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On Sept. 1, 1939, 70 years ago, the German Army crossed the Polish frontier. On Sept. 3, Britain declared war.
Six years later, 50 million Christians and Jews had perished. Britain was broken and bankrupt, Germany a smoldering ruin. Europe had served as the site of the most murderous combat known to man, and civilians had suffered worse horrors than the soldiers.
By May 1945, Red Army hordes occupied all the great capitals of Central Europe: Vienna, Prague, Budapest, Berlin. A hundred million Christians were under the heel of the most barbarous tyranny in history: the Bolshevik regime...
Did Hitler Want War?
Hitler and Stalin both knew that a clash in the east was inevitable. Seizing the opportunity of the outbreak of hostilities in 1939 to push their frontiers outward in anticipation represented an acceptance of the political reality. Hitler didn't want a war with England and France, whom he saw as natural allies against the Asiatic/Bolshevik threat to Europe--backed, ideally, by the strength of the US from across the ocean. Ironically, this was precisely the state of affairs that came about a decade later in the form of NATO.
As to why he moved against Poland when he did, those...