The beginning of World War 2

maven.mapping:

At dawn on September 1, 1939, the world changed forever. The stillness of the morning was shattered by bombs falling on the Polish town of Wieluń and by the thunder of the German battleship Schleswig-Holstein opening fire on Westerplatte.

Within hours, German troops were crossing the border, unleashing the new and terrifying tactic of blitzkrieg — tanks, aircraft, and infantry moving in ruthless coordination. The attack was preceded by the sham of the Gleiwitz incident, staged to create a false pretext for war. Poland resisted with determination — in the defense of Westerplatte, in the streets of Poznań, Kraków, and Bydgoszcz — but the scale and speed of the assault left little doubt about the imbalance of forces.

Two days later, Britain and France declared war on Germany, yet their response came too late to alter Poland’s fate. Today, on the anniversary of that morning, we remember not only the outbreak of the deadliest conflict in human history, but also the bitter lesson it left behind: peace cannot survive when aggression is ignored.

Collection: world-war-2 - Tags: world-war-2, europe - Source: instagram.com