What is a strange war?

1939, 1 In September, fascist Germany brazenly dispatched 58 divisions, 2,500 tanks and more than 2,000 planes to attack Poland. On September 3, Britain and France declared war on Germany one after another, and the Second World War broke out in an all-round way. However, what followed was a strange war situation: apart from fierce fighting at sea, the two sides held their respective positions on the Franco-German border and sat quietly for more than eight months.

/kloc-on the morning of September 9, 2000, the Polish government officially informed the British government of the German invasion through its ambassador in London, and provided immediate assistance according to the requirements of the treaty. In the afternoon, Poland made an urgent request to Britain and France, hoping to send planes to bomb the German air base and the western industrial zone, so as to slightly disperse the offensive power of the German air force. However, for several days, the Polish ambassador failed to meet British Prime Minister Chamberlain.

On September 3rd, although Britain and France declared war on Germany and fulfilled their commitments to Poland politically, they did not respond to Poland's request for assistance according to the treaty in time, nor did they give a clear answer.

After arriving in London, the Polish military delegation waited idly until September 9 before being received by the British Staff Headquarters. Polish military representatives asked the British Air Force to start operations and immediately supply ammunition urgently needed by the Polish army. None of these requirements have been met.

France's guarantee to Poland is more specific than Britain's. 1939 On 9 May, French Chief of Staff Gamelin and Polish Army Minister signed a protocol of military action, stipulating that once Poland was attacked by the Germans, the French Air Force should act immediately to ensure that 60 planes were dispatched to bomb German targets, with a radius of 1500 km. Three days after the mobilization order was announced, the army began to act and launched an attack on limited targets. From the beginning of the general mobilization, during the negotiation, Colonel Jacklin, Polish Deputy Chief of Staff, asked how many troops the French could send to take part in the attack. Gamelin told him that France could send about 35~38 divisions by then. It can be said that it is a vow.

But in fact, neither Britain nor France provided any assistance to Poland, nor did they dare to go further than declaring war on Germany. At that time, most of the main German troops went to Poland. There are only 23 divisions defending siegfried line in the Western Front, while Britain and France have 1 10 divisions, which is overwhelming. However, the millions of British and French troops sat quietly in the fortifications of maginot line, watching their allies being wiped out by the enemy. France even asked the British Air Force not to bomb Germany, lest France retaliate. On both sides of Germany's western border, the armies of both sides walked up and down without cover within the range of the other side, fighting in their own way. The Germans unloaded their guns and trench on the railway, and the French left them alone. They count the German trains crossing the right bank of the Rhine every day, and these military vehicles are only 500 meters away from them. As long as the Germans put up the placard "We won't shoot", they can work without cover. It was not until more than three months after the declaration of war on February 9, 65438 that the British army suffered its first casualties-a squad leader on patrol was killed by stray bullets. For more than half a year, "everything on the western front is calm." People call this strange phenomenon "strange war".

This strange war was the result of the long-term appeasement policy of Britain and France. Chamberlain's assurance to Poland was a bluff, without serious military preparation. As early as the spring of 1939, the British and French General Staff reached an agreement to aid Poland, arguing that "the fate of Poland will depend on the final outcome of the war, not on whether we can reduce the pressure on Poland from the beginning". With the invasion of Germany, this bluff guarantee was exposed and the appeasement policy went bankrupt completely. Although Britain and France were forced to declare war, apart from the sea blockade, there was neither an emergency plan to aid Poland nor domestic preparations. Chamberlain never paid much attention to armaments from being Chancellor of the Exchequer to Prime Minister. At that time, the German military budget reached 654,380 billion pounds every year. Britain only spends 20 million pounds a year. 1939, the war disaster is imminent, but because the first round of war will be France against Germany, the war preparation work in Britain is slow and inefficient; The draft bill was passed in April, and by the time the war broke out, there was no trace of British troops on the European continent. The newly formed four divisions did not arrive in France until June 10, when the Polish war was over.

After the fall of Poland, Britain and France rejected Hitler's peace proposal and adopted a series of measures in military diplomacy to prepare and contain the war in order to isolate and attack Germany, but they did not completely give up the appeasement policy. Especially after the Sufen War broke out, Chamberlain and Daladier used public opinion's sympathy for Finland and hatred for the Soviet Union in an attempt to revive the appeasement policy, launched a large-scale smear campaign against the Soviet Union, and tried their best to mobilize the British and French people and world public opinion to launch an anti-Soviet war, so as to open up a new battlefield and distract Germany's attention in the western front. After the Soviet-Finnish War, the appeasement dream of Britain and France was completely shattered, and the Daladier government fell. In the face of Germany's coming attack, Britain and France had to make up their minds to fight. At the British-French Supreme Military Conference held in London on March 28th, Chamberlain proposed that the "Royal Navy" operational plan must be implemented immediately, and mines should be laid in Norwegian waters to cut off the supply of iron ore to Germany. Unfortunately, it's too late. For example, the plan for laying mines in Norwegian territorial waters was put forward as early as1September 29, 939, and the British cabinet unanimously agreed. Later, due to the influence of the Finnish war, the original proposal was withdrawn. When Chamberlain made up his mind, Hitler was already in the lead. This strange war ended when Germany attacked Norway. The fake war played by Britain and France finally dragged itself into the real war and had to pay a heavy price for it.