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During the later stages of World War II and the post-war period, Germans and Volksdeutsche fled and were expelled from various Eastern and Central European countries, including Czechoslovakia, and from the former German provinces of Lower and Upper Silesia, East Prussia, and the eastern parts of Brandenburg and Pomerania (Hinterpommern), which were annexed by Poland and the Soviet Union.
During World War II, expulsions were initiated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland. The Germans deported 2.478 million Polish citizens from the Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany, [30] murdered 1.8 to 2.77 million ethnic Poles, [31] another 2.7 to 3 million Polish Jews and resettled 1.3 million ethnic Germans in their place. [32]
The siege of Warsaw in 1939 was fought between the Polish Warsaw Army (Polish: Armia Warszawska, Armia Warszawa) garrisoned and entrenched in Warsaw and the invading German Army. [ 1 ] : 70–78 It began with huge aerial bombardments initiated by the Luftwaffe starting on September 1, 1939 following the German invasion of Poland .
Polish Matczak family among Poles expelled in 1939 from Sieradz in central Poland. The Expulsion of Poles by Nazi Germany during World War II was a massive operation consisting of the forced resettlement of over 1.7 million Poles from the territories of German-occupied Poland, with the aim of their Germanization (see Lebensraum) between 1939 and 1944.
Polish forces assaulted the railway station (defended by a German armored train Panzerzug 72A, which was destroyed on 16 March), pharmaceutics factory and the horse riding arena. On 17 March the Germans abandoned most of the defensive lines, leaving only a small number of troops to cover their retreat, and started to evacuate their main body of ...
The Invasion of Poland, [e] also known as the September Campaign, [f] Polish Campaign, [g] and Polish Defensive War of 1939 [h] [13] (1 September – 6 October 1939), was a joint attack on the Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany, the Slovak Republic, and the Soviet Union, which marked the beginning of World War II. [14]
The history of Poland from 1939 to 1945 encompasses primarily the period from the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union to the end of World War II.Following the German–Soviet non-aggression pact, Poland was invaded by Nazi Germany on 1 September 1939 and by the Soviet Union on 17 September.
In all, about three million Poles died as a result of the German occupation, more than 10% of the pre-war population. When this is added to the three million Polish Jews who were killed as a matter of policy by the Germans, Poland lost about 22% of its population, the highest proportion of any European country in World War II. [111] [112]