r/todayilearned • u/leafpool2014 • 1d ago
TIL that in WW2, Poland declared war on Japan. Japan rejected there declaration of war. Quote: “We do not accept Poland’s challenge. The Poles, fighting for their freedom, only declared war on us under pressure from the United Kingdom.”A curious case: Poland only declared war on one country in WWII;
https://www.outono.net/elentir/2021/03/21/a-curious-case-poland-only-declared-war-on-one-country-in-wwii-peace-did-not-come-until-1957/1.0k
u/Captain-Griffen 1d ago
Note that it was in 1941, by a government that had zero control over Polish territory.
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u/firelock_ny 1d ago
Didn't Poland declaring war on Japan give legal protections to members of Free Polish military units?
Not that WW2 Japan paid much attention to laws of war...
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u/Dreferex 1d ago
To be completely fair, they would have probably been the most acceptable choice to be captured for the members of Polish forces. Which is a really weird statement to proclaim about Japan in WWII but fuck it.
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u/firelock_ny 1d ago
I'd think the Italians would be better captors, going by the example of how the Japanese treated Dutch, French and other European prisoners of war.
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u/OwlMuted885 1d ago
Maybe, but Japan and Poland had very good relations before the war.
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u/k-tax 1d ago
Did they? Honest question, I have no idea and I find it doubtful, to say the least, as Poland had only 20 years of sovereignty before WWII. On the other hand, probably both Poland and Japan had to deal with having Russia as their neighbour, so a common enemy could unite those two countries.
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u/Nowa_Korbeja 1d ago
They did. The most important man in inter-war Poland, Józef Piłsudski, was financed by Japan in years 1904-1905 (Piłsudski's political party was fighting to overthrow Tzarist Russia).
Piłsudski has been to Japan and ate sushi (or sth like that) ;)Independent Poland had good relations with Japan as both countries were afraid of Russia/USSR.
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u/Dreferex 1d ago
Oh, yes, but they would have to admitt to being at war to treat them as POWs, and I doubt that they would want to endanger their inteligence cooperation.Then again, what would the Poles be doing in pacific is anyones guess.
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u/Rauliki0 1d ago
There was one polish pilot Witold Urbanowicz that fought in China with Japanese pilots. Hw wvwn acore two kills (or more, but 2 are confirmed).
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u/MandolinMagi 22h ago
Did Polish troops ever fight in the Pacific? I can't remember hearing of any.
Not that Japan respected the rules of war or POW treatment.
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u/Tortoveno 14h ago
If in the Pacific you mean 1905 Tsushima battle (on the Russian side), then yes, they did.
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u/Wloak 14h ago
They did. The Allies operated much more like NATO with people supporting both efforts in the best way they could.
Before entering the war the US let fighter pilots resign on condition of joining the RAF, by the end everyone in Europe was taking orders from an American general, the Polish fought under the command of many different units on both the East and West front. In the Pacific from what I recall they sent troops through Canada and the US, but also ships to support the British Navy, the challenge was it took a long time to get ships into the Pacific.
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u/Arturius1 1d ago
None of that mattered. The reason for Japan refusing Polish declaration of war was because the countries intelligence networks still heavily collaborated when it came to gathering and exchanging intelligence on the soviets. Japan wasn't going to throw away long established successful partnership against their common enemy that easily.
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u/Galaxy661 1d ago
The Polish Underground State did have some control in german-occupied Poland, organising, among others, underground education, courts, black markets and armed resistance
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u/iamstupidsomuch 1d ago
still, they weren't in any state to engage in international relations
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u/Galaxy661 1d ago
Their supervisors in the Exile Government in London were very much in a state to engage in international relations
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u/iamstupidsomuch 1d ago
yes, but unlike the London government, the PPP was never recognised as legitimate by any country
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u/ThomYorkesDroopyEye 20h ago
A friend in highschool tried to breakup with his GF, she said "No, I don't want to". He didn't know you could do that, and didn't know how to react so stayed with her for another 2 weeks.
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u/Laam999 13h ago
Early 2000s BBC sitcom called Coupling has this as the premise of the first episode. It's a GREAT show, give it a try.
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u/Dash2in1 11h ago
Coupling is great indeed.
Fwiw Seinfeld also had this as a premise, where George tried to break up with his girlfriend and she refuses. To solve this he started dating another woman, which then leads to the situation of them both not willing to break up.
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u/Available-Road131 1h ago
I did that with a girl I was dating after a month. Later she became my ex wife
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u/Keyboardpaladin 1d ago
Did they take offense to a response like that?
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u/77skull 1d ago
Actually Poland and Japan were kinda allies and the bit about Poland only declaring war on Japan due to pressure from the allies was true. It was a symbolic declaration and Japan turning it down was a show of good will towards Poland, it was the opposite of an insult
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u/leafpool2014 1d ago
I remember also reading after diving into this that a japanese author in the 1900s declared poland a honorary samurai state for how much they keep fighting for freedom/ coming back
1904 Polish translation of Bushido: The Soul of Japan, reads:
"I dedicate this book to the Polish nation, which I consider to be a nation of samurai."
"The concept of daimyo and samurai will reveal their true meaning to Polish readers when we compare them to the Polish kasztelan and starosta."
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u/Modred_the_Mystic 1d ago
The Haitians also had an honorific for the Poles/Poland
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u/Eymrich 1d ago
I wonder what sort of thing could unite two countries so different from each other. I wonder what's in between them that could trigger it.
Surely is not like they have the same shitty neighbour 😒
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u/TacTurtle 1d ago
They both viewed themselves as plucky underdogs trying to wrestle their own independent empires free from undue outside influence from the great imperialist nations of the time (mainly Britain, Russia, and to a lesser extent America).
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u/Redwardon 1d ago
They both spent a thousand years fighting off Mongols.
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u/Eymrich 1d ago
Right... "Mongols" lol
Japan fought then twice in like 20 years and that was it. Polan was invaded like 3 times but it was ancient history by that time. I was pointing out something more actual and more obvious, something they has issues in the last few decades lol.
Also Mongols after the 1500 were just a distant memory, their empire was huge but vanished fast
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u/majko333 1d ago
Poland in the interwar period also helped to modernize japanese military and cryptography
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u/IHaveTheHighground58 1d ago
It was less about "being forced to by Allies", and more about the fact that Japan and Poland had a common "enemy" - USSR, and as such shared some intelligence, especially since the Japanese weren't particularly keen on helping Germany with that intelligence anyway, so no actual harm to Allied war effort
Turns out that the "Allies" from after operation Barbarossa were fairly fragmented as well, and often sabotaged one another, be it USSR sabotaging western allies, Poland being somewhat friendly to Japan, or Western allies appeasing Stalin the same way they did Hitler
Still not to the same extent as the Axis, but far from "the whole world united against evil" rhetoric some people seem to believe
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u/Sylvanussr 1d ago
I’m surprised that Japan’s alliance with Germany didn’t jeopardize that. Although they were both enemies of the USSR/Russia, which I’m guessing is the origin of the camaraderie (no pun intended)?
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u/Conscious-Ball8373 1d ago
The alliance between Japan and Germany was at best only there in theory. They were partly fighting the same enemies but that was it. In practice, probably the only reason they didn't also fight each other is geography. Japan had signed a neutrality pact with Russia in 1941 and stuck to it until the very few last weeks of the war. There was zero strategic coordination - the Molotov-Ribentrop pact, Operation Barbarossa and the attack on Pearl Harbour were all done without informing the other party in advance. Both sides considered the other racially inferior.
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u/Own_Bee_4268 1d ago
Racist societies don't often consider others to be racially superior
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u/Conscious-Ball8373 1d ago
Very true.
Hitler did declare the Japanese "honorary aryans" but that was just diplomatic language for "you're not as good as us but we'll let you tag along."
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u/fizzlefist 1d ago edited 1d ago
“Honorary in-group” is just fascism for “we’ll get to you later”
See also: the Association of German National Jews who supported Hitler.
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u/Sylvanussr 1d ago
That seems less of a “we’ll get you later” example and more of a “the leopards won’t eat my face!” moment.
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u/brionneverysexy 1d ago
My understanding is Germany had a vision that allowed non German people they that were good enough to have sphere of influences. Japan and India were two they thought would be good in their regions. I am not sure what their plan for Africa would be. Ideally the US controls the Americas as a German ally. They just never got India and America on board with the plan
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u/Imaginary-Group1414 1d ago
While Japan provided support to the Polish resistance through a secret organization, Germany—under the framework of "Sino-German cooperation"—was assisting in the modernization of the Chinese Kuomintang. Ultimately, the Tripartite Pact between Japan, Germany, and Italy was nothing more than a farce.
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u/Oddisredit 22h ago
Yeah I think until the battle of Shanghai the republicans forced of China were German trained and equipped. It’s pretty wild seeing Chinese soldiers in WWi German uniforms
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u/Nieznajomy6 1d ago
Read about Poland-Hungary relations in WWII. Even tho hungarians were in Axis, they didn't let germans use their railroads for attack on Poland, even saying that they will blow them up if german troops wouldn't listen. At the Warsaw uprising hungarians refused to fight with poles and even got them some weapons. We were enemies at paper, but brotherhood between our countries is stronger than wars
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u/The_Minshow 1d ago
Their 'alliance' was just a defensive pact against the US. Japan wasn't thrilled about Germany and Russia ending Poland, but not much they could do.
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u/oby100 23h ago
Japan and Germany were not allies. This gets muddled in revisionist history because the US and Western allies fought them both at the same time and the US came to war with both on nearly the same day.
Japan and Germany DID make moves to become allies, jointly signing the anti comintern pact that was explicitly a defensive agreement specifically against communist Russia as both had reasons to worry about future military aggression from Russia.
This fell apart when Germany signed a non aggression pact with Russia. It signaled to Japan that Germany was not interested in forming a real alliance, so they signed their own non aggression pact with Russia after getting decidedly near the hell up, somewhat ironically mere weeks before Operation Barbarossa kicked off.
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u/Keranan37 1d ago
You are right about the second part. Poland and Japan became decent allies because they were both working against the soviets. It was mostly an intelligence agency cooperation though.
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u/Piotral_2 1d ago
To be fair against Hitler's wishes Japan still had Polish embassy after 1939 didn't fully accepting that Poland was conquered. They only liquidated the embassy after Hitler pushed them to in 1941 shortly before Poland declared war against them.
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u/leafpool2014 1d ago
Poland and Japan have a long history of good relations
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japan%E2%80%93Poland_relations
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u/leafpool2014 1d ago
I mean it explains more in the article but Poland and Japan collaborated alot during the war in espionage. The japanese were furious over the German Russian invasion of poland and there prime minister resigned in disgrace
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u/Lord0fHats 1d ago edited 1d ago
Nobuyuki Abe* did not resign because of the invasion of Poland. Abe's government collapsed because he sought a diplomatic resolution to the Sino-Japanese War and to restrain the runaway budgets of the Army and Navy. Failing this, he had no support from the military and his lack of results/ongoing gridlock in negotiations with the US led to him resigning his position in January 1940.
(yes he is distantly related to that other Abe you probably know about)7
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u/oby100 23h ago
Not true at all. Japan and Poland were definitely not THAT close and Japan did not care all that much what Germany was doing, besides the fact they seized the opportunity to attack European colonies while they were busy with Germany.
Imperial Japan was an expansionist empire. Their goals were conquering and securing resources. What DID happen is days before Germany invaded Poland, the Nazi Soviet non aggression pact was signed, prime minister of Japan Kiichito resigned in disgrace and called the situation in Europe “complicated and bizarre”.
He resigned because all of his diplomatic assumptions of Europe, including an increasingly united front against the Soviet Union that Japan wanted to join in fully, were utterly shattered when Germany signed that deal.
This moment doesn’t get enough focus. Absolutely no one predicted the staunchly anti communist Hitler would sign such a deal with Stalin. Utterly shocked the whole world just before Poland was invaded.
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u/leafpool2014 22h ago
I think you should do more research into japanese polish relations during ww2, they collaborated alot during the war on espionage
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u/wojtekpolska 1d ago
no, poland and japan were allies even during ww2 due to the shared hatered of the USSR
Japan smuggled Polish spies into siberia trough Japanese-owned Manchuria, and Poland provided Japan access to radio listening stations on Polish soil to spy on russia together, and both exchanged intelligence data together.
japan also famously rescued polish children deported to siberia by transporting them from vladivostok to japan on japanese ships
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u/cheese0muncher 1d ago
If someone declares war on you, just say 'no' there is nothing they can legally do about it.
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u/leafpool2014 1d ago
Yes that is sad, kinda sad that even to this day taiwan and korea cant have peace. Someone is allways harassing them
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u/ravens-n-roses 23h ago
The Koreas are fine. While still technically at war they aren't changing anything any time soon.
The north isn't strong enough to take on south Korea and all it's allies, and the war to break the power in the north would be devastating to the people we'd be trying to liberate. They would not thank us for bringing war to their towns.
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u/leafpool2014 23h ago
I mean they are two economic political extremes so define fine, tho i rather live in south korea obviously it isn't doing well either
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u/leafpool2014 1d ago
Had to find a different source because apparently the first one wasn't valid. Hopefully this one is valid
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u/revuestarlight99 1d ago
At the time, Poland and Japan had quite good relations. Poland was among the first to recognize the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo and opposed describing Japan’s actions in China as “aggression.” As a result, the Chinese government at the time leaned more towards Germany. When Poland was destroyed by Nazis, everyone was delighted.
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u/AIAWC 1d ago
When Poland was destroyed by Nazis, everyone was delighted.
Very mentally sane thing to say
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u/revuestarlight99 1d ago
Alright, let me rephrase that. When Poland was destroyed by the Nazis, any Chinese person who was determined to fight Japan would have been glad to see the collapse of the Polish government at the time. When the League of Nations discussed the Sino Japanese conflict after the Nanjing Massacre, Poland firmly opposed a proposal to aid China. In the vote, only Poland and Peru failed to vote in favor.
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u/DheeradjS 1d ago
If you are fighting a war and the country supporting your enemy gets dismantled themselves, you'd probably celebrate a bit.
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u/Exotic-Half8307 1d ago
Important to note that the scale of the holocaust was brought to light only at the end of the war, for a lot of people Poland was an dictatorship allied to Japan at the time
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u/oby100 23h ago
We really need to remind ourselves that much of Europe was authoritarian at that time. Basically all of eastern and Central Europe. Fascism is justifiably vilified, but leadership in Poland, Hungary and Lithuania (and many more) were not friendly democracies but equally nationalistic and Sabre rattling in their hatred for “lost territory” post WWI.
I like to bring up the fun fact that in about a single year, Lithuania was given THREE ultimatums from three different much more powerful states. First from Poland, then Nazi Germany, and then the Soviets whose demands would (and did) obviously lead to Lithuania’s loss of independence.
It’s a bit grimly humorous to imagine the Lithuanian government just receiving these horrifying demand letters one after another, just getting progressively worse as the signatories of agreements guaranteeing your sovereignty leave you in read.
“Heyo! France! Italy! Japan! Germanys threatening to invade me unless I give up extremely valuable territory! Can yall like help out or something? You signed that thing, remember?”
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u/Nattekat 1d ago
This is something that always disappoints me when reading reactions on those interesting subjects. People severely underestimating the power of hindsight. Poland was pretty much like Belarus right now.
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u/malinoski554 1d ago
In what way?
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u/Nattekat 1d ago
A better question would be in what way they weren't. Then the answer is alignment with Russia.
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u/Dizzy-Cartoonist3011 1d ago
Poland was absolutely not aligned with the USSR in the interwar period.
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u/crowieforlife 23h ago
Polish-Soviet war ended just 10 years before WWII.
Granted, Poland at the time was an authoritarian dictatorship, which had a conflict with every single one of its neighbors, so it wouldn't be a surprise for it to have a bad rep. The only surprise is that that the bad rep is something completely inaccurate rather than the things it actually did wrong.
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u/TimeCake233 13h ago
I wouldn't say that. Polish dictatorship lead by Marshal Piułsudzki was quiet good for economy. The country was hit by NY's crash but not as bad as it's neibhours. Also they were no mass killings of Polish population by the government. What they did was wars and striping some of rights. They arrested Far right and (less of) far left leaders but all left the prison after the elections. Polonisation wasn't that bad rules of it are just slightly more restrictive than now (example 40 students to form a German or Ukrainan class). Piułsudzki was a well educated socialist and democrat at heart that's why the presidential elections were free same with 1922 election (2 years after Piułsudzki took power). The economy was better than for 4 years of previous rule that's why pro dictatorship coalitions won. The government before Piułsudzki famously did nothing and was anti Jewish, Dmowski famously couldn't shut up about Jews. Piułsudzki's ponit of view (later after most wars were over) was "If you are living in Poland you need to be loyal to Poland. He started attacking Ukraine minorities after they tried to kill him wich was straight up war declaration. German's were mad because he took thier land and gave it away (wich reviewed food industry and made market more competitive), Bolshevic's were mad because Lenin wanted Russian Empire lands for Bolshevic.
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u/crowieforlife 12h ago
No one cares how good it was for Poland. Nobody likes a nation, which starts coups and conflicts with all of its neighbors.
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u/iSailor 10h ago
China (ROC) at the time was allied with both Germany and USSR. USSR saw a strategic interest in creating a buffer state against Japan, so they helped KMT unify the country and funded them while also fueling with arms (e.g. Soviet were behind creation of ROC air force). Meanwhile Germans, mostly due to rare earth metals exports, helped form ground troops like the elite 33th, 87th and 88th divisions who were equipped with German gear and trained by Germans. Needless to say, Chiang Kai-shek sent both his sons to respective countries, with Wei-kuo being sent to Germany and having participated in attack on Czechoslovakia and Ching-kuo having studied in Moscow and married to Russian wife. And then soon after that China became allies to both of UK and US. So it's really a fascinating history of China being friends with everybody but Japan.
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u/bilus 1d ago
Do you have any sources for the recognition of Manchukuo by Poland? For example: https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1934v03/d162
This list doesn't contain Poland either: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_relations_of_Manchukuo
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u/Piotrrrrr 1d ago
Before Poland regained independence as a result of WWI, the part of its population under Russian occupation was forcibly drafted to fight the Russo-Japanese war in 1904. The choice of dying in a war at the other end of the world for your occupant, versus dying in Poland fighting for independence, is viewed as one of main factors driving Polish revolution of 1904-1908 where ordinary people fought occupying military on the streets. Iirc, Japan learning that Poles would rather fight their enemy than obey and fight Japan, was the start of friendly relations between both countries
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u/Diacetyl-Morphin 1d ago
Reminds me how Switzerland rejected the declaration of war by the Bavarian Soviet Republic. This country was a short-lived communist republic in the aftermath of WW1 in 1918-1919.
They wanted support from Switzerland, like loks and trains, but didn't get it, so the foreign minister just declared war. The reply from the Swiss was "You are drunk, go home!". Because the Republic had not even an army that would have been capable of fighting a war.
Germany needed only 20'000 soldiers to defeat the Republic, in the fightings (606 people were killed overall). For comparison with the Swiss Army, the Swiss had 230'000 soldiers ready at the end of WW1.
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u/Heliomawr 1d ago
germany did not use 20000 soldiers. They used 20000 paramilitaries to brutally crush a workers uprising.
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u/helloimpaulo 1d ago
Yeah weird how people whitewash massacres
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u/Heliomawr 1d ago
it was a communist uprising so no surprises there, many from the west would rather side with nazi precursors than a workers revolution.
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u/Zisthebest1235 1d ago
Yeah because no communist revolution ever resulted in the deaths of innocents🤦♂️
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u/Diacetyl-Morphin 1d ago
About the KPD in Germany, they were not really much different from the NSDAP. It's not that well known like the failed Hitler Putsch to seize power there, but in the same year 1923, the KPD tried to seize power themselves.
In fact, both worked together sometimes, like in the parliament of the Weimar Republic (Germany 1918-1933) to destroy democracy.
Just like it is today in 2026 in Germany: In Sachsen-Anhalt, the far-right AfD nazi party won the elections in this state, but they have no partner for a coalition to form a governement. Who is there to support them with the 4 votes they need to still be able to govern? Right, it's the far-left BSW communist party.
These two extremes of the political spectrum were always like "the enemy of my enemy is my friend". That also goes for WW2, like the pact between NS-Germany and Soviet Union to split Poland in 1939.
When there's a common enemy and goal, they work together, but once that is done, they turn on each other.
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u/Skyavanger 1d ago
The kpd of 1919 and later years were completely different. And no, even thälmanns kpd was nowhere near the nsdap. You Are severely downplaying the nazis.
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u/Diacetyl-Morphin 1d ago
I need to check the sources again but i think you are right, it was a Freikorps. Although, most members of these were former soldiers of WW1, not militia guys without proper training, as veterans they could be quite effective with the needed equipment and support.
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u/Doctor_Loggins 1d ago
I've heard of refused flanks, but I've never heard of refused declaration of war.
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u/orange_sewer_grating 1d ago
Haha yeah, it actually makes sense though. WWII had some weird mashups of which countries were sharing enemies. Japan and Germany did have good relations, but they were allies mostly because they were both against the West (mainly Europe, until America got involved). Arguably, Japan screwed Germany because Japan needed to involve America due to America's support of European colonies in Asia, but Germany had no fight with America and was hoping it would stay out of the war.
Meanwhile, Japan's biggest traditional enemy at that point was Russia, who the Nazi also went to war with, but so did Eastern European countries like Poland and Finland - who were also enemies of Germany (sort of, sometimes for real and sometimes on paper depending on which country we're looking at).
Japan and Poland had nothing to do with each other, and Poland wasn't even a dangerous threat for Germany, and they shared their biggest enemy, so there's no real reason for them to declare war against each other except that they were each allied with other countries who were at war.
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u/Nothos927 1d ago
Realistically the US would’ve entered the war against Germany one way or another. They were already de facto at war in the Atlantic by the time of Pearl Harbour, and leaving aside all the high minded ideals of democracy and human rights, a largely self-sufficient German Reich stretching from the Atlantic to the Urals would have been disastrous to the US’ economy.
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u/achtungbitte 1d ago
those high minded ideals of democracy and human rights only stretched so far as to western europe.
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u/orange_sewer_grating 1d ago
Parts of the US wanted to, but there was a large push against it. At the time of Pearl Harbor, FDR didn't have the political backing to join. The US was supporting Europe, but there were limits to that and Germany certainly wasn't going to force us into the war.
I'm not a huge expert so maybe I'm just wrong and it it's probably we would've joined anyway, but I didn't think that was the consensus
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u/Seienchin88 1d ago
That’s not really correct. A slight majority of the public became pro war before Pearl harbor. The German attack on the Soviet Union pushed the pro war faction immensely.
That being said - it’s a pity that the story "America was suddenly attacked“ sounds so much better than what really happened - the U.S. embargoed the resource Japan would starve to death without (oil), didn’t even attempt to negotiate with Japan, stationed long range bombers on the Philippines threatening Japan’s shipping even further, guaranteed the independence of European colonies (which had the only other oil available), started the biggest fleet building program ever (before Pearl Harbor!), had started lend lease to supply Britain with near endless supplies and engaged German uboats in the Atlantic in an act that was basically war but Hitler didn’t want to escalate it. The Americans also had cracked the Japanese naval code and knew that the combined fleet went radio silent before Pearl Harbor indicating a major attack somewhere.
Or in short - Roosevelt’s government very cleverly did everything in their power to provoke the axis to declare war on the U.S. and use the momentum for war to stop the evil Axis empires. I doubt anyone expects Pearl Harbor but it was almost a present compared to if Japan had just attacked the Philippines or tried taking Indochina despite American threaten. But anyhow, Roosevelt deserves credit for bringing America into the war.
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u/Mr_Placeholder_ 1d ago
Tbf that’s all also an extremely reasonable response to a belligerent foreign power that is actively committing war crimes and also potentially has you on their hit list
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u/orange_sewer_grating 1d ago
I agree with you, but I also think what you said is agreeing with me. Or at least, it's not against anything I said because I believe everything you just said along with what I said.
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u/Nano_needle 1d ago
Japan and Poland had nothing to do with each other
That isn't true as Japan and Poland were sharing intelligence on Russia with Polish code breakers training the Japanese ones in this art. Japanese also rescued some Polish children from the Soviets.
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u/orange_sewer_grating 1d ago
Fair point. I guess it would be more accurate that they had nothing to do with fighting each other despite being on opposite sides of the war. But they did cooperate against Russia. Which is basically what I was saying but I phrased that part wrong so good call-out
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u/Nerevarine91 1d ago
Hungary and Romania being on the same side despite being extremely hostile to each other is another example.
And, speaking of Romania in WWII, I believe it was Antonescu who declared that he supported Germany against the USSR, considered himself neutral in the war between Germany and the UK, and supported the USA against Japan.
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u/orange_sewer_grating 1d ago
Yeah, the smaller states stuck between Nazi Germany and Russia definitely ended up with some strange bedfellows
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u/DangerousCyclone 1d ago
Germany screwed itself because Hitler decided to declare war on America himself. FDR was trying to figure out how to extend the proclamation to Germany but the Germans did it for him. The Japanese didn't ask the Germans to do so either so it was one of the worst mistakes made in the war for seemingly little reason.
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u/ilikedota5 1 1d ago edited 54m ago
Arguably, Japan screwed Germany because Japan needed to involve America due to America's support of European colonies in Asia, but Germany had no fight with America and was hoping it would stay out of the war.
That was Hitler actually. The Tripartite Pact didn't require Hitler to declare war, but he interpreted it broadly. Hitler's logic was, America had been officially neutral, but this has been a farce, supplying the UK with weapons, materiel, intelligence (Atlantic sub locations). We are bound to go to war eventually, lets just skip the pretenses. Hitler actually was right that the USA was de facto in the war, so declaring war just recognizes that reality and allows them to be hit.
But that was arguably a mistake, even presupposing that the USA and Germany would have went to war eventually, because FDR, simultaneously, wanted to support the Allies to the point of officially joining in. But domestically, people weren't in favor of joining the war. There was still a strong isolationist current, even though it wasn't an outright majority per se, non-interventionism was still seen as prudent. Much of FDR's balancing act was supporting the allies without officially getting involved as a belligerent. See Japan attacked, not Germany. So then, if FDR sent troops to Europe to fight the Nazis that would be awkward, particularly because Europe and Asia were basically entirely separate wars up until the USA entered. But Germany declaring war gave FDR an easy out for sending troops to Europe. We are at war with two countries, therefore we are sending troops to do battle with both. The fiction did serve a purpose of preventing more weight from being brought on Germany.
At this point, Japan's main enemy wasn't the USSR/Russia. The reason being that Japan fought two battles. Khalkhin Gol and Mukden. They learned that fighting the USSR/Russia was a bad idea because it just stretched Japan's supply lines. "They" really doesn't mean Japan, but the Imperial Japanese Army in particular. Oversimplifying here, there were a few factions/plans/ideologies, the Imperial Japanese Navy wanted to go South and attack the European empire's colonies. And because the IJA got their teeth kicked in, the IJN was ascendent. Prior to this, Japan had already attacked China, and taken much of China, but was struggling in the interior because logistics, and they were already bogged down. So China was somewhat put on the back-burner, at least for the IJN.
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u/Kayteqq 1d ago edited 1d ago
Actually it’s not even that Poland and Japanese had nothing to do with each other. They cooperated against russia, shared intel and weirdly respected each other. Heck, poland was the only country mentioned in so called „modern bushido” (bushido: the soul of japan by Inazō Nitobe) as „our honorable brothers living alongside the Vistula river” and explicitly called „samurai nation” while it didn’t even exist on the map! (Pre ww1). WW2 is messy as fuck man
Poland is also weird. Like, we’re collecting weird associations like infinity stones. For example, we „officially” have an n-word pass as the Haitian government officially gave polish the title of „white n-os of europe”, we’re also apparently samurai nation and we’re for some reason deeply respected on madagascar. Like it’s so random (though I do understand reasons behind it - poles after losing our homeland got involved in a lot of global affairs).
Also, there’s a non-zero chance that American flag was partially inspired by coat of arms of Ziemia Sandomierska, most likely due to Tadeusz Kościuszko influence. Ah, and when we’re at the topic of Kościuszko, the highest mountain in Australia is named after ours (and not only ours) national hero
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u/SprinklesOfAcid25 1d ago
And if we move to a more modern (post-communist) times, Tadeusz Mazowiecki has one statue in the capitol of Bosnia.
Actually you got bunch of poles with statues or streets named after them in Bosnia, although locals sometimes assume they are Germans - in case of Leopold Glück.
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u/klingma 17h ago
Germany absolutely had a fight with America, the fact Germany explored building a bomber capable of crossing the Atlantic Ocean is evidence of their intent.
Germany was not happy America was trading with Britain while they were fighting each other in Europe. However, Germany was under no obligation to declare war on America after Japan's attack and America's declaration of war...that was a willing and voluntary decision for Germany.
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u/denimbabe 1d ago
Imagine declaring war on someone and they just say no thanks and go back to their day.
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u/Ireallydfk 1d ago
Imperial Japan was too busy slaughtering innocent Chinese citizens to deal with that
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u/skinnyminnesota 1d ago
*their
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u/skinnyminnesota 1d ago
"Japan rejected there[sic] declaration of war" is how the title shows up for me. So to answer your question: No.
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u/Available-Road131 1d ago
this is very honorable. It's just sounds very respectful to poland especially if they declared war on them
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u/Conscious-Ball8373 1d ago
Polish has not been a great nationality to be over the centuries. Forever stuck between Russia and the Habsburgs. They've kind of taken friends where they could get them. The Polish government-in-exile, operating out of London, decided they were better served by buttering up the British than by buttering up Japan. Both sides of WWII carved up Poland as it suited them (if you count the USSR as being on the allies side, of course).
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u/jakelesiuk 1d ago
“Poland, I just wanted you to know you can’t just say the word ‘War’ and expect anything to happen“
“I didn’t say it, I declared it”
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u/leafpool2014 1d ago
So i find it funny that after america, the second largest viewer of this post is poland at around 8.5%
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u/bcoder001 1d ago
It was the diplomatic version of "bitch, please..."
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u/tehwagn3r 1d ago
It's obvious why one would think so, but no. Poland and Japan actually had good relations, it was more a "No thanks, I know you don't really mean it."
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u/greysqualll 21h ago
Ok, I was really confused (about why not Germany) until I read this section:
The most curious thing about the Polish case is that Poland only formally declared war on one country during World War II, and it did not go to Germany, the USSR or its allies, which had previously invaded (in case of invasion, the declaration of war is an unnecessary formality)
So in practice, war had already been declared against Germany and the USSR.
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u/GoodTato 9h ago
Like when the ai declares war on you in Civ V and you KNOW you'll never see their units for the entire war since they've got their own problems
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u/Pomeetorek 17h ago
Them Germans and Russians were not cool but we have had it with those aholes on the other side of the globe. War it is.
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u/camino_2022 10h ago
By the way, the war between Poland and Japan lasted 16 years, they sorted it out in 1957 by signing all the official documents.
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u/Tortoveno 15h ago
The Japanese knew they can try China, that they can try the US but they knew they have no chance with Poland :)
Greetings from Poland, Japanese friends!
BTW. Even after this Polish intelligence worked with Japanese intelligence (against the USSR)
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u/Proud-Sample5703 1d ago
imagine finally declaring war on someone and getting back a polite "no thanks, we know you didn't mean it"