937 when the Sino-Japanese war started, or even way back to September 18 1931, when Japan invaded Manchuko, or Manchuria. 842 Views · View Upvotes · Answer requested by Quora User

Question: What started on September 1, 1939?
Answer: World War II