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The city of Poznań, then known as Posen, had been part of Prussia since 1815 and later Germany, before being given to Poland with the Treaty of Versailles in 1920. Following the invasion of Poland in 1939, the city lay in the west part of Poland which was annexed by Nazi Germany, with the city being the local capital of Reichsgau Wartheland.
The Free City of Danzig (now the Polish cities of Gdańsk, Sopot and the surrounding areas), situated to the east of the corridor, was a semi-independent German speaking city-state forming part of neither Germany nor Poland, though united with the latter through an imposed union covering customs, mail, foreign policy, railways as well as defence.
The borders of Poland resembled the borders of the German-Russian gains in World War 2, with the exception of the city of Bialystok. This is called the Curzon line. The small area of Trans-Olza, which had been annexed by Poland in late 1938, was returned to Czechoslovakia on Stalin's orders.
Pre-war Poland was portrayed as a capitalist state based on exploitation of the working people and ethnic minorities. Soviet propaganda claimed that unfair treatment of non-Poles by the Second Polish Republic was a justification of its dismemberment. Soviet officials openly incited mobs to perform killings and robberies. [171]
The independence of Poland had been successfully promoted to the Allies in Paris by Roman Dmowski and Ignacy Paderewski.U.S. President Woodrow Wilson made the independence of Poland a war goal in his Fourteen Points, and this goal was endorsed by the Allies in spring 1918.
The history of Poland from 1945 to 1989 spans the period of Marxist–Leninist regime in Poland after the end of World War II.These years, while featuring general industrialization, urbanization and many improvements in the standard of living, were marred by early Stalinist repressions, social unrest, political strife and severe economic difficulties.
On 14 September, with Poland's collapse at hand, the first statements on a conflict with Poland appeared in the Soviet press. [79] The undeclared war between the Soviet Union and the Empire of Japan at the Battles of Khalkhin Gol had ended with the Molotov–Tojo agreement, signed on 15 September as a ceasefire took effect on 16 September.
[9] [10] The remainder of the Polish territory was either annexed by the Soviet Union (201,000 km 2 [2] or 51.6% [2] of pre-war Poland as per the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact) or made into the German-controlled General Government occupation zone (95,500 km 2 [2] or 24.5% [2] of pre-war Poland). A tiny portion of pre-war Poland (700 km 2 [2]) was ...