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22 Sep, 6 tweets, 5 min read
On this Day - German and Soviet units convened for a joint parade in the Polish city of #Brest. Here, the two commanders - General Heinz Guderian and Brigadier-General Semyon Krivoshein - share a joke on the reviewing stand. #Poland1939 #NaziSoviet
Here a Soviet T-26 tank passes a waiting Wehrmacht motorcycle reconnaissance unit. Friendly cooperation between the two allies. #NaziSoviet
Wehrmacht and Red Army troops mingled to watch the parade. #Brest #Poland1939
Conversation was sometimes stilted, but common ground could be found in the universal language of cigarettes. #NaziSoviet #Poland1939
Guderian and Krivoshein conversed in French. Guderian would boast about German hardware; Krivoshein would reply "We have better". #Poland1939
Krivoshein later claimed to have taken part in the parade only reluctantly.
Interviewed by German journalists on the day, however, he raised a toast to #Hitler and #Stalin and invited the journalists to visit him "after the victory over capitalist England". #NaziSoviet

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More from @Roger_Moorhouse

Roger Moorhouse Profile picture
18 Sep
On this Day - 1939 - #Wehrmacht forces massacred some 358 Polish civilians and POWs at Śladów, west of Warsaw. (no photo available) It was one of the worst such massacres during the German invasion of Poland. #Poland1939 Image
Prisoners and civilians were rounded up following an engagement with Polish forces and forced to bury the dead. They were told that they would be released afterwards.
Instead, they were led to the banks of the Vistula and machine-gunned into the river. #Poland1939
This extract from my book “First to Fight” gives an eye-witness account of the lead up to the massacre. #Poland1939 Image
Read 5 tweets
Roger Moorhouse Profile picture
13 Sep
On this Day - 1939 - one of the most iconic photographs of #WW2 was taken in #Warsaw. It was taken by American photojournalist Julien Bryan, and it shows a 10-year-old girl, Kazimiera Mika, bending over the body of her sister, who had just been killed in a German air raid.
The sisters had been with a group of other woman, digging for potatoes near Powązki cemetery, when they were targeted in a strafing attack by Luftwaffe aircraft. Two of them were killed. Bryan arrived soon after and took out his camera. #Poland1939
According to Bryan, Mika cried: "What has happened?! What have they done to you?!" begging her sister to come to. "Please talk to me. Please..."
Bryan comforted her as best he could but, he wrote, "What could we, or anyone else, say to this child?" #Poland1939
Read 4 tweets
Roger Moorhouse Profile picture
12 Sep
On this Day - 1939 - the British and French prime ministers and chiefs of staff met in the “Supreme War Council” at Abbéville. They discussed the progress of the ongoing German campaign in Poland and assistance for their ally. #Poland1939
French prime minister Daladier said that the German advance was proceeding “as expected”, and stressed that he had “no intention” of throwing French forces against the German western front.

This, in spite of a previous commitment to do just that.
British prime minister Chamberlain described the French decision as “wise”, and stated that “nothing the Allies could do would save Poland”. Both Britain and France committed themselves instead to building up their own defences. #Poland1939
Read 6 tweets
Roger Moorhouse Profile picture
12 Sep
On this Day - 1939 - Hitler’s filmmaker Leno Riefenstahl witnessed a German massacre of Polish Jews at Końskie, south of Warsaw. #Poland1939
She was there to interview the German commander, General Reichenau, for a propaganda broadcast, but instead was caught up in a “reprisal action” against local Jews. #Końskie
After the death of a couple of German officers in a Polish Army ambush, the Jews of the nearby town, Końskie, were rounded up for punishment: forced to dig the soldiers’ graves with their bare hands, while being abused by German soldiers. #Poland1939
Read 6 tweets
Roger Moorhouse Profile picture
10 Sep
On this Day, 1939 - Polish defence at #Wizna, on the eastern Narew, came to an end with the surrender of the remaining bunkers overlooking the river valley. #Poland1939
After Polish sappers had destroyed the nearby bridge, the bunkers at #Wizna dominated the wide channel of the Narew, a river that the German 3rd Army needed to cross if it were to continue its advance southward. The Germans waited on a pontoon, but none was available.
Facing the German 3rd Army were some 700 Poles under the command of 31-year old Captain Władysław Raginis. He had galvanised his men in their task by swearing an oath, with his deputy, that they would not give up their positions alive. #Wizna #Poland1939 Image
Read 9 tweets
Roger Moorhouse Profile picture
12 Nov 20
#OTD 1940, Stalin's foreign minister Vyacheslav #Molotov arrived in #Berlin for talks with Hitler on the second phase of the German-Soviet strategic relationship.
Staying at the Schloss Bellevue (now home to the German President), Molotov had two days of talks with Hitler and other senior Nazis.
The talks were strained, however. Molotov wanted German agreement to Soviet control of the Bosphorus, and of Bulgaria. Hitler, unwilling to agree to any further westward expansion of Soviet power, wanted the USSR to aid him in the destruction of the British Empire.
Read 6 tweets

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